I get a lot of questions about knee pain and weak knees…

It reminds me of the old saying, “If I had a nickel for every time I heard about knee pain, I’d be a millionaire.”

Regardless, there is a high demand to discover how to support your knee joint when you are experiencing knee pain. Many people look for knee pads to take over.

But first, let’s take a look at the knee joint to see what gives it strength and stability to begin with. The main components of the body that hold the knee joint together are the ligaments. By definition, ligaments connect bone to bone. So, in the center of the knee are the 4 main ligaments that hold it together:

– ACL (Anterior Cruciate Ligament)
– PCL (Posterior Cruciate Ligament)
– LCL (Lateral Collateral Ligament)
– MCL (Medial Collateral Ligament)

It was explained to me by a Dr. friend of mine shortly after my knee surgery, Dr. Ralph Dobelbower,

“Dr. D,” as we affectionately called him, explained to me that the ACL is about the thickness of a #2 pencil and practically holds the knee together. He added that it’s amazing how something so thin is able to handle all the pressure from the rest of the body and keep the knee together.

Of course, when any of these ligaments are torn, it is nearly impossible to restore normal knee stability without surgery. However, there are many cases where these ligaments are not torn and the knee is still unstable. As a result, many people turn to knee braces to provide stability and support to the knee joint.

This is all very well in theory, however the reality that these braces do the same job as the knee ligaments is something quite different…

There are pros and cons with knee braces. All of this I experienced by trying out different types of knee braces in an attempt to figure out how to make my knee feel normal again.

The advantages are that they definitely keep your knees warm when the seasonal temperature is cold, and depending on some of the thicker neoprene knee pads, they can keep your knees especially warm on summer days. So much so that you will need a towel to hold the sweat produced. Depending on how snug the brace fits, this may prevent swelling while the brace is on; however, after removing the brace, it’s an incredible relief. There are also the larger metal-style braces, like the one at the top of this post, that hold the knee in a somewhat locked position and prevent it from overextending or twisting.

Then there are the downsides and one of the biggest downsides of all knee braces has to be…I didn’t want to wear them! I didn’t want to deal with the hassle of remembering to wear them to training, dealing with the smell because they ALL smell no matter how hard I tried to clean them, and then when I was working out. I was never totally sure that I would not injure my knee again. All of this added up to trying to figure out what the underlying cause of the knee instability is to begin with.

Which brings us back to the ligaments we talked about at the beginning of the article. Strengthening the ligaments in your knees is key to making sure your knee joint has the strength, stability, and support it needs so you never have to think about wearing a knee brace again.

Now, invariably, the following question arises: “But I heard that there is no way to strengthen the ligaments in my knee joint. My (fill in the blank) told me so.”

This has always led to more questions from me, “How do they know?” “Has yours (fill in the blank) ever had knee pain?” “Is the knee therapy you’ve been doing working?” “If so, why do you keep having knee problems?” “What other options has your (fill in the blank) given you other than ligaments cannot be strengthened?”

It reminds me of a quote from T. Harv Eker that says, “It is NOT what we know is the problem. It is what we know is NOT, that is the problem.”

Also, most of the time when you get close to strengthening your knee ligaments is when you stop the exercise.

Try this at home if you can…

Find a sturdy wall and put your back against it. Next, squat down with your back against the wall so your knees form a 90-degree angle. Now wait 30 seconds…

Most likely, before the second hand reached 30, his legs began to shake and he stopped exercising. This is key to understanding how to strengthen the ligaments in the knee joint. Do as many Google searches as you like, there is very little right now that teaches you how to strengthen your knee ligaments so you can ditch knee braces.

Ligaments are the body’s natural knee braces, the only ones that are right for you all you need to do is strengthen them properly.