I recently pulled my psoas muscle.

I have never experienced such a painful injury.

I am a gymnastic trainer, and I was spotting a teenage girl on a roundoff back-handspring. The girl is usually very consistent in performing the maneuver. For some reason she went crooked, and I needed to lunge to catch her weight and guide her. I felt a slight pinch in my right leg but nothing overly serious. It wasn’t until several hours later that the pain began to set in. By the end of the night, it hurt to sit or stand. I couldn’t get comfortable. I was in such severe agony that I cried. I went to the doctor the following morning and got diagnosed. I had never even heard of the psoas muscle before. I normally exercise every morning for an hour. I often go for eight-mile runs. With this injury, I was unable to do any workout that involved using my legs. I was very limited and frustrated. I eventually started attempting to lightly jog, and that was a big mistake. I only prolonged my recovery time and caused myself further discomfort. I needed to ice my leg every night and found it just about impossible to sleep or go up and down stairs. It took me several months to be able to jump rope, squat or lunge. Even after nearly a year, I felt a tenderness in my leg that made me very cautious. I was worried about re-injuring myself every time with any type of high intensity aerobics. The injury was a problem both for my daily workout sessions as well as for my job.

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