When you have pain for years, there is something magical about taking steps in the right direction towards getting rid of that pain.

I have had pain in my right knee for five years now. It's all a really long story of being told that I have tendonitis in my ankles and being sent in a circle of different doctors and specialists at the children's hospital, as well as trying to use physical therapy as a tool to rid of the pain.

Nothing was helping, so I took a break from things for a year or two. The pain started to become more often. I saw an orthopedist and he gave me a prescription for a brace to keep my patella in place. Once it got to every day pain, we looked into what surgery could help rid of my pain.

X-rays and MRIs were ordered and nothing looked wrong except for a very small amount of fluid in my knee, but my doctor told me, "This is causing you pain and that is not okay." We started the process for scheduling an arthroscopic surgery.

While in surgery, my doctor found plica. It is embryotic tissue that forms between four and five months of you being in your mother's womb. Usually it transforms into regular adult tissue, but in 20% of the population it does not and even then it does not bother everyone who has it later in their lifetime. In my case, it had formed into a thick band that was rubbing between bones. The doctor took that and the other plica out and repaired any cartilage that was missing and not in the right place. Plica is something that is not able to be seen in an MRI or on an X-ray; it is only able to be seen while in surgery. So it's no wonder my knee hurt so much!

I had surgery in the middle of August, two weeks before going back to school six hours away from my home. I did not have time for physical therapy and my insurance can't approve PT out of the area, so I just did some stretches and kept my knee moving and working to get it to recover from surgery.

I still had some pain, which is not normal. I was able to go to a few physical therapy sessions while I was home for winter break, in which my therapist concluded that what was operated on is good to go but all of the muscles around my knee are underdeveloped, which is causing my knee to be pulled in all sorts of ways and cause me pain. For this, I have been wearing Superfeet orthotic insoles to stabilize my foot and lower leg, as well as doing exercises to strengthen my hip and using a foam roller to get my IT band loose and comfortable.

Since the PT, I have been extremely encouraged and confident in the fact that my leg will eventually feel better and be free of pain. In the meantime, I am trying to not psych myself out and tell myself that I can't do something because it will hurt my knee.

This is why I went hiking in Yosemite this weekend. We had a long weekend for Martin Luther King Jr. Day and took advantage of it. I invited a group of fellow students to my house and we went to Yosemite for a day or two. We spent the days hiking and enjoying the snow and God's beautiful creation.

Having had surgery not even five months ago, I was a little weary to do so much hiking, especially in the snow. My mind is telling me that I am going to slip and fall and hit my knee and hurt it all over again, but at the same time I don't want to be afraid of getting back out into nature and doing something that I love so much.

Here's what I did:

I wasn't afraid to be at the back of the group.

I wasn't afraid to take my time.

I went a few places that were out of my new post-surgery hiking comfort zone.

I wasn't afraid to stand up for myself and my physical condition.

I didn't push myself too far, but I made sure that I wasn't being a party pooper.

My closest friends in the group asked me a few times throughout the day and on each hike how I was doing, which made me really think about how I was doing and if it was okay or not.

Overall, it was a wonderful experience and I am so glad that I went with it. Being the day after hiking, my legs are a bit sore and my knee is experiencing some pain, but it is nowhere near as bad as what I was expecting.

Yosemite is my happy place. I have been saying this for years. And I wouldn't have missed it for the world.