bucket handle tear

this is what was causing my knee so much trouble for the last few years. so outlined in blue is the portion of the medial meniscus (inside portion of the knee) of my left knee that kept jamming up the joint. normally the meniscus sits nice and flat and allows the femur and tibia to slide over each other nice and smoothly, the meniscus acting like a bowl for the femur to sit in so it doesn't move around. Well the lip of my bowl was torn and flipped back on itself, sitting inside the bowl. you can imagine that this doesn't allow the knee to work the way it should.

this kind of tear is called a bucket handle tear because it flips back and forth, sometimes sitting where it should, other times jamming the joint. in this picture it is flipped back. also in this picture the black, empty space is the notch between the two heads of the distal femur. in this notch are the ACL and PCL ligaments.