ACL injury, Please advice?

AJ, I would ask your orthopedist the amount of the tear. If the tear is anywhere around 50% I would advice a surgical treatment. The reason for this is the ACL serves 2 purposes. The first is to keep the thigh bone, femur, in constant contact with the shin bone, tibia. In between the 2 bones sits cartilage and a set of meniscus. If the ACL is not capable of holding the bones together then there will be a bouncing of the femur on the tibia. This will destroy the meniscus and then the underlying cartilage on the tibia and the cartilage on the femur. This will cause an early arthritic condition to form. The other function that this ligament does is to prevent the femur from slipping forward on the tibia. So to have instability of this ligament is to allow the knee to slowly and prematurely deteriorate. If the tear is less than 40% there is a chance that it will heal on its own. That will require a lot of therapy but in the end it will be okay. Tears greater than that are just not stable. Good luck and hope that this is helpful.