Sharp elbow joint pain from pressing
I've had significant elbow pain in both elbows that started about 3-4 months ago and slowly got worse and worse. I've had golfer's elbow a few times before and this feels different. This feels almost like joint swelling or arthritic-type pain; rather than the tendon related issues with golfer's or tennis elbow that I've dealt with before.
I'm 41, 5'9", BW 230 lb., all-time PRs are: Bench - 315; Press - 220; DL - 425; SQT - 365; and, PC - 255. At the time the pain started I was doing SSOC. I had mentioned it in passing to my coach, but it was not really significant at the time. I had to end my SSOC subscription after April due to a reduction in hours at work and I could no longer afford the fee. Otherwise, a great program that I highly recommend to anyone who can afford it. I mention this only because my coach never had any issues with my bench press form (ok not quite never, but I only recall 1 or 2 minor queues over the 4 months I was doing SSOC for bench), so I don't think this is a result of a form issue. However, if I need to I'd be happy to film something.
The pain is at the tips of my elbow joints. It becomes aggravated with any pressing movements, but particularly heavy benches. It also hurts to extend my arm fully. When I do this, sometimes my elbow pops and there is sharp pain when this occurs, but it does seem to relieve some of the chronic pain afterwards. The elbow joint is tender to the touch or if I bump it into something, which can be extremely painful. After I lift, it slowly gets better.
I've tried ibuprofen. I've tried icing my elbows after workouts and periodically on rest days.
At first, it only bothered me on bench, but it started bothering me on press a few weeks later. At first, it was only my right elbow, but it started affecting my left as well and the pain is now almost identical in both. At the height of this, it was painful even to do unweighted push-ups or to sometimes to even push open stubborn doors, etc.
About 6 weeks ago, I hit a new workset PR on bench at 315x1x3. The pain was almost unbearable after each single. At this point, I decided I should take a break from all pressing movements. During this time the chronic pain all but went away and towards the end of it I had no pain interacting with my environment or doing push ups, etc.
So, last week I started bench pressing again and the pain has immediately returned, but to a lesser degree. I only pressed 215x5x2 for my second workout after a 6 week layoff and although the pain and duration of symptoms were much reduced, virtually all of the same symptoms were present just to a lesser degree.
I've been thinking about dropping the bench and just doing press only. Or, maybe trying to dumbbell press and see if that helps, but I don't have a lot of dumbbells and they are expensive. My fear of course is that now that I am back on LP after the layoff I'll just encounter the same increasing pain as the weight goes up.
Anyone ever dealt with anything like this or have any thoughts on what this might be or how to work around it? For a while, I was thinking it might just be arthritis or gout, but never heard of that just being in the elbows.
Thanks in advance for any advice.