Shoulder injury or not?

[Monx]

Hi all

Having re-started and run a novice LP for about 6 months now I have developed some sort of shoulder injury (I think..). Have been trying to train through and around it but pretty sure it is hampering progress. It is an ache in various areas of my left shoulder that sometimes is present in the back or down my upper arm. Sometimes it can be sharp but difficult to pinpoint where it is exactly.

No specific incident to speak of that caused it just kind of started hurting, I think the low bar position aggravates it most and although I am able to push through workouts after the squat it seems to be preventing larger weights being handled, particularly in the press, bench and clean. Some days it's worse than others and now is pretty constant and arises from daily activities such as lifting objects (especially overhead), opening doors and driving.

I have brought it up with the doctor twice now in the hope I could be steered in the direction of finding out whats wrong and fixing it but he just moved my arm through a couple of ranges of motion, informed me that the shoulder is a very complex structure and told me I'd be fine. No guidance or advice offered, he may as well have just patted me on the head.

This has got me wondering now whether it is actually injured or is just pains resultant from doing this sort of training? I am careful to pay attention to bar position in the squat and to warm it up and stretch into position but the pain always comes sooner or later.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated as I am getting nowhere with the doc and cant afford to go private. Is it just going to be a case of resting for a while and seeing what happens? I have taken a week off here and there but there seemed to be no significant improvement as I said daily activities cause it to hurt also :/

Many thanks

[Dag]

Shoulders can be tough to pinpoint. In my case, I can't say it hurts exactly HERE. Sometimes it hurts different places but mostly it seems to come from all over. The only advice I can offer is to be very careful. What you're describing may be nothing or it may be a warning that something bad is on the way.

Good luck!

[Monx]

Thanks for the response. Difficult to say where it is yep. I've only had a couple of workouts where it hasn't presented at all. Guess a layoff and deload would be better than getting injured.

Cheers

[MattBraunstein]

It kind of sounds like some sort of tendinitis. I haven't had this issue with my shoulder, but have with my elbow. It's something that comes on gradually and gets aggravated by something in the lift. Definitely try some NSAIDs to help calm it down. You may need to pay closer attention and try some setup modifications to try and pinpoint the cause. It sounds like it's coming from the squat, since that is what seems to aggravate it.

[Monx]

Hadn't thought of tendinitis, good point. Will give the anti-inflammatory's a go. Trained this evening and it wasn't too bad to be fair. I've started advanced-novice programming for the squat with the one PR set followed by two back-off sets, guessing the lower volume of high intensity may help it settle down. Just hoping the other lifts will start to catch up too

Thanks

[MattBraunstein]

You may try paying attention to form changes in you upper back/shoulders/elbows on your heavy vs light sets. Sometimes you can change positions, such as raising the elbows, in an effort to get the weight up. These positions could be causing the irritation, which is why it's not as bad when reducing the heavy set volume. If you read Bill Hannon's recent article on thoracic spinal flexion, this is what I'm talking about. It is the problem that causes my elbow tendonitis too. Not necessarily an easy problem to fix.

[Russbowen]

Realised today, as I perceive my squats to be getting heavy, that de-racking and walking back 1-2 steps that bar position has to be 100% correct and to be chest up and strong as if in the squat. On my 2nd set of 3 x 5 this dawned on me as I was too casual during this phase. Now I'm sore.

[Monx]

Yeah that article was up the day after my misses pointed out my upper back was looking a bit loose, have been paying more attention to keeping the chest up (without raising it).

Good shout about the walkout though, I'm trying to not take too many steps back after unracking or too much time before starting to squat.

So much to focus on for less than two minutes work!

Cheers all

[lou t]

I have a very long history with my left shoulder that resulted in a big surgery.

My shoulders had a hard time with LBBS, but over time I learned to stretch the shoulder capsule to increase the range. If you are not actively stretching your shoulder capsule, your condition will likely not improve long term.

Also, most guys have a miss proportionate strength in the rotator.

If it hasn't been mentioned already, ice the shit out it, advil, stretch, massage, warmup. If it persist, I would get a MRI, before your really fuck it up and end up like me, 5 months from surgery, PT. Still can't do any significant press, bench or shoulder work. Not yet at full range of motion. SUCKS but getting better.

[Monx]

How did you stretch your shoulder capsule? I have been doing the low bar position stretch at the beginning of and in-between empty bar warm up sets. Not sure how much difference it's making to the problem.

Sorry to hear of your injury, think I'm way off getting an MRI approval from my doc, he hasn't recommended anything for it as of yet. Will press him further if it persists as I cant afford to go private (UK resident), or maybe look for another doctor..

Thanks for your advice, hope your rehab is successful.