Injury Question

[skinnyfatdude]

Months ago, I was benching and lost tightness on one of my last reps. I think my back rounded, and I felt a sharp pain on my mid-back, a few inches below my shoulder blade on my left side.

The pain only occurs if my form falters, no matter how slight. Any small mistake on my left side will cause it to hurt, which makes pushing for a PR really difficult.

My plan was to just continue on and try to keep perfect form, but every time I bench, I manage to make slight mistakes on a couple of reps and the pain comes back. I've reset several times, and I've taken up to a week off, but it's always there when I go back to bench.

This week, I made a mistake squatting, and even though my weight was on my heels, I believe I was leaning too far forward and my lower back rounded squatting 210. I felt fine at the time, but a couple of days later I started feeling pain in my mid-back, to the left of my spine, on the same side as my bench injury. It feels like a bruise near the spine. The pain is relatively minor, but consistent.

Now, the left side of my back is nagging me. I feel the "bruise" whenever I bend over with rounded back, hyper-extend, or put pressure on that spot. I also feel some general dull discomfort on my left side.

I don't feel pain when I lift, except on bench, as usual. But I definitely think these injuries are related and my back muscle problems are accumulating. What I'm not sure about is where to start - do I try the Starr method on bench? Just take a couple of weeks off? I'm really worried about the "bruise" - seems like it has the potential to turn into something serious.

Thanks for reading this far, and for taking the time to care about some random guy's problems on the internet.

[Mark Rippetoe]

What did your chiropractor say about this?

[skinnyfatdude]

I have an appointment to see an ortho, but he can't get me in til next week. Since I can pretty much do everything without pain except bench, and I'm worried that several weeks off is going to destroy my progress, I'm tempted to keep lifting and maybe just skip benching for a couple months.

Today I've been icing on/off every 20 minutes; tomorrow I'm supposed to squat (200), press (97.5), and DL (230) per my usual MWF schedule.

[Mark Rippetoe]

If you see an orthopedic surgeon before you see a chiropractor about this, you will be wasting somebody's money.

[skinnyfatdude]

My wife's employer gives her a large sum to spend on healthcare - basically a "spend it or lose it" type of deal in addition to our regular coverage. We're coming up on the end of the year, so I might as well a little of it to see somebody...

[Mark Rippetoe]

Well, okay.

[DTF]

So you're wasting your wife's employer's money... And that's OK because it's not yours?

[skinnyfatdude]

Yes. I am a terrible person. I pour full jugs of milk down the drain for personal amusement. Sometimes I steal money from others and light it on fire, just to watch it burn.

Back to the original post - ice/rest seem to be working. I'm pretty sure that my low back issue is caused by hyper-extension. I can tell that one is improving daily. I have no idea about the bench problem, since I can't feel that until I'm actually on the bench.