Thoughts on Shoulder Bursitis

[JFord]

My doctor said that my humerus was elevated by too strong delts and too tight back muscles (that can't do their job). Now I should roll around on a Lacross Ball to loosen my back, and stop pressing.

Interesting. I must be doing it wrong because my (MRI-proven) subacromial bursitis and partial thickness rotator cuff tear got better since overhead pressing. This despite a year of worsening pain, multiple failed injections, PT, and giving up surfing because I couldn't paddle. Now I've been surfing for the past couple of years and have to pause to recall which shoulder was the one affected.

Your doctor has me worried though. I might have to get a lacrosse ball.

[Pluripotent]

Look, guys... Clearly if your back musculature is overly contracted, then it's obvious that the resulting obfuscation of the humeral tuberosity will necessarily cause impingement of the superior head against the acromium fossa and if the subsequent subluxation is not subjected to rigorous trigger point compression for which the lacrosse ball is uniquely suited -- and likely invented for this purpose (the game of lacrosse only secondarily fabricated to help with marketing and availability of this indispensable instrument) then the unrelenting compression to which the shoulder structure will be subjected to will undoubtedly result in a cascading inflammatory process that -- if left unaddressed -- will leave you an unsightly cripple for whom all the accolades of modern medicine will be of no avail.

[Danny Yarbrough]

In what backward location do you live where ibuprofen is available by prescription? It's basically free in Texas at Walmart.

It's called Europe (specifically Austria).

But I just googled it. Turns out that tablets with 400mg of Ibuprofen are actually free to buy, while for tablets with 600mg Ibuprofen you need a prescription. Makes a lot of sense, since you can just take more of the smaller dosed tablets....
America, please don't become the bureaucracy shithole that Europe is.


@JFord: The doctor was mostly refering to bench presses. When I asked her about overhead, she first hesitated but then still advised against it.
Apart from OHP, have you done anything specific to deal with your bursitis?

@Pluripotent: I lol'd hard

[Will Morris]

It's called Europe (specifically Austria).

But I just googled it. Turns out that tablets with 400mg of Ibuprofen are actually free to buy, while for tablets with 600mg Ibuprofen you need a prescription. Makes a lot of sense, since you can just take more of the smaller dosed tablets....
America, please don't become the bureaucracy shithole that Europe is.


@JFord: The doctor was mostly refering to bench presses. When I asked her about overhead, she first hesitated but then still advised against it.
Apart from OHP, have you done anything specific to deal with your bursitis?

@Pluripotent: I lol'd hard

Deadlift. Heavy rows. Don't sit at your desk with your shoulders hunched forward.

[JFord]

@JFord: The doctor was mostly refering to bench presses. When I asked her about overhead, she first hesitated but then still advised against it.
Apart from OHP, have you done anything specific to deal with your bursitis?

Hi Philipp.

I had three corticosteroid injections (one subacromial bursal and two intraarticular all by an orthopod). I also had physical therapy. None helped. I suffered through it for a total of over a year, figured I'd have to give up surfing (which I did), and then came across SS. I found Paul Horn in LA and he was great. He walked me through the program although I'd already read part of the book. I just didn't feel comfortable starting the lifts purely from the descriptions. I told him about my reticence to do squats (lateral meniscus tear post surgery but that's another story). He said "You're going to do squats." I told him about my shoulder and my reticence about the bench press and OP. He said “You're not going to do bench presses. You are going to do OP.”

My ortho told me never to lift barbells. Paul emphasized that he wasn't a doctor and couldn't tell me what to do but he still encouraged me to try. I told him I was a doctor and therefore didn't trust orthos and that I promised not to sue him if he messed me up. I'm pretty sure I signed something saying I couldn't sue him anyway but I wisely never read that stuff. I was 57 at the time and had never lifted barbells except for a brief period in high school. In fact, other than surfing and martial arts, I was never an athletic guy. I was pretty scared about starting this process to be honest.

After a few weeks, my knee pain was almost gone proving that low-bar squats down to horizontal didn't destroy knees, at least not mine. After about two months, my shoulder pain was almost gone despite going from 45 to 85 lbs (I know, I’m a weakling but I'm only 5'6" and weighed 155 at the time). Now, I’m at a point where I’m OP’ing 115 (yep, still a weakling going up in increments of literally one pound). However, now I have to think about which shoulder had both subacromial bursitis and a rotator cuff tear (proven by MRI).

Incidentally, that same shoulder was tweaked recently when I tapped out late from a Kimura (a nasty jiu-jitsu shoulder lock). I pushed through OP’ing and was again back to new in a few weeks.

Your results may vary but I'm back surfing at age 60. Perhaps you should see an SS coach and get your form checked out?

[Pluripotent]

It's called Europe (specifically Austria).

But I just googled it. Turns out that tablets with 400mg of Ibuprofen are actually free to buy, while for tablets with 600mg Ibuprofen you need a prescription. Makes a lot of sense, since you can just take more of the smaller dosed tablets....
America, please don't become the bureaucracy shithole that Europe is.


@JFord: The doctor was mostly refering to bench presses. When I asked her about overhead, she first hesitated but then still advised against it.
Apart from OHP, have you done anything specific to deal with your bursitis?

@Pluripotent: I lol'd hard

I'm not entirely sure what the cut off is in the US, but I believe you also have to have a prescription to get 600mg or 800mg tablets of ibuprofen here in the states. OTC, they usually come in 200mg tablets, honestly I haven't tried to look for 400mg tablets so not sure if they're available OTC or not. But whatever, just take more of the smaller doses, problem solved. You have to take > about 600 mg of ibuprofen for the anti inflammatory effect to be very strong, anyway, but you do have to be judicious, because of the risk of stomach ulcers (don't take high doses consistently for more than about 5 days at a time). /PSA

My father is a doctor -- he actually went to get trained by Matt Reynolds once but he remains very concerned (TM) about my weightlifting. He's pretty convinced that I'm screwing up my knees even though I have zero knee pain. Somehow, despite 100% painless knees I'm going to end up with knee replacements. His new concern is that I've gained too much weight (I went from about 135 lbs to almost 200 - trying to break 200 before StrengthCon!) So now he thinks that I'm going to get diabetes and he's constantly reminding me that "It's not all muscle!" I'm not sure what my body fat percentage is actually. I suppose I could do caliper testing if I really wanted to, but I'm guessing it's somewhere around 20%, which is hardly diabetic inducing, and probably a necessary percentage if I'm going to be gaining more weight.

[Danny Yarbrough]

@JFord and Will Morris: Thanks for the answers! They help me figuring out what I'm going to do next.

Right now the pain is almost completely gone. I take 1200mg ibuprofen per day which I will stop tomorrow (will be 6 days). Then, I'll replace the bench with heavy rows for a week or two. If the bursitis remains silent, I'll incorporate bench pressing again (with form checks). If the bursitis is coming back, I'll see an online SSC.
Also, I will focus on keeping my shoulders back at the desk (which I'm actively doing as I write this).

Just some thoughts:
What might have led to this injury (apart from my poor posture) is the fact that I disregarded the deadlift for a while. The squat was falling behind the deadlift so far (225 5RM vs 320 5RM) that I decided to not go heavy on the deadlift to better recover for the squats (they were killing me every time). That way I wanted to close the gap a little.
It probably was a bad idea, because the only thing left as a heavy pulling exercise where chin ups, which I only did for 2 sets at the end of every workout, and I wasn't really dedicated to them that much. So I was going hard on the presses and LPed them, but pulling was only some 2 sets of lousy chins at the end where the number of max reps never really changed (and I didn't gain weight at that time either).

So yeah, this might have contributed to it. But then again, I don't know shit about all of this.