Deltoid injury?

I've probably (hopefully) just tweaked my bad shoulder yesterday, but I woke this morning with pain in my upper arm - shooting pain in all directions until I actually got up. It is, basically, fine now, though I am aware that at least something was tweaked. It doesn't actually hurt or throb, just doesn't feel right. My assumption is that if I really HAVE torn the rotator cuff, that I would have known it during my workout yesterday morning, or at least soon afterwards. I don't THINK it would have waited almost 24 hours to present itself and it did not hurt to dress this morning, including fastening my bra so that is a good sign.

The pain is more on the side of my deltoid than anything, though I wonder of the "shooting" nature of it when still in bed was actually nerve. Probably too late to ice...and I HAVE to go to the office today for a 12 hour work-day - too many deadlines and I am the only one in my office who can do the work.

Hoping a couple of days taking it easy will address it. An MRI isn't in my budget right now...not with a move coming!

If anyone HAS had this type of injury, any tips on self care? I WILL get it checked out if it doesn't ease by Tuesday. I am currently considering if riding tomorrow is a good idea, but will have to see. As upright as my riding position is I hope that means I will be able to.

Catrin, I have no advice for a deltoid injury, but, please be careful. You've had so many injuries...

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Originally Posted by Crankin

Catrin, I have no advice for a deltoid injury, but, please be careful. You've had so many injuries...

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Sadly, yes, but all of them combined (excepting the neck injury perhaps) is better than my physical condition + diabetes onset before I started exercising and lost the weight. I figure that either way injuries will come, and I would prefer they come from being active. I THINK I know what happened yesterday and I won't be doing that particular exercise again (pushups on an unstable surface). I USED to feel 90 years old and couldn't walk up a single flight of stairs...NOW I can do things that I once would have never dreamed of.

At least I no longer ignore injuries when they happen :)

Good! I would not be one to tell you to stop exercising.
Like the doctor who told me to "just ride 5 miles and gain 10 pounds" a few years ago, when I was having some medical issues. Yeah, so I could be like him, and ride around town with my gut hanging out over my shorts :eek:.

I HAVE decided to go ahead and get the MRI. If nothing else the hospital will allow me to make payments. There have been too many problems with this shoulder, and while it is better in some ways than it was a year ago, in other ways it isn't. It would be good to know exactly what is going on with it and determine, realistically, how much stronger it can get. Surgery is NOT an option as long as I can use it! I do know my neck injury affects it... My doctor has been encouraging me to get the imaging for the last 6 months.

Hope you get some answers.

Finding a balance when you're not 100% is very difficult.

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Originally Posted by OakLeaf

Hope you get some answers.

Finding a balance when you're not 100% is very difficult.

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Yes it is, which is why I've been resistant to getting the very expensive pictures. The trick will be on finding the right specialist to examine them - since for so many surgery is the automatic outcome. I simply need to know exactly what is wrong and what I can realistically expect. From my experience the gym activities are helping it a lot - as long as it isn't anything overhead. Functionally speaking I am scre@ed for anything overhead and that can be a problem when you live along. Frankly I don't care if I can't press my weight in an overhead squat - I DO care if I can't perform normal functional movements - especially since I live alone. This particular shoulder tweak is getting my attention...

Just a thought but you know your body. Are you over thinking this? Would a massage or trip to PT be a less expensive visit. I have similar issues and a nice massage - sometimes w/ hot stones or hot cups and ASTEM treatment from the PT does wonders to redirect my muscles fibers and loosen the muscle

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Originally Posted by Sky King

Just a thought but you know your body. Are you over thinking this? Would a massage or trip to PT be a less expensive visit. I have similar issues and a nice massage - sometimes w/ hot stones or hot cups and ASTEM treatment from the PT does wonders to redirect my muscles fibers and loosen the muscle

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It would be nice if PT WOULD help my shoulder, but it never has - and I've been in PT with multiple therapists for months on this very shoulder. The mobility work I do HAS helped in some areas. We KNOW there is a physical problem with my shoulder, it is time to figure it out. Part of it is indeed muscular and connective fiber related - but it is time to know if there is anything else going on. Thankfully the MRI isn't THAT expensive, I only have to pay 20% of it...and it is a good diagnostic tool. I DO know that I've never experienced anything like the pain I had last night. Ever, and that included when I broke my upper arm and collar bone. That is why it has my attention.

It is time for the MRI.

I tore my rotator cuff many years ago. I didn't know it for several years.

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Originally Posted by goldfinch

It is time for the MRI.

I tore my rotator cuff many years ago. I didn't know it for several years.

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This is what I am afraid of. Surgery just is not an option but I refuse to worry about this just yet. Hopefully it's just an inflamned tendon, but time will tell. Of course Even a torn cuff does not always require the "s" word...

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Originally Posted by Catrin

Surgery just is not an option.

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I'm very opposed to surgery and any type of invasive intervention in general, but that doesn't mean that in specific cases it can't be beneficial. I hope you will keep an open mind about it.

I just returned from my Osteopath and with good news. No expensive pictures or consults required :) Apparently my rotator cuff, biceps tendon and even my deltoid are not the problem (he did a wide variety of tests for these). The problem turns out to be my pec minor and there is some inflammation/tendinitis there. Ice, topical medication that he provided, and if it doesn't ease in a reasonable time period I've a referral to a massage therapist who does trigger point therapy. He offered an injection but I turned it down, though I might revisit that idea. My mobility work is targeting the area he thinks is most responsible, and he wants me to continue as I am - keep exercising and just don't do what hurts!

I am, however, taking a couple of days off... He also suggested acupuncture, but I am less likely to go that direction. Something about needles... I wanted to do other things tomorrow, perhaps a very gentle yoga class I've heard about to just get some movement in. If I can sleep well tonight without pain then I will consider it. I suppose that I need to learn to sleep on my back...

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Originally Posted by Muirenn

If I had a torn rotator cuff, I wouldn't attempt push-ups. I would, however, do exercises that worked the area doing something that has less inherent risk of injury. My reaction to your first post was exactly the same as Crankin's.

Maybe it's time to learn to exercise in a new way? Something a little more deliberate and controlled? Then you could approach the types of exercises you are doing now with an increased understanding of your own kinesiology. An injury every few years, fine. Several per year? Not so much.

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Thankfully no torn rotator cuff, just tendinitis in my pec minor (Pec Minor Syndrome) and the cuff appears to be fine :) He thinks the underlying cause of the tendinitis is actually the underlying cause of my dysfunctional shoulder and THAT is progress as this is the first time we've had an idea what that cause might be.

I won't be doing pushups or pressing/overhead activities until the inflammation goes away - and then I will revisit that decision. It was just SO painful last night that it really got my attention and I thought it was my rotator cuff. This year I've tried to be much better in focusing on not doing what hurts - and trying to keep my ego out of it. I've only recently added pushups back in, and obviously that was a mistake. Apparently I also need to stop sleeping on my side.

SO thankful that this doesn't appear to be on the same scale as the injuries from 2010-2011. This IS my first new injury since the whiplash injury in late 2011, which still isn't right... The PT this last winter was due to a long-term dysfunctional shoulder, not a new injury. They just keep on giving :\

Glad to hear that perhaps your injury isn't as serious as previously thought, although I'm certainly trying not to minmilize it either. Good luck with your treatment!

IN addition to the shop, I also work as a personal trainer at a nearby hospital. I love that it seems that many people are interested in fitness and many like the CrossFit type of workouts! I LOVE the energy both physically and mentally. But with lots of different types of exercise, we definitely have to be careful with some of the movements. I see this all the time with people watching Youtube videos, and trying to to duplicate the same movement themselves. Some certainly are very good, but others are definietly putting our bodies in position for potential injuries.

Anyway, I know I got on another subject altogether, but take care and keep us informed!

Yes Ridebikeme, we certainly have to be careful with how we address our movements. That is why I love my group training environment. Our coach is an old-fashioned strength and conditioning coach. He does use Crossfit methodology, along with other tools. He strongly insists on proper form. There are certain things I am not allowed to attempt, or must scale because I cannot perform them properly, and on other things he makes me stop if my form starts to deteriorate. As he keeps telling us, weight doesn't matter if we can't perform the movement right.

I am the slowest and weakest in my group - and that is OK, this is not about ego. I am also the oldest :) I've seen SO much physical improvement in the last 11 months of doing this - and this is the closest thing to an injury I've had. No matter that I am the slow one, I can do things that I once never dreamed of. I love this, but I would probably not join a straight CrossFit box unless the coaches had the same kind of background. There has to be the knowledge base to know HOW and WHEN to scale the work properly for different limitations. The interesting thing is my neck does much better when I do this 3 times a week, if I drop down to twice a week my neck complains.

What happened Thursday had a bit of ego to it, we were doing a different type of pushup and I was so initially pleased at being able to do it that I started ignoring my body. That won't happen again.

In a way it is good it happened, because it is pointing to a probable root cause of my overall shoulder/scapular dysfunction and THAT is huge! It just hurt SO MUCH Thursday night that I really thought it was something far worse.

Hope you can get it completely resolved.

Just a word of warning, I know your injury is nothing like mine, but I think one thing we have in common is that after things have been out of alignment for a long time, there's no one "key." The pec minor might indeed be the key to its own particular layer of muscle dysfunction. But I can just about guarantee there will be other keys. It's a little disturbing to me (but also typical of my experience) that it's taken this long for them to pinpoint a muscle that's so often involved in shoulder injuries and arm numbness. I wonder how your teres major is doing, just out of curiosity.

One reason I really don't have any desire to return to gym-type fitness is the overemphasis (IMO) on muscles farther up the kinetic chain, at the expense of foundational alignment that sets the whole thing up for good or ill. I had no idea until I started yoga, how key the hands are to doing a proper plank, chaturanga dandasana or push-up. Not just where they are or which direction they're pointing in, but having equal pressure on each metacarpal head and fingertip. You *can't* protect your shoulders properly until you have hand and wrist strength. Likewise, you can't protect your hips until you have foot strength. But nobody teaches that in any gym setting I've ever been in. Hope yours is different....

Doing push-ups with the aim of knocking out reps would be about the dumbest thing I could do right at the moment. But a good series of mindful sun salutations is actually beneficial to my shoulders. "Hands, feet and head" is one of my yoga teacher's constant emphases (head, because it's a big weight and easy to ignore the neck alignment).

Best of luck with the therapy. I hope you don't rule out acupuncture. It's nothing at all like getting shots, because the needles are so much finer, and doing motor point work in the neck, shoulders and chest shouldn't involve many points that can be sensitive (if any? but that isn't anything I know anything about except by experience). There are exceptions, mostly in the hands, wrists and feet where soft tissue is thin and there are a whole lot of nerve endings, but most of the time all you feel is a tap, no feeling whatsoever of being punctured and no pain. If there's a practitioner in your area certified in sports medicine acupuncture, that would be the way to go - when I just looked the website is down - but there are also lots of practitioners who studied motor point technique with Matt Callison, who developed it, before he started the certification program, so ask around.

Good points Oak, and thanks for the tips on acupuncture. I am not ruling it out, just not looking to it as my first choice. It is good to know that it isn't painful!

I agree, when it comes to gym work form is SO very important. Thankfully my coach is unusual in this area, at least in my experience. He is very clear in the role of proper hand/hip/knee/foot placement and has no problem getting our attention in whatever way is necessary. He is also good at figuring out what cues to use in order to help us in this endeavor. It is still amazing to me, for example, I MUST look a certain place on the floor in order to not over-extend in a deadlift - if I lift my eyes higher than that point my back over-extends. It really is amazing.

Everything is all connected, and while my doc found this yesterday, yeah, there are certainly likely other contributing things. I HAVE seen marked improvement recently at my scapula-thoracic 'joint' which was certainly contributing to my problem. I think it's been difficult since my symptoms affect the entire shoulder girdle from my AC joint down to the bottom of my lat on that side. My cervical spine issues don't help. I've seen my shoulder freed completely after manual manipulation of just my neck! My own reading has shown that the pec minor syndrome CAN explain most, if not all, of my shoulder/scapula symptoms. So it will get some targeted love, along with my first rib and scalenes. I will look into the teres major.

In the end I am not looking for 100% improvement in that shoulder and neck, nor do I expect it. I am simply working to become as fit, strong, and flexible as I can become as I look to the next stage of my lfe - given my age and physical limitations. My focus is on movement, not so much the ability to deadlift x amount of weight or squat THAT. Those are good functional movements, and that is their focus for me. I've come a long ways in the last 11 months and am very thankful. Working in my group environment helps to keep me humble and focused on what I can do.

Added: I just looked up the teres major, and considering it's interaction with the lat, it seems good to check out some exercises for that. We know my serratus on that side also needs attention. You know, the body is just so amazing, my right side is as functional as my left side isn't. The human body is SO good at compensating! I suspect that my body's been compensating for decades on that side - which is why it is has been so difficult to solve this.

Glad you are getting to the cause ofyour pain, Catrin. I am just echoeing what Oak said about acupuncture; it is not a painful experience at all. While I did not have it for a sports injury, I was considering it again for my back, if the PT had not solved the problem.

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Originally Posted by Catrin

Thankfully my coach is unusual in this area, at least in my experience. He is very clear in the role of proper hand/hip/knee/foot placement and has no problem getting our attention in whatever way is necessary. He is also good at figuring out what cues to use in order to help us in this endeavor.

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That's great. I'm jealous. In my gym, if I spent five minutes with my participants sitting on their mats with their hands out in front of them trying to get equal weight on all ten metacarpal heads, half of them would just start doing push-ups the scary unsafe way they've always done them, and the other half would refuse to even try because "their wrists hurt." I think I would have to kick them to get their attention. :rolleyes:

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Originally Posted by OakLeaf

That's great. I'm jealous. In my gym, if I spent five minutes with my participants sitting on their mats with their hands out in front of them trying to get equal weight on all ten metacarpal heads, half of them would just start doing push-ups the scary unsafe way they've always done them, and the other half would refuse to even try because "their wrists hurt." I think I would have to kick them to get their attention. :rolleyes:

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Tony doesn't HAVE to kick us - his voice is enough. I am the recipient often enough so can vouch for his effectiveness :) Of course this is part of the reason we pay him, unsure how that would go over in a free class. Of course with the kind of things we do if we DIDN'T focus on proper form then injury wouldn't be far behind. It is amazing how even changing where we look at makes a difference in body position.

Great points Oak!

I'm glad to hear that you are enjoying class Catrin! It does indeed sound as though you have come a long way since starting class.. congratulations! I think each class we all learn something whether it's a physical improvement or perhaps something that we still need work on. I'm VERY excited to hear that you are the oldest person in your group! I know that may sound rather strange, but after teaching classes all winter long with people our age and older, well it was very special! Those folks improved a trememdous amount and a couple are actually now "hooked" into working out in addition to other activites that they partcipate in.

Here's to healing quickly CAtrin!

Ditto everyone else. Be open to acupuncture for sure. on a side note I rolled my ankle in my Weekend Warrior class - I should have followed my gut and just said NO when our coach rolled out the dodge balls - crap Lots of RICE going on in my house

I might note just for reference that although the pec muscle area doesn't have tons of nerve endings, what it does have is tons of blood vessels. It's pretty common for my DOM to raise a small hematoma or bruise when he needles me in there, although he's always mad at himself when he does... no harm done, no problem, just a bruise.

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Originally Posted by OakLeaf

I might note just for reference that although the pec muscle area doesn't have tons of nerve endings, what it does have is tons of blood vessels. It's pretty common for my DOM to raise a small hematoma or bruise when he needles me in there, although he's always mad at himself when he does... no harm done, no problem, just a bruise.

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This is good to know! I've found some trigger point/mobility suggestions from my favorite mobility guy that involves a lacross ball + yoga block - nothing ventured nothing gained!