Damn You, Rotator Cuff – LFMF

“Generally speaking, pain is what makes the body a particularly important concern for the individual” – A.J. Vetlesen

“Yes. Now that my fill_in_the_blank hurts less, I’ll probably stop doing what I did to make fill_in_the_blank feel better – until it hurts more again. Rinse and repeat…” –  Me

The shoulder is a marvel of range of motion + ability to apply force in many different directions. When it all works, it’s awesome. When it gets sore –  different story.

I suppose I’ve done everything I could to damage my shoulder – 1) years of playing tennis wherein the only thing I really liked to do was serve as hard as I could then get to the net for a volley –  long ground stroke rallies are for the patient. 2) more years of playing volleyball wherein the things I liked to do most were serve as hard as I could and then spike the ball hard whenever I got the chance.

And now 3) I’ve taken up rock climbing and hard (for me) bouldering, which puts another severe load on the shoulder, although it’s more pulling and pushing rather than a throwing motion.

Long story short, one shoulder is sore (I’m right handed so there’s a clue which one) and I’m now forced to take care of it.

After a couple Google searches and a conversation with my soft tissue repair guy (whom I can’t recommend highly enough; he’s repaired me many, many times over the past 7 years), I’ve settled into this (almost) daily routine:

  1. Internal rotation, external rotation, scapular retraction exercises –  all with strength bands of various resistance levels. At the moment the external rotation is very weak and painful, but getting better. 2012/05/28 update – external rotation is now pain free at low weights; big improvement. Now I have to not overdo it on weight or reps per the article below…
  2. Shoulder flexor exercises by doing push-ups. Thanks to Alyssa’s sharing of this article, I now know how effective push-ups are for shoulder rehab.
  3. Bat wings
  4. Supraspinatus and Subscapularis lift. Stand holding a light pair of dumbbells in front of your thighs, palms facing each other. Keeping your thumbs pointed up, raise your arms up at a 30-degree angle to your torso until just above shoulder height. Hold for 1 second, and lower to the starting position. Do 2 sets of 8 to 10 repetitions.
  5. Scapular wall slides
  6. Light dumbbell military presses.
  7. Lots of ROM stretches
  8. Foam roller sessions to release the lats.
  9. Yoga stretches

And, eat a low-inflammatory diet, take fish oil daily, get lots of sleep, and – probably most important of all – work on climbing endurance more often than climbing power until it all settles down.

Examples of shoulder articulations.

It all seems to be working (it was up until a couple days ago when I applied my “if some is good, a lot more must be a lot better” mantra, anyway). Please do your own research…

I’d also like to hear what’s working for you in the Comments section below!

Namaste, Rick

P.S. – 2012/05/28 – found a nice T-Nation article on sore shoulders.

P.P.S. – 2012/09/18 – found a good Men’s Health video on the “The Surprising NFL Shoulder Exercise”.