Both of my shoulders have been… bad… for awhile. About a month ago at rugby allstar tryout going into a tackle I injured the left one. Pretty painful, not dislocated could still move it, etc. so I somewhat ignored it as this was midway through the first day.
The only time it really bothered me excessively was binding in scrums ( external rotation ), and whenever I would try to push someone it felt like my should was about to come out of the socket.
Trainer told me I hadn’t torn ligaments and the shoulder was still in the socket so it would just be “very painful”, but ok to play with…sureee. I knew she was wrong, but I probably would have ignored other advice anyway.
A month later benching with 95lbs causes pain/feeling of my shoulder about to come out. Saw an orthopedic a few days ago and: a) he was positive I have a partially torn labrum b) I have an MRI in 11 days.
If it does turn out to be torn, which if it isn’t, something else is fucked up, are there any other options besides surgery? Rugby season is approaching (practice should start in a month or two), but I don’t think my shoulder could last the whole season.
If anybody out there has had the surgery before, what can I do while I am recovering? By that I mean, right now front squats, deadlifts, and stuff like that don’t really bother it at all. I do plan on starting working one arm lifts soon as well.
I tore my labrum about 3 years ago. The doc laid out 2 options: surgery or physical therapy for 6-8 weeks while laying off any upper body lifting. After talking it over with many (including some here on T-Nation), I opted for the PT. Basically I would go in 3 times a week and do rotator cuff work for an hour or so.
I stayed away from upper body lifting, as instructed, and focused on squats, cardio, etc.
After about 2 months I eased my way back into upper body lifting and I felt great. Today I’d say I feel 90% healthy, with the only exception being if I do something like bench heavy (3-5 rep max) for more than 6 weeks or so.
My friend actually had the surgery about a year ago and spent 2 months in a sling. He wasn’t able to lift until about 3 months after the sling came off. Out of the 2 of us, I feel like my experience was more positive in terms of effectiveness and recovery.
I remember as I searched posts and contacted members with this problem here at T-Nation, the overwhelming majority seemed to lean towards PT as the less risky and more effective option. Just my 2 cents…Good luck.
Hey, I have torn my labrums in both shoulders, one is a SLAP tear, it is about halfway torn and the other is just a partial little tear, I didn’t get surgery on either, I did lots of rotator cuff work in physio and scapular stabilization.
This was about 3 years ago when I tore them, now they are fine for the most part although they can get really bad if I get hit wrong and my bench press is still well behind my other lifts
I have a torn labrum and also a hole in my rotator cuff too apparently as I just found out), which is not an uncommon injury for volleyball players.
I will have to get surgery at some point, but, as mentioned above, the recovery for that is about 8 months before you are back to any sort of decent strength.
I’ve always had problems (doctor said I might’ve had a tear for 2 or 3 years now) with my shoulder but in August/September it was getting so bad that I couldn’t even brush my teeth with my right hand because it hurt that much to raise my elbow up. When I got the whole deal explained to me, I decided I was going to have to play through it because the injury would be season-ending. Men’s college volleyball season doesn’t start until January, so I had a little more time than you did.
What I did was to first lay off any hitting or upper body lifting. Eric Cressey was very helpful in helping me put together a rehab program and it started with the basics:
Sleeper stretch
Foam roll everything out
Lots of rowing (some types of rowing were painful but I found variations that were pain-free and did them)
Internal/external rotations with the elbow pinned down to the side
Prone internal rotations (look them up)
Scapular pushups
From there I eventually progressed to being able to do sets of regular pushups without much pain and from there I went to doing pushups on a BOSU or with one or both hands on med balls.
I rested it and did the right things and was even able to start playing and swinging my arm to hit a little by November and at the end of our fall season I was feeling okay. My strength is still way down: it’s frustrating to go from doing sets with 100lb dbs to now having to work into doing db bench with 50s.
If you give it some rest and do some rehab, you can get to the point where you can play through it, but depending on how bad it is, you may need to get surgery on it at some point.
I aslo have 2 torn labrums. Left shoulder is a complete SLAP tear and right shoulder has not been scanned, but it has the same symptoms just not as bad. I tore both years ago in High School playin football. There is no way I could handle surgery and being inactive for so long, so I basically ignored the doctors.
Actually I didn’t get my left one checked out until i reinjured it for probably the 10th time about 6 years after the inital tear. I did not go for any PT, but I do throw in some rotator cuff work on my own. I am going to look into some specific rehab in the near future, as I plan to play semi pro football this summer. Like has been mentioned here, the surgery sucks and will really slow you down.
My advice would be try all non invasive options first. Mine will flare up from time to time either from contact, or a bad bench session, even pullups. In those cases, anti inflammatories, ice, and rest is the way to go. I also cant sleep on my left shoulder anymore, even that pressure gives me problems. Its a bitch, but thats life
I tore the labrum in my left shoulder October 25, also playing rugby. I picked and went off the back of a ruck and ran into both props and got driven down onto my shoulder and dislocated it. It popped back in when the ruck collapsed on top of me. I got it checked out and had an MRI and the Orthopedic Surgeon said it looked like a pretty decent tear and recommended surgery.
I went under the knife on November 20, almost 5 weeks ago now. After the surgery the surgeon said it was one of the most impressive tears he’d ever seen. Full SLAP and posterior tear, went from about 10:30 to 5:00 (if you’re looking at my left shoulder from the side). Had 5 anchors screwed into the humerus and a bunch of sutures. It was pretty painful the first few days, but by day 4 or 5 I was off painkillers completely and it barely bothered me. I was in a sling for the first 4 weeks but it was mostly to keep me from using the arm and to let it heal. I’m out of it now and have a pretty good range of motion back already.
It’s sore sometimes (like right now from scraping ice off cars this weekend) but seems to be getting better every day. I go to physical therapy twice a week but am still pretty limited in what I’m allowed to do (no weights, just started doing some strengthening movements against gravity this week). I probably won’t be allowed to lift with that shoulder for another month or two, but I’m already back in the gym doing cardio and some leg work (can’t put a bar on my shoulders to squat at all, but I can use the leg press and a few other machines). I still don’t know if I’ll be able to play any rugby this spring, but my club’s going to nationals in April or May and I’m hoping to be back for that.
Overall this has been a royal pain in my ass, but surgery was the only option for my injury to have any chance of healing. If I hadn’t had it the risk of repeatedly dislocating my shoulder would have been increased to the point where I’d have to have stopped playing rugby or do permanent damage. I may have anyway, I still don’t know if my shoulder will ever be back to 100%, but from the way it’s been feeling better day by day, I’m thinking it will be pretty close.
Let me know if you have any questions about the surgery or recovery, I’ll do my best to answer.
I tore both of my labrums playing rugby a little over a year ago and tried to play with them torn this past season. It completely changed the way I play; I couldn’t tackle or stiff arm without something sliding out of place or completely dislocating. I would recommend you get the surgery, I am in January, because you should think about how it affects your play and your future as well.
Also from what I’ve heard from the football players and wrestlers here at maryland who got the labral surgery said it had not limited them afterwards, but full recovery usually takes 6 months with the therapy.
I hear ya terp, we have a guy on our team that dislocates his shoulder(s) kind of frequently. Do you still play for maryland? My coach played for them awhile ago and we played you guys last spring I believe.
Yeah, I played this fall but had to hang it up for a while because of the upcoming surgeries. Do you play for Millersville? I remember playing you guys last spring.
MRI came back, it is definitely a labral tear. I’m meeting with the ortho again on thursday to schedule surgery. I’m going for surgery because I want to play my last fall semester and I really don’t think I can make it through the spring season without fucking it up worse.
[quote]sicilianspeed42 wrote:
I aslo have 2 torn labrums. Left shoulder is a complete SLAP tear and right shoulder has not been scanned, but it has the same symptoms just not as bad. I tore both years ago in High School playin football. There is no way I could handle surgery and being inactive for so long, so I basically ignored the doctors.
Actually I didn’t get my left one checked out until i reinjured it for probably the 10th time about 6 years after the inital tear. I did not go for any PT, but I do throw in some rotator cuff work on my own. I am going to look into some specific rehab in the near future, as I plan to play semi pro football this summer. Like has been mentioned here, the surgery sucks and will really slow you down.
My advice would be try all non invasive options first. Mine will flare up from time to time either from contact, or a bad bench session, even pullups. In those cases, anti inflammatories, ice, and rest is the way to go. I also cant sleep on my left shoulder anymore, even that pressure gives me problems. Its a bitch, but thats life[/quote]
How are you making out? I recently got an MRI showing SLAP tear in my left shoulder and trying to avoid surgery. Got a cortisone shot that didn’t help a bit. I can’t sleep on my left side without my entire arm going numb down to my hands. Doing some band work at home but even that aggravates me. Have you been able to make gains over the years with you condidtion? Best of luck and continued recovery.
It has a pretty good track record and the science behind it is pretty sturdy.
If you try prolotherapy, they usually start you out on some sugar substance to irritate the area, thus sending healing growth factors to repair the damaged area. If the solution isn’t strong enough, they will opt you for sodium morruahte and even human growth hormone.
Keep us posted on your recovery. I have an MRI scheduled in a few weeks for my right shoulder. It’s been bothering me for a while and my doctor thinks it might be a labrum tear.
However, the shoulder has steadily been getting better the past few weeks and my strength is going back up, so hopefully I can avoid surgery if it continues to improve or the tear isn’t that severe.
Surgery was friday, saturday sucked ass. Stopped taking percoset that night, not a big fan. Would be cool being in california or somewhere and getting a prescription for marijuana instead. From what I heard recovery is slightly different depending on the degree of the tear.
Personally I say if you can avoid surgery do so.
Two weeks after I hurt my shoulder it got good enough not to bother me too much unless I did anything. Could barely bench 95lbs, didn’t get any better for months. If you are continuously improving and somewhat pain free or atleast able to manage it I’d avoid the surgery.
Just noticed you’re from cali… if you get the surgery look into the medical marijuana haha.