What's Wrong with My Tricep?

[Bill_Roberts]

[quote]J-J wrote:
Bill Roberts wrote:
Thanks. I may have to do it.

Although I don’t know that it’s a tear. I just find it odd that after even 2 months now of no exercises aggravating the problem (unless chest presses aggravate it even though they don’t hurt), I still can’t DL, row, or do any chin/pulldown/pullup type movement except with exceedingly trivial weight.

During the year that there had been similarly located pain in other situations, I had no problems with those exercises, but conceivably they were preventing healing. I would’a thunk though that 2 months of avoiding these exercises should have been sufficient.

Not directly related to the OP’s question, except perhaps as an example of it sometimes not being best to “train through it.”

Where is your pain source Bill? I don’t think you specified.

If the tricep think about the fact that with the rows/pulls you are using JUST the long head as it is the only one crossing the shoulder, but with presses the other heads are assisting that head plus it is not stretched so will not have as much tension there… [/quote]

It is under the left shoulder, posteriorly. I can’t specify which muscle: I’m not that good at localizing exactly where pain is.

Generally on the left, pretty much everything connected to the shoulder or scapula has been, as found from deep tissue massage and neuromuscular therapy, chronically tight and painful when treated. Nothing connected to the scapula hurt while lifting, though the anterior and medial delts could easily hurt from shoulder exercises, which were limited to a very narrow selection that were less problematic.

The severe trouble came after several weeks of intensive high volume, high frequency deadlifting. The under-shoulder pain came then, but I trained through it for about two weeks, until a point was reached where I also could not row or do any sort of pulling-down movement, and the pain in DL’ing was serious enough that it was obvious I had to stop.

After about 2 months rest, I thought I might be able to DL again, and tried an extremely conservative first workout: 10 reps with 135.

Which brought in a little pain towards the end, and then substantial pain the next day and several days after.

So obviously the 2 months rest did not fix the problem.

That is, rest from DL’ing and lat/midback exercises. It could be the case that chest pressing has interfered with healing, as it has definitely over time consistent aggravated the other problems with scapula-connected muscles on the left, though it’s never been painful there while doing such exercises.

Similar to the OP, though, I have a tightness when putting the upper arm back which prevents some triceps exercises, and prevents pullovers, though I do employ a light DB for stretching that position. (ROM is pretty poor.)

[J_J2]

I would think from the description of the area and the work that exacerbated it, it is either:

Tricep; long head (my first choice)
Teres Minor
Teres Major
Subscapularis maybe…
POSSIBLY Infraspinatus…

Just rest like described may well have been fixing the issue, but it is totally plausible it hadn’t done the job OR not done the job well (maybe for the reasons we discussed; having partially healed in an injured state - if that makes sense), maybe due to other exercise, maybe due to any drugs used during that time, etc.

The healing process of soft tissues is such that 2 months should have been enough - technically, but consider that if it is at the muscle-tendinous junction or at the tendon itself… then the healing process could be slowed by any supra-physiological levels of Testosterone that may have been present during that time.

I agree that the presses could have prevented the full recovery of the problem - if the tricep long head or even some of the rotator cuff (RC) muscles… even the lateral rotators which are not directly involved in presses are still stabilisers of course.

The addition of the tightness in shoulder flexion again points to the tricep long - although this would cause pain if torn usually… unless it has begun to heal in its torn state as we spoke about.
Also it is totally common for a strain to not cause pain in movement when unloaded but cause pain when engaging loaded movement - indicative of a lower grade injury, but an injury none the less.

However the ROM issue could also be related to one of the RC muscles listed too… in short. Go back to your therapist and muse this same stuff with them… they (well i would) will be able to suggest 2 or maybe 3 possibilities that they could treat for and see if any hit the mark.

[Bill_Roberts]

So far as location of possible tear or other very localized problem, I’m pretty sure it’s not the triceps, as elbow flexion has no effect on it. In other words, I can put the arm in a position causing pain at the problem spot, and extend and flex the elbow all I like and there is no change in feel at all.

Any of the others, it could well be. The teres major and the subscapularis are known to be tight and were described as being “inflamed” during the chronic period when I was getting deep tissue massage.

So far as muscle tightness problems go, probably every single one of those is a culprit, including long head of the triceps.

I did mean to ask my active release therapist last week – as I’m not able to see him regularly now – which specific muscle he thought it might be, but got too distracted talking about this and that and forgot to ask

In any case he works on pretty much everything related to that shoulder and scapula already. But it provides no cure, simply some degree of help.

It would suck having to take an extended layoff from pressing as well as DL’ing and lat/midback work at the same time. Really don’t want to do that.

[J_J2]

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:

In any case he works on pretty much everything related to that shoulder and scapula already. But it provides no cure, simply some degree of help.[/quote]

I would honestly go to a sports therapy clinic (a good one!) or chiro or whatever… however i am not ‘up’ totally on what an ART guy will provide and the depth of treatment/assessment available to them… are they as thoroughly educated as a good sports therapist or physiotherapist?[quote]

It would suck having to take an extended layoff from pressing as well as DL’ing and lat/midback work at the same time. Really don’t want to do that. [/quote]

Tell me about it, i have been holding onto a decent sized abdominal hernia for over 2 years now as i cant face the time off!
BUT as we both know… it is better to take off a planned amount of rehab time than to cause a ‘real’ injury and be forced out for some time, and from the tightness around the whole shoulder joint and possibility of a small tear… it is a possibility.

Easier said than done of course!

**As for the triceps thing, it is possible for the pain to only present on the movement of one joint even if the muscle crosses two… however that said, i have long learnt that 9 times out of 10, what the client suspects the injury to be (or not) is in fact the case.

JJ

[Bill_Roberts]

I really don’t know the education of my ART therapist, though he strikes me as a very bright and overall knowledgeable guy who certainly knows what he’s doing with the ART.

I have a better opinion of him than of chiropractors I have met. (Which does not mean all chiropractors. For example, ART was developed by a chiropractor, Dr Leahy. But I haven’t met him.)

It is true that there would be persons more expert in treating injuries of this sort. I wouldn’t know where to go in this area, and past experience in medical matters has me feeling quite likely I’d be flushing money down the toilet. It’s very hard for me to see how there could be any treatment other than surgery which would do better than the physical manipulations I’ve already had, so I am probably just not going to do that. Even though, in an ideal world, I agree that it would be the smart thing to do.

I’ll probably just see what happens with still more time with no DL’s or lat/midback work, and have switched chest pressing exercise to one that may perhaps be less aggravating. (Incline Presses in a thing that calls itself a “3-D” rack, though really it is 2-dimensional, and which has been called a “Jones machine.” Like a Smith machine, but free to move back-and-forth, though not to twist side-to-side or to allow one side to rise more than another.)