It's a Traps!!!!

So I just got back from seeing Dr. Fullerton. I saw him simply for diagnostic purposes, because I felt like he was a bit rushed in diagnosing and treating whatever he found, all in one session.  So I thought to see him to just figure out what is wrong, and come up with a game plan from there.  He checked out my shoulder, especially my upper back, and he found that I have torn my trap muscle, in the mid-back area.  This is probably the main source of the pain I’m currently experiencing.  He also checked out the shoulder capsule and the infraspinatus (a muscle that gets needled regularly). If he found anything he didn’t comment on it, but he was mostly excited about finding the tear in the trap. I think he was excited because he found it using techniques with the ultrasound that he had learned about earlier this year.  Secondly, I think he was impressed at the extent of the damage. The tear wasn’t just in the tendon/ligament, it was in the actual muscle belly as well.

He also checked out my hip. While it is so much better than prior his treatments, it still bothers me to raise my right leg to my knee.  He found some damage to the tendon that the adductor magnus attaches to, as well as some damage to where that particular tendon continues on up to the abdominal rectus.  Hopefully the next treatment I get will be my last for that.  …Story of my life right?

I’m not as hopeful that the next treatment for my shoulder/trap will be my last, mostly because I fear there is something going on in the front of the AC joint as well.  Dr. Fullerton is only really able to address one thing at a time, so I understand his focus on the back.  I just worry that I will need yet another treatment after this.

Because of the timing of things, I don’t expect to see him again until around January.  I need to get some other things in order before I go see him again.  But I have hope still; I think I can actually beat this.

Possibly the last treatment for my right hip????

Well, hopefully these next few months will be my last series of posts dealing with hip pain.  I think I’ve finally resolved the last piece of the puzzle, at least concerning my right hip.  I saw Dr. Fullerton this past Friday, and having been tired of him addressing my shoulder and then running out of time to address my hip, I decided to make this appointment all about the hip.  He went through the notes from past visits, and asked to see my side lunge.  

The side lunge is a stretch that I can do very easily with my left hip, but not so easily with my right side.  I can’t do it on the right side because my groin is too tight, nor is it easy to balance. So after seeing the imbalance with the stretching, he then did some injections around my inguinal crease (some of the damage was underneath my femoral artery/nerve) and then had me try it again.  This time I could do it a lot better because my groin wasn’t tight, but I still couldn’t balance like I could on my left side.  He then performed some injections on the more outer part of my hip, and then this time when I tried it I could stretch my right leg just like my left leg. 

It was ridiculous how easy it was to perform that stretch on my right side.  I remember showing the asymetry to a PT and he was like “well maybe over the years your hip has adapted to various pathologies and now, that’s just how it works.” He made it sound like it was permanent and couldn’t be fixed.  Well, it can be fixed, and Dr. Fullerton fixed it.  It’s been a few days since seeing Dr. Fullerton, and my hip has clicked a couple of times with very slight movement, like shifting weight in bed.  Of course I worry that I’m doing something to make the hip out of socket, but perhaps it’s always been out of whack that and now for the first time it’s starting to behave properly.  I am also noticing some muscles surrounding my LEFT knee are spasming.  I’ve noticed that when I get one muscle treated, if it’s been affecting another muscle, that other muscle will start spasming as it releases.  So perhaps my right hip has been affecting my left knee. Pretty cool stuff.

Once I’m allowed back into resistance training, I’m planning on doing some pilates and yoga to work on these muscles.  I imagine with a healed hip the movements will be much easier to perform.  They say to help deal with injuries you need to work on core strength, but what happens when it’s your core that is injured? Anyways, I am looking forward to testing it out and will report back on how it handles.  I’m not posting a video about this because my vlog is more about my shoulder recovery than dealing with my hips.

In a couple of days I will see Dr. Fullerton yet again for him to treat my shoulder, so I'll report back with that.

Six weeks out from fifth prolotherapy treatment

So it’s been about two weeks of resistance training after my fifth prolotherapy treatment.  As I predicted, at the two week mark I started to get all of my old pains back. And, as I predicted, after that I started to get back to feeling better.  As of right now, there are days where I don’t even notice any pain in my back area, and there are some days where I feel the need to try to roll out some knots. 

I also think I’m starting to realize that the discomfort I’m feeling is stemming from the issues in the front of my shoulder.  I realize that most of the discomfort I’m feeling is from tight neck muscles in the front of my shoulder, like the scalene and the sternocleidomastoid. So for the next session I hope for him to check that out and make sure everything is fine.  I remember one session where he poked the front of my shoulder and it hurt a lot, and it made him go “Hmmm” but he didn’t do anything about it because he decided to address the damage to the back first.  Perhaps it is time for him to try that again and see what happens. Wouldn’t surprise me if there was something wrong with the front of my shoulder too. Sigh.

Did a little bit of the phase one stuff, and nothing felt… rusty. Every movement came pretty easily.  I still did real light weight and in slow, controlled movements.  After all of that I then did a little bit of Indian clubs.  I worked with the two pounders and  there was one motion that stretched my shoulder and it felt… significant. It kind of hurt, but it was the pain that I’ve associated with adhesions tearing, and not injury pain.  As soon as I stopped clubbing I felt fine.

It still doesn’t feel quite right in my left side when I try to pull down my shoulder blade, but perhaps that’s because it’s playing tug of war with my shoulder, it’s hard to tell.

I saw my PT that does dry needling, and he found a huge knot in my pec, probably from the trauma of the prp injection. 

I really haven’t been able to push myself with heavy weights yet because I was in an accident and right now my car is in a shop. I can’t get to a gym so I’ve been using the apartment’s fitness center but they don’t even have a barbell so I’m kind of stuck.  I’m hoping to get a temporary gym membership down the street but we will see.

I am able to do thinks like Dumbbell squats, and I have to say my core feels a lot more stable now on the left side.  I used to feel kind of… wobbly.  I also feel like I have more control over my shoulder blade, even if I keep finding myself with a forward-oriented shoulder.

…It’s been over a year now of seeing Dr. Fullerton, and I thought after a year I would just stop and give up.  But because I keep feeling better each time, I keep seeing improvement, I don’t want to stop.  Instead, I’m excited to see how much better I will feel after the next treatment. I’m sure I’m coming off a little strangely with this, but I’ve always been one to take care of things: My car, my chief knives, my butcher’s block, etc.  But the most basic thing to take care of is my body, and it seems that I didn't do a good job of that earlier in life.  Now that I'm a little wiser, I want to be pain free.  I want my body to work the way it was intended to work.

11 days out from my fifth Prolotherapy treatment

It's not yet two weeks out from the fifth treatment, but I'm really feeling better. I think a lot of the discomfort I was experiencing was stemming from the damage to my rib cage.  It's also pretty amazing how much my shoulder has changed after just one treatment to the shoulder capsule.

I don't know why, but Dr. Fullerton kind of ignored the shoulder capsule this time, even though I was pretty certain I could use another treatment.  He asked of I could hold a plank now, and I said something like, "Maybe??"  I didn't really know how to respond because I haven't tried doing a plank/push up since the last treatment.  ...I now realize that I should've simply said that, but for some reason I felt nervous and just didn't know what to say.

I'm still pretty impressed with how much more I can decompress my left ear now.  It's pretty much identical to the right ear.  Also I haven't felt as near as much need now to try to crack my neck, so that is obviously a good thing.

I still feel the need to try to roll out some areas in my upper back, like where the upper trap attaches to the shoulder blade, I think?   One of the hardest things about this whole process is that because it's my back, I can't easily point to it.  Like I can only approximate the location.  I think next time I will have to roll out and then turn around and show him where my skin is red.

I've really been tempted to go early this January and get a treatment just for my hips, but I think I will probably just wait it out for the next time.  ...if my shoulder/back is still giving my trouble I will book two sessions a week apart, and go from there.  So I guess I'm betting that I will need a sixth treatment on my back.  ...That's kind of sad, but I keep getting so much better after each session.

We will see;  we will see.

Fifth Prolotherapy treatment.

Sorry y'all for not having been more active, my laptop has been down for a month and I really didn't feel comfortable using my work computer to upload blog posts (government security and all).  Anyways, it's back and so am I.  Here's the vid I took right after my fifth treatment.  We had a major breakthrough in that it seems my ribs were "looking pretty rough" under the ultrasound.  When I had the injection at my chest it felt like a huge pressure/weight had been lifted. It was a type of pain I didn't even know was there because I was simply so used to it.

Anyways, here's the vid:

Two weeks out from Fourth Prolotherapy Session.

Concerning the shoulder/back, I'm still pretty weak/sore in the shoulder. Like grabbing and holding onto a soup can doesn't feel good.  It's weird how much it's affecting me. Like I rolled over onto this shoulder in my sleep and the pain woke me up.

I'm halfway there to re-starting weight lifting. Going to do rehab (phase 1) until it doesn't hurt anymore, then doing phase 2 until I feel good with that, then on to sprinting and lots of Pilates Barre method classes. I know I know, a dude doing pilates and barre. But they seem like a really good solution to working my core in the correct manner, and will help me get proper mechanics down.

Once symptom of the laberal tear is my shoulder gets reall tired with constant pressure. Like if I try to hold a plank or a downward dog it really wears out quickly.  So I'm really looking forward to see if I improve in that area.

I'm really interested in seeing how this past session changes things. I think he really got the remaining muscles that were bothering me, especially my serratus.  I'm really looking forward to trying out deadlifting again. I've never done deadlifts without hurting my back, so if this works it will be pretty damn amazing.

I just really hope that my back is done, that I can move on. I accept that the pit in my shoulder capsule may need a few more treatments, but as far as the muscles go I really hope everything is set.  I just wish the Doc had started treating the tear in my labrum, the pit in my capsule, sooner.  It still makes me pretty mad that he hadn't addressed it until now. Hopefully I can get some pity points and he'll do it for free while he works on my hip. 

Speaking of my hip, I'm definitely feeling different. Although it's hard to tell if it is the PRP because four days after seeing Dr. Fullerton I had a varicose vein removed in the same leg.  Well, not removed, but burned shut with a laser that was placed inside the vein.  While my body reabsorbs the burned up vein, I'm experiencing a lot of pain in my groin, not unlike what I was feeling before I started up dry needling.

I do find though that bringing my knee up doesn't hurt like it used to. I am now realizing how much I used to brace myself for pain while bringing my knee up, say to cross my right leg over my left.  It will be interesting to see how squatting will feel.   Can't wait really.

So I'm only two weeks away from being able to try out my new body, albeit I will have to approach things conservatively.  Still, there is a possibility that I won't need another treatment. The pit in the capsule could be completely healed, and it could be that the tissue in my hip Dr. Fullerton addressed is really all I needed. If that turns out the be the case, I will be overjoyed. Of course, if I need a fifth treatment I really won't be mad because I have been experiencing such progress over these past nine months.

As I read what I just wrote I see so much hope and excitement for what's to come. I can't help but think about how I've been excited for what's to come for years now. Heck back in '09 I was pumped because I just needed to figure out the pain in my shoulder and hip and I was good to go.  I wonder if this is normal, or if I am just really, really strange.  I guess I have to be constantly optimistic, otherwise I would just get beat down and wouldn't be able to keep going forward. Yes it's been a long journey, and yes I always think that I'm just one step away from being completely healed, but I figure as long as I keep getting better then I'm doing something right.

And I am getting better all the time. Every step I've taken has made me feel better. I guess my body only allows me to feel as certain level of pain, and as I fix one thing or another I realize how much pain I was actually in.  I am still surprised that I had so much wrong going on with my back and I was still able to crossfit.  Or even walk, for that matter.

For the first time, when I left Dr. Fullerton's office two weeks ago my neck/ear felt completely normal.  This is obviously a good sign. I just hope I don't need a second treatment for the shoulder capsule.

Day after Fourth Prolotherapy Treatment

I have to say I had no idea so much was wrong with me. Everything that Dr. Fullerton treats is getting way better, it's just there so much stuff that he can't treat it all at once. Each session takes like four hours of him probing around with the ultrasound wand, figuring out precisely what to address. Every time I see him and he's working on me he comments that he should use the ultrasounds he's taking for an upcoming presentation. Yesterday I finally asked him why he always says that. He replied that because of my musculature, the damage is really easy to see on the monitor. So that was a nice stroke of the ego. This time he looked at my back again, but for the first time he looked at and addressed my right hip.

What was found

Where do I begin? There was some damage going on with the lateral part of the QL, and there was also some damage to where the serratus meets up with the lat. That part seemed to be really the last part of my back that hasn't been addressed. I also talked to him about how holding a plank or downward dog

The (hopefully) final
few areas that were addressed

hurts my shoulder, and how maybe that was due to the labrum tear? He looked at the shoulder again, and despite the fact that he didn't find anything the first time this time he found some debris and a pit in the capsule. So it looks like I'm actually going to get that tear in my labrum repaired as well.

He took a look at my right hip and found some damage up in the high quad/pectineus area.

When he administered the injections to pretty much every area, that body part responded by twitching like I was going into a gand mal seizure. Concering prolo, the twitch seems to signify that there was damage in that area. The more the twitch, the more that muscle/ligiment/tendon whatever needed help. So it seems that all these new spots that we addressed today were really needing help. So I'm hoping to continue to see great improvements over these next few months.

Pain/ability

The pain right now isn't that great. I feel like I have some pressure in my back, like a hot water bottle is lodged underneath my shoulder blade. Uncomfortable, but not painful. I am really limiting the use of my right arm though. I find myself lowering my head to meet my hand when I shampoo my hair. I was walking the dog and pulled the lease with my left hand and I felt a sharp pain somewhere in my back. It kind of felt like an adhesion breaking up but I found it to be really unsettling so I am trying to use my left arm as little as possible right now.
My leg feels pretty good right now, the day of I was walking with a limp but now I think I can walk alright, even take on stairs without too much of an issue. 

Mental fortitude

I'm 9 months into this treatment and I have to admit that taking this upcoming month off is going to be frustrating. I was just starting to get some real strength back and I was also making some important strides with my technique in sprinting (get it?). I hope I won't lose too much strength/muscle memory when I get back into the mix, but I don't like being on the sidelines.
Hope this is the last time he will treat my back, but if it isn't I'm not going to be mad because I am making so much progress. Now that my body is becoming hale again, I think I'm going to look into some kind of soft tissue treatment. Like I might go back to a DO that does manipulation, or find a massage therapist. I'm not really too convinced that the rolfer I saw is the answer, because he treatments were so temporary. Of course, perhaps things will be different now. Who knows.