Seven weeks out from second Prolo treatment for shoulder/back

So it's been slow, slow goings but I'm happy to report that I do seem to be making improvement.  I really don't feel my neck being as tight as it used to be.  I don't feel the need to try to crack my neck all the time like I used to (it was bad, like all the time).  I can also tell that my back muscles are starting to behave like they should.  It's hard to describe, but things just feel more... right.

My left QL, the one that once made me think I had a kidney infection, has been super tight since the treatment (I think the muscle responded to the trauma of the injections by tightening up), but still things feel better (especially after getting some soft tissue treatment).

I am in Chicago right now for some personal business, and it gave me the opportunity to go see Bobby my old massage therapist.  He worked on mostly my back and pecs, and at the end of the session he commented that my body seems much more unremarkable than it used to be. Muscles that used to take a really long time to release now release in a much more normal time.  It is good to hear from someone else that they are noticing a difference in how my body is acting, and one for the better.

When I do DB rows, I can feel the very bottom of my lat freaking out over trying to work.  I've noticed that my back is fairly asymmetrical, especially in my lats.  My left side just isn't as developed, and I think that has been because the injuries have been causing improper mechanics.  Now that I'm starting to be able to use my back in a proper way, the lower part of my lat is really getting a work out. I think it's pretty awesome, further proof that things are headed in the right direction.

Things might be headed in the right direction, but I am still unsure as to whether I've fully recovered or not.  I still find myself trying to decompress my left ear and I still have pain in my lower back, so if I had to go see Dr. Fullerton today I would ask for one more treatment, but thankfully I won't have to cross that bridge for another month or so.  Until then, I will keep working out and getting stronger!

One Month after Second Prolo Treatment.

So I'm 4 weeks out from my second prolo treatment, and I feel... better.

For the first three weeks following the treatment my lower back was killing me. I figured it was just the muscles all inflamed from the treatment. I didn't really stop to think about how that's really different from what I have experienced in the past, I just accepted it.

Anyways, this week my lower back was bothering me I decided to try to foam roll it out. I found that my back was seriously tight, and once I was done rolling out the knots, I felt 100% better. It made me wish that I had done this earlier.

My point with all of this is that the source of my pain could be addressed through soft tissue work.  I think it's important for me to do soft tissue work after a prolo treatment because my muscles responds to the trauma by tightening up resulting in adhesions.

I may feel like I'm worse off the week after a treatment, but if I roll out and break up those adhesions suddenly I can feel how my body has improved for the better.

Riding out this "prolocoaster" has been wearing me down. I'm just ready to get this over with, to be pain free and to get back to lifting like I used to.

I'm also hoping that past session will be my last treatment.  I'm still doubtful, just because I still don't feel right, but the Doc seemed pretty certain I would only need 2 sessions.

I'm looking forward to lifting again this weekend. Eventually I'll test everything out and squat with full ROM, and I'll see if my hips are in alignment now. Used to be off, with the treated hip going lower than the non-treated hip. Perhaps this is from tightness in the hip rather than a sign of how the joint is moving, I'm not sure.  I would be interested to see if I can pass my Ober test now with either leg, perhaps I'll ask my PT guy when I see him next.

...Also, I'm thinking to ask the doc for a prescription of PT so my current dry needling guy can address both hips/lower back. That would be amazing.

Second Prolo Treatment for Shoulder/Back

So Yesterday was my second visit with Dr. Fullerton. When I saw him he had me perform the same functional tests as last time, but this time I was able to pass a couple of the tests! Progress has been made! I Still have a pit in my left hip capsule, and there was still a lot of work to be done on my back.

In fact, more issues were found with my back muscles than last time. I don’t know if it was crossfit or

Band-aids where I got
poked. Also, I feel like
 my back is  really
asymmetrical

high school wrestling, but something really messed me up. Thankfully, Doc keeps searching so that’s why he keeps finding things. I am very impressed with his thoroughness. They call this the “old couch new carpet” problem. When you get new carpet (fix one issue) you suddenly notice what you once thought was a perfectly good couch (some other body part) isn’t actually all that great (there’s an issue/pain).

 After he addressed issues with my back muscles the first time others issues became apparent. I didn’t really notice the pains just standing around, but when he poked and prodded me there were definite spots of tenderness that weren’t there before. Leaving the office, I was actually feeling pretty good. I felt stiff as all get out, and I definitely didn’t feel normal, but I have felt worse. I chalk it up to taking a Tylenol 3 with codine beforehand.

 At the end I commented about how Dr. Fullerton hadn’t addressed my labrum yet, and he said that he didn’t treat my labrum last time, and wasn’t planning on doing so since it didn’t seem to be causing me issues, combined with the fact that the tech report on my MRI was a little wishy-washy. I felt a little hesitant about this, but I’m not really in the position to boss a doctor around, especially while on painkillers.

Because he addressed so many muscles/points around my spine, both lower and upper back, I feel pretty stiff while typing this. I can’t really lean over to get anything, and even standing causes some issues. Thankfully I have a wonderful wife who is helping me out while I lay on the couch with a heat pad on my back as I watch the NCAA tournament. It could be worse.

Phase Two of Rehab from Prolotherapy

8 weeks out from the first prolo treatment. I can see why Doc wanted to space these treatments out 9 weeks apart.  I'm still feeling everything... settle.  I now really don't feel any of the pain that I felt after the treatment when I hold things, and I'm still not cracking my neck like I used to, so that seems to indicate progress is being made.  I've started working on strength and range of motion.  I think, for my shoulder muscles, using the Indian Clubs is pretty much ideal. It works on strengthening and stretching at the same time, plus it's pretty fun.  In addition to using Indian clubs (I use them as a warm up) I am now doing an upper body day and a lower body day, here's the program:

Upper Body (A)

DB Bench press (5 X 10)

Lat pulls (5 X 10)

DB Rows (3 X 12)

Tricep extentions (3 X 12)

Bicep Curls (3 X 12)

Shrugs (3 X 12)

Shoulder Raises (3 X 12)

Lower Body (B)

KB stiff leg deadlifts (5 X 10)

KB Box squats (light) (5 X 10)

DB Lunges (3 X 12)

Leg Curls (3 X 12)

Leg Extentions (3 X 12)

Note: one thing that is important to note is that I don't have any movement where I elevate my shoulder past 90 degrees. I'm still not ready for overhead movements like incline bench or overhead press.

The frequency of my workouts is Day 1 is conditioning (sprints), Day 2 is A, Day 3 is B, rest day, then repeat. It's three days on, one day off, like crossfit.

Leg day killed me, especially the lunges. On the second set my hammies cramped up so I just stopped.

I've noticed now when doing bench press I experience a clicking in the very front part of my shoulder. It isn't accompanied by any pain, but this might be important because Dr. Fullerton thought there might be something wrong with the front part of my shoulder. Who knows.

I'm still feeling all the normal pangs, but then all the pangs are not bothering me as much as they used to. I feel healthier. I feel like I'm better. I actually feel like I can get back to 100%, something I haven't experienced in over a decade.

Six weeks out from first treatment

So it's been two weeks of doing the scapular stabilization exercises. After the first day of exercise, my muscles were sore/unhappy for about 5 minutes, but then everything went back to normal. I get the same experience after each workout, but each time it's to a lesser extent.  These past couple of times I've had no increase in pain after working out, so I think now I'm going to start getting back to strength/ROM, so that means I'll get to work with Indian clubs, in addition to some other dumb bell/barbell exercises.

I think I've been babying my body for a while now. I've been really conservative just because I want to heal up ASAP.  But when I expressed my concerns to the Dr. he just said to let pain be your guide and to keep moving.


Letting pain be my guide has been difficult, because right now I'm back to being in pain all the time.  The amount of pain/discomfort that I'm in is less than before I started this, but it's still there. So knowing that my muscles are still frayed, is it ok to use them, to push them? It seems from Doc's advice that it is ok.

The pain/discomfort that’s going on in my back is... evolving. It used to be just this big knot of pain, but now I can feel each muscle separately and feel the pain in each one.  It's like a room of people has gone from everyone screaming and you can't hear what they're saying to everyone is talking loudly and you can now make out each conversation. Hopefully after the second treatment it will be reduced to a quiet murmur.

Concerning my hip. It's been... interesting. When I mentioned to one PT that I still experience hip pain despite the fact that I haven't squatted/deadlifting for six weeks he asked if I've considered the possibility that it's a sports hernia. I have, in the past, been given that diagnosis, but I think that is not what I have.  The main reason being that there are times where I do not experience any pain. I think because there are things that I can do to relieve the pain, it's not a sports hernia. I may be wrong, I'm not an expert on the subject matter. However, I figure it my groin pain is stemming from some type of structural damage then it should be fairly constant. That's how it was before I had PRP injections to treat the torn labrum in my hip (constant pain no matter what I did).

As of right now, when my groin/pectineus acts up I also have a tight TFL and possibly glute medius and piraformis.  I roll out on a soft ball, and it is amazingly painful but when I get that release in the back of my hip, the pain in the front seems to go away, or at least diminish greatly.

So it seems that my current hip/groin pain is coming from tight muscles in the back of my hip, and those, in turn, may be tightening up because of the structural damage to my left hip capsule or to the fact that my left spinal erectors don't seem to work very well right now.  In either case, that first week after my first prolo treatment for the left hip/right spinal erectors, I had no hip/groin pain whatsoever.  ...I hope this hasn't been too confusing, if there's any questions just leave a comment and I'll be happy to respond.

I've starting running hard for short bursts on the treadmill, and it doesn't seem to cause any trouble whatsoever, so I'm thinking it would be ok for me to get into sprinting. There's a sprinting group that works out nearby. I'd like to join them but I'll have to tell them that in about three weeks I'll have to stop going for about a month.  We'll see what happens.

Rehab from Torn Labrum in Shoulder: First Day.

Excited because today I get to do resistance work!!!
Going to start out conservative, going to work on scapular stability.  I should point out that I'm not just working on recovering from a torn labrum, but I'm also working with damaged rotator cuff and various back muscles.

On a related note, I've realized what I'm doing is broader than just treating a torn laburm. Through this process I've found out that I have an injured rotator cuff as well. There are a lot of people out there that might benefit from avoiding surgery to repair their rotator cuff, so I'm going to make it easier for them to find some of these videos.  A torn labrum and damaged rotator cuff go hand in hand, actually. This might be one reason why surgery repairing a labrum only might be ineffective in relieving pain, it might be only a partial repair. Plus, if you have poor mechanics you're just going to tear it again.

Anyway back to my protocol for scapular stabilization.  My rehab will go through three different phases. First is endurance, second is range of motion/strength, and the third is speed strength.  Endurance will get those stabilizers back to strength, so I will develop proper mechanics. Then I can work on strength, like bench press. And after that has been worked some then I can work on explosiveness, like in Olympic lifts and sprinting.

Here is the document describing the exercises I'm doing for phase one. I'm planning on doing only 2 sets for the first two times, and after that bump it up to three. Also, I'm doing these every other day, adding weight bit by bit. Hopefully I can move on to phase two in two to three weeks, depending on how I'm feeling.

Ear Problem Solved??!!?!?!

Since High school, I’ve experienced discomfort with my left ear.  Not the outside, actual ear, but inside, like my eardrum.  I’ve always felt like there’s too much pressure in that ear.  In Ms. Sutton’s pre-calculus I was stretching my neck, trying to release the tension that I was feeling.  I pulled my head toward my right shoulder a little and I hear a “crack”, and felt some immediate relief.  That was the beginning of a 17 year habit of cracking my neck.  I always experienced a sensation of whatever muscle that was too tight in my ear relaxing.  I would also try swallowing, trying to get my left ear to decompress, it was a very subtle, but very constant nuisance. 

Today, instinctively I started pinching my neck, the part right under the jawbone, kind of near the glands Drs feel to see if you’re sick. I felt some asymmetry, some kind of lump on the left side. Pressed on it thinking it was a knot of muscle that needed to be released. I did not get a release I got something... different.  With a loud “crunch” I felt something give.  It felt like I put something back into place, or absolutely destroyed something.  I freaked out a little because of the severity of the crunch and its proximity to my voicebox. It was like I had destroyed a thin, airy wafer in my neck and I was worried I had hurt myself.

I said something and sounded fine, so I calmed down and realized that  whatever it was that was bothering me had disappeared. I felt the left side of my sinuses clear up a little. I feel my left ear open up a little (it itches some now as I type this), and when I swallow both sides feel the same, the same blessed feeling of normalcy.

This is awesome.  Besides the pain in my shoulder this discomfort in the ear was a major factor I decided to get the treatment. I don’t know if this was just a temporary fix, but it feels way better than it has in over a decade and it’s lasted for about an hour as I type this, much longer than any other treatment I’ve had. Perhaps this will be permanent, that would be amazing.