Injury dilemma!

[HATE]

Alright I've been having issues with some joints for about 6 years now. I'm only 25 and I've had tendonitis in my shoulders and my knee bugs me from time to time. I'm 6'3" and I down to 163 pounds and I need to gain mass but my old injuries are holding me back. I can eat whatever I want and stay shredded bc of how crazy my metabolism is but the amount of food I eat wont matter if I cant do the right amount of training so the diet thing dosnt matter at the moment. Im pretty sure overhead pressing is out and basically all straight bar movements are as well. I've done research and countless workouts experimenting on what works and what dosnt. Inverted rows, neutral grip chins, pushups, db curls, farmers walk, sled drag, sprints, seem to be what im stuck with. And this might seem like an excuse but squats and deads just don't seem like they are gonna happen bc of the length of my femurs. Rear elevated split squats worked for a while but my rear left knee started getting irritated during the movement so I stopped with those. But with all that said I just cant seem to progress. I've been doing bodyweight mostly and even then my joints flare up and crack and pop and what not. I know that I will need to keep adding resistance to my lifts but it seems like my body dosnt want to cooperate. I feel like I am condemned to be stuck at my current size and its very frustrating. And Im not looking to get huge. From how it feels I think I have problems with my supraspinatus in the right shoulder, and im not sure about the left but the mri showed tendonitis on the front of the shoulder. And anything can cause irritation so it isn't just one thing in particular that im doing to cause aggravation. And I've been to PT more than once and they think its strange bc I have good muscle definition and I kept getting stronger but the pain never stays away. Does anyone else have these issues? Does anyone have any advice for gaining strength and size with a problem like this?

 

[Rarchib]

I had pretty severe Tendonitis in my knees. For a while I thought I couldn't squat or do much lower body exercises. Eventually, I found out that the Tendonitis was due to a muscular imbalance within my quadriceps group. Ever since I began to correct the imbalance my knees have not flared up. I would suggest focusing on primarily strengthening the stabilizing muscles in your shoulders before you keep trying to avoid the pain with alternatives. Also, I have always had shoulder issues with pressing movements while using barbells, Im sure you've already done this but if I were you I would strictly stick to dumbbell pressing movements. I do not think the length of your femurs can hinder your ability to squat or deadlift unless you have a serious medical issue. I would not take those two main lifts out of your training.

 

[HATE]

Well do you have any advice for strengthening my shoulder stabilizers? And I have done countless external rotations, and I've tried face pulls but it felt funky on my shoulder(maybe the weight wasn't light enough), and I've tried shrugs with my arms abducted in the scapular plane and yet again it irritated my shoulder. Like I'm stumped man. And I'm trying not to be a sissy about all this but im sure you and many others know how crappy it is when inflammation sets in during a workout. And maybe I can get away with deads if I have someone checking my form or just use a trap bar. But I seriously cannot do traditional squats. Im not mechanically designed for them. I know it sounds like an excuse but its impossible for me to keep my knees from passing over my toes without leaning forward and vice versa.

 

[Skipper999]

Try starting in the up position of pushups and then kind of roll your shoulder blades out as if you are trying to push up higher. Then return to the up position of a regular pushup.

 

[HATE]

Ok thank guys. I'm gonna try to see if I can resolve this problem. I hope I can figure something out bc this issue is really frustrating

 

[TaoPhD]

Do you take any supps for your joint issues? I've had elbow and shoulder pain and found that cissus supplements help way more than anything else such as glucosimine

 

[puccah8808]

It's weird but my joints feel better after taking fish oil.

 

[kenpoengineer]

IForce Joint Help plus glucosamine will help with pain, soreness and repair. Add fish oil in there as well for joints and heart health.

 

[HATE]

Yeah I've taken cissus powder and a supplement called super cissus multiple times. I've taken quite a bit of fish oil as well. Nothing really ever seemed to work so I stopped taking supplements and I'm currently not taking anything now. Also I tried glucosamine and chondroitin (not sure if that's spelled right) and nothing changed. The only thing that really ever works is taking a couple weeks off lifting but then again that approach is like one step forward and two steps back. But I will say that something strange happened this summer. My right shoulder was bothering me so I was trying to take things easy on it. Then one weekend I did something to aggravate my left shoulder. The following week at work I had to do some heavy lifting. My left shoulder was bothering me more so I decided to just tough it out with my right arm and let it take all the strain. So I grabbed the panels with just my right arm after doing all the lifting my shoulder instantly felt better. Does anyone have any idea why this would have happened? And the pain was right underneath my upper trap and the way the weight pulled was straight down like in a farmers walk or dead lift

 

[TaoPhD]

I have no idea. Maybe something was pinched and that opened the area enough to allow it to breath? How long did you take cissus for? It takes about three weeks with me to notice a difference.

 

[HATE]

Each time I had cissus it was a months supply. And I'm pretty sure I have taken for at least two months straight

 

[BigKrabbe]

I think if you really work on mobility and soft tissue work your injuries will begin to go away. Get a foam roller, tennis ball, racquet ball and get after it! Also cissus quadrangularis, joint force, antaneus labs Achilles are all good joint supplements to take. As always though, train around your injuries. Everyone's body is put together differently, and unfortunately some exercises don't work for some peoples bodies. Keep at it, don't let it get ya down.

 

[Joe_P]

I think if you really work on mobility and soft tissue work your injuries will begin to go away. Get a foam roller, tennis ball, racquet ball and get after it! Also cissus quadrangularis, joint force, antaneus labs Achilles are all good joint supplements to take. As always though, train around your injuries. Everyone's body is put together differently, and unfortunately some exercises don't work for some peoples bodies. Keep at it, don't let it get ya down.

I agree with this. Also if you want to work on your shoulders and stabilizers do your overhead pressing standing and finish your reps over your head. I added these in when benching took its toll and it worked wonders. Also start doing lots of chin-ups with different width grips. Not pullups, they will hurt pretty bad if your shoulders are in bad shape. You can do chins every day you workout in different rep schemes and they are easy to throw in between sets of other things.

 

[HATE]

Ok I'll add in those things. And thanks guys I appreciate your advice. It's nice that there are people out there that offer advice rather than just say tough it out.