Shoulder pain/headaches

enhanced

enhanced

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
Trying to figure out how to keep this short and simple..

I'm thinking back in 2016, I was running a sustanon cycle. On flat bench, I worked my way up to the 100# db's. On my last rep, I usually bring the db's toward my thighs and sit myself upright on the bench.
That day, on that last rep, I was attempting to do that sit up motion with the db's. Evidently, I didn't breathe enough, and upon sitting, I experienced the absolute worst headache ever! I was afraid to stand up, thinking I was on the verge of passing out.
About 2 weeks went by with a very painful, dull pain on my left side of my skull. Almost felt like a very bad hangover. I went in for a CT scan and it came back negative.. They put me on anti-inflammatory meds.
2 weeks later, I had zero pain relief. I went to my personal Dr and she put me on a couple different muscle relaxers and nsaid's. About 2 weeks into that, I had significant relief. I finished off the Rx and never had it refilled.
As the years have gone by, I still get the severe headaches in the same area if im working on projects around the house. Almost like a stress related/tension headache. I pop 4 ibuprofen, lay on the couch and it eventually goes away.
These past 6+ months or so, I've been dealing with what feels like probably some major knots in my left rear trap that runs up my neck and limits how far I can turn my head to the left.
Again, when working outside, that pain travels up my trap and to the rear base of my skull, completely stopping me from doing anything.

So here's my question. Do I go back to the Dr for more meds? I hate taking prescription pills...

Should I seek a good deep tissue massage to work out the knots?

Dry needling at my chiropractors office?

Would bpc-157/Tb-500 help? Not sure i could inject myself in the rear trap..

Thanks for any information anybody might have.. Years of this has gotten old. View attachment 197634
 
enhanced

enhanced

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
Not sure the other pic worked.
Screenshot_20200914-160644_Gallery.jpeg
 

Resolve10

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
  • RockStar
Can you get someone to massage it? A weaker version would be taking a lacrosse ball to a wall and rolling on that, but a licensed therapist would be so much better.

While actual evidence for benefits is iffy when I've had issues with the neck like that I get a quick manipulation (crack), cupping, or when it was real bad some needling. These are things I wouldn't want to become frequent and the underlying issue should be addressed, but I've found pretty quick relief with all depending on the issue that allowed me to get back to normal life and then address any underlying issue as needed.

I'd definitely recommend all those before going back for more pills.
 
HIT4ME

HIT4ME

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
So, what do you do for a living? Are you sitting a lot? Can you get some photos of your posture?

It sounds like some kind of impingement or nerve issue of it is related to the headache, and given that both pains are so uniquely severe if I am reading you right, they seem possibly related.

Have you tried turning your head so that you are facing the non-effected shoulder, tuck your chin down toward your chest and gently use your non-effected hand to reach over your head, grab the back top of your head and pull forward/down to stretch that trap a little? I would repeat this for both sides to get your neck loosened up, and also work on some posture exercises.
 
Ptlhains

Ptlhains

Active member
Awards
3
  • First Up Vote
  • Established
  • RockStar
I am 53 and love dry needling and have a great person to do it.
I am gonna say that if you get only a few needles, its useless.
Find someone that really knows what they are doing and is not afraid to drop a box or two of needles (40-80) in traps and neck.
 
enhanced

enhanced

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
Can you get someone to massage it? A weaker version would be taking a lacrosse ball to a wall and rolling on that, but a licensed therapist would be so much better.

While actual evidence for benefits is iffy when I've had issues with the neck like that I get a quick manipulation (crack), cupping, or when it was real bad some needling. These are things I wouldn't want to become frequent and the underlying issue should be addressed, but I've found pretty quick relief with all depending on the issue that allowed me to get back to normal life and then address any underlying issue as needed.

I'd definitely recommend all those before going back for more pills.
Good idea on the lacrosse ball for my own personal massage.
 
enhanced

enhanced

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
So, what do you do for a living? Are you sitting a lot? Can you get some photos of your posture?

It sounds like some kind of impingement or nerve issue of it is related to the headache, and given that both pains are so uniquely severe if I am reading you right, they seem possibly related.

Have you tried turning your head so that you are facing the non-effected shoulder, tuck your chin down toward your chest and gently use your non-effected hand to reach over your head, grab the back top of your head and pull forward/down to stretch that trap a little? I would repeat this for both sides to get your neck loosened up, and also work on some posture exercises.
The old Marine in me still has me with great posture. People actually still comment on it.
The stretch you mentioned - pulling my head down in the opposite direction- actually does provide some relief. Especially when the headache is throbbing!
 
enhanced

enhanced

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
I am 53 and love dry needling and have a great person to do it.
I am gonna say that if you get only a few needles, its useless.
Find someone that really knows what they are doing and is not afraid to drop a box or two of needles (40-80) in traps and neck.
Interesting.. We just went into phase 3 with covid. Not sure where to find a place that will put that many needles in me. Lol.
My chiropractor has done it a few times in other areas. (I'm all broke down, lol)
 
enhanced

enhanced

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
A couple things I forgot to mention.
I'm 48 years old and have never stopped being active, except for maybe a week here and there..

I don't like taking pain pills.

I have a great chiropractor that has done cupping, needling, and adjusting here and there for different areas of my back.

I dealt with a severely pinched sciatic nerve a few months ago that lasted about 7 months.

Spondlthendesis L4-5.. Like bad.. Like, surgery is inevitable..
 
Ptlhains

Ptlhains

Active member
Awards
3
  • First Up Vote
  • Established
  • RockStar
I am glad you have a great chiro. Geez, the stuff you described above sounds like me lol. Damm covid lockdown stuff does not help us with conditioning or finding professionals. I have a physio person who really knows dry needling and a massage guy who does dry needling and active release. I would ask local powerlifter or football or strongman type athletes who they go too or know. If you have not done active release, I would suggest that over massage. For that area of the traps / neck, I really find that face pulls with a straight or curved push down bar (while looking up toward the ceiling) really helps. I can really find and focus on the knot with high reps (30+). I also use the rope every few times. And do these movements for a few sets twice a week.
 
enhanced

enhanced

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
I love face pulls!! I always use the rope. I'll try it with a bar and face up next time.
 

sammpedd88

Well-known member
Awards
3
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • RockStar
Trying to figure out how to keep this short and simple..

I'm thinking back in 2016, I was running a sustanon cycle. On flat bench, I worked my way up to the 100# db's. On my last rep, I usually bring the db's toward my thighs and sit myself upright on the bench.
That day, on that last rep, I was attempting to do that sit up motion with the db's. Evidently, I didn't breathe enough, and upon sitting, I experienced the absolute worst headache ever! I was afraid to stand up, thinking I was on the verge of passing out.
About 2 weeks went by with a very painful, dull pain on my left side of my skull. Almost felt like a very bad hangover. I went in for a CT scan and it came back negative.. They put me on anti-inflammatory meds.
2 weeks later, I had zero pain relief. I went to my personal Dr and she put me on a couple different muscle relaxers and nsaid's. About 2 weeks into that, I had significant relief. I finished off the Rx and never had it refilled.
As the years have gone by, I still get the severe headaches in the same area if im working on projects around the house. Almost like a stress related/tension headache. I pop 4 ibuprofen, lay on the couch and it eventually goes away.
These past 6+ months or so, I've been dealing with what feels like probably some major knots in my left rear trap that runs up my neck and limits how far I can turn my head to the left.
Again, when working outside, that pain travels up my trap and to the rear base of my skull, completely stopping me from doing anything.

So here's my question. Do I go back to the Dr for more meds? I hate taking prescription pills...

Should I seek a good deep tissue massage to work out the knots?

Dry needling at my chiropractors office?

Would bpc-157/Tb-500 help? Not sure i could inject myself in the rear trap..

Thanks for any information anybody might have.. Years of this has gotten old. View attachment 197634
I did this same thing a few months ago doing bent over rows with a barbell. I couldn’t even roll over in my bed without feeling like someone was stabbing me in the head which is the same spot you have circled. I took ibuprofen like candy and rubbed biofreeze on it. It finally went away but I still feel it slightly every now and then. Just FYI if you’re not aware your traps actually link to that spot you have circled so be carful doing shoulder work or anything targeting the traps.
 

Uncle_E

Member
Awards
2
  • First Up Vote
  • Established
My back is crooked from scoliosis, so I frequently get those pains in the trap/neck. I find that the lat’s have a surprising role in causing it. I loosen up the lats with stretches, foam roller and massage gun and see a big reduction in the pain.
 

sammpedd88

Well-known member
Awards
3
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • RockStar
I did this same thing a few months ago doing bent over rows with a barbell. I couldn’t even roll over in my bed without feeling like someone was stabbing me in the head which is the same spot you have circled. I took ibuprofen like candy and rubbed biofreeze on it. It finally went away but I still feel it slightly every now and then. Just FYI if you’re not aware your traps actually link to that spot you have circled so be carful doing shoulder work or anything targeting the traps.
Also dry needling wouldn’t be a bad idea. There’s prob not a lot of circulation in that area so anything to force blood to that area to heal would be beneficial I’d think.
 
Ptlhains

Ptlhains

Active member
Awards
3
  • First Up Vote
  • Established
  • RockStar
I love face pulls!! I always use the rope. I'll try it with a bar and face up next time.
The hand position and ability to isolate makes all the difference.
As long as your looking up, it does not matter where the bar lands (face, chin, upper neck)....just focus on that knot and bust that bitch up lol....
 
HIT4ME

HIT4ME

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
The perception of most people that you have good posture does not mean that you actually have good posture :)

The idea that you were training chest when you first did this, and you attributed the headache to not breathing does not mean that it actually was caused by not breathing - and the clear MRI is important here. Obviously not breathing and an aneurysm would be my first concern and I'm glad that was checked out.

Having very little actual evidence to go on, it sounds to me like a muscle imbalance that is causing stress somewhere around the area. Without direct observation and a lot of skill (which honestly there are plenty people who know more about rehab than I do, I wish I knew a lot more), it can be hard to pinpoint what is going on for a number of reasons.

The first thing everyone goes to, and may be the case here since it happened after a chest movement with pretty heavy weights, is that your "pulling" muscles in your back aren't strong enough to sustain the force of the stretch caused by your "pushing" muscles in your chest. This is often said to be seen in your shoulders "rounding" foward slightly. I think to an untrained eye, someone with otherwise good posture could look to be stick straight, but this shoulder rounding is still an issue. The other thing to check is how your arms fall if you stand relaxed with your arms to your sides. Do your pals face perpendicular to your thighs? Or are your palms at an angle to your thighs or even somewhat backwards?

But it could also be another muscle in your back that is weak and can't support your traps or is making your traps work hard, or a muscle that shares the same nerve as the traps. As a personal example, I once had a really bad pain in my front right delt that would NOT go away. It made it hard to move my arm often times, and no amount of manipulation seemed to help it heal.

Then one day I was foam rolling my upper back and I hit a spot that felt like a knife was being pushed into the very spot on my shoulder that I thought was injured. Using a baseball I found the precise spot between the bottom inside corner of my shoulder blade and my spine that caused pain in my shoulder and rolled that out and the improvement over the next couple days was dramatic. I would have never guessed, but that muscle must have shared a nerve with the shoulder muscle and my shoulder wasn't even what was really hurt.

My other thought, which has been tremendously helpful when I did it - yoga. I used to do this and need to start again, but when I did it I was amazed at the unexpected improvement I saw in all my little nagging pains that I attributed to getting older.

Sorry I don't have super specific advice, but maybe this will give you a different way to look at it that could help. I don't know.
 
enhanced

enhanced

Well-known member
Awards
4
  • RockStar
  • Established
  • First Up Vote
  • Best Answer
I really need to get to the sporting goods store and get a baseball and back up to my brick wall and roll it.
Again, my posture is great. Shoulders always up & back. Lower back with a slight arch in it. Hands resting, tend to face somewhat out - the tops of my hands facing backwards.
I know there's a lot of nerves that run across the traps, so pinpointing it probably won't be easy.
I guess in the meantime I can start popping 800mg ibuprofen upon waking each day just to combat the inflammation and pain.
 

Similar threads


Top