Perpetually Injured. Could really use some advice

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I have been training for years. I did Taekwondo from age 6-14, played football for a year, did "backyard" grappling from 12-19, BJJ from 19-22 on and off, and have been doing boxing training and olympic lifting for the past few years. Every time I start to get some traction, I get injured. I am currently dealing with an ongoing shoulder problem, and reoccurring plantar fasciitis, which has dominoed into knee pain because I walk on the outside of my left foot to compensate. My neck hurts all the time from the shoulder being tight.

I stopped doing BJJ because it would flair up injuries. I started progressing fast in strength training until I damaged my SI joint and tailbone from deadlifting with not the best form. I moved over to olympic lifting as the weights were smaller and I enjoyed it more. Now anytime I do overhead work I get shoulder pain post workout. I took a break from weights because of the pandemic and have been doing a lot of cycling and bodyweight exercises. The cycling has been going well, but its causing my tailbone to get bruised. Bodyweight stuff has been good, I can probably do at least a dozen pull up all the way down, but my shoulder will be in pain for a week plus. Anytime I add muscle mass, I end up with less mobility and more pain. I can do my workouts pain free most of the time, but by the end of the workout, I am in pain.

The only thing that helps is stretching, massage, and not working out unfortunately. Everytime I take time off to let things heal, they tend to come back very quickly and its just this cycle of damaging myself and healing.

I dont have money to get surgery or to even get an MRI, so I am stuck with minimizing risk. Just typing this hurts my neck and shoulder.

I dont want to give up, but I also dont want to live a life of perpetual pain and injury.
 
Welcome to my world brother.
You need to learn what's important to you. Some activities risk injury and are worth it. Some activities risk injury and are not worth it.

I have been training for years. I did Taekwondo from age 6-14, played football for a year, did "backyard" grappling from 12-19, BJJ from 19-22 on and off, and have been doing boxing training and olympic lifting for the past few years. Every time I start to get some traction, I get injured. I am currently dealing with an ongoing shoulder problem, and reoccurring plantar fasciitis, which has dominoed into knee pain because I walk on the outside of my left foot to compensate. My neck hurts all the time from the shoulder being tight.
Some of your injuries could be improved with money but I'll stay away from those suggestions.
I've had shoulder/neck problems for almost 15 years now. Stop doing anything that causes them pain. Then you can develop a good program towards improving them.
If you have poor walking mechanics due to pain, get off your feet, stop walking so much. Let the injuries heal.

I stopped doing BJJ because it would flair up injuries. I started progressing fast in strength training until I damaged my SI joint and tailbone from deadlifting with not the best form. I moved over to olympic lifting as the weights were smaller and I enjoyed it more. Now anytime I do overhead work I get shoulder pain post workout.
I picked up the Olympic lifts for a year before dropping them due to shoulder pain. How important are they to you? You can get plenty strong while remaining healthy with other exercises. If you don't plan on competing, I would suggest you drop olympic lifting and all other exercises that cause pain, especially if your main goal is boxing.

I took a break from weights because of the pandemic and have been doing a lot of cycling and bodyweight exercises. The cycling has been going well, but its causing my tailbone to get bruised. Bodyweight stuff has been good, I can probably do at least a dozen pull up all the way down, but my shoulder will be in pain for a week plus.
Pullups can be hard on the shoulders, I rarely do them now. They were my favourite and best exercise for many years. Try inverted rows instead.
I'm not a cyclist but several of my friends are. They wear special compression shorts with padding underneath. They say it's 100% necessary to protect your tailbone. This will cost money but I imagine it's worth the investment.

Anytime I add muscle mass, I end up with less mobility and more pain. I can do my workouts pain free most of the time, but by the end of the workout, I am in pain.
Adding muscle should not affect your mobility, maybe post your training because something is wrong.
Again, figure out which exercises cause pain and stop doing those.

The only thing that helps is stretching, massage, and not working out unfortunately. Everytime I take time off to let things heal, they tend to come back very quickly and its just this cycle of damaging myself and healing.
Are you learning from your mistakes or repeating the exact same thing after healing and expecting different results?

I dont have money to get surgery or to even get an MRI, so I am stuck with minimizing risk. Just typing this hurts my neck and shoulder.
I dont want to give up, but I also dont want to live a life of perpetual pain and injury.
When I have some time I'll give you my recommendations for your shoulders/neck.
 
Sounds like a life of poor decisions and poor training progression.

Like you really fucked your own body hard here.

All I can say is take time off and rehabilitate. Then when you're better start slow as hell and don't push your body to the breaking point.

Slow and steady really is the best way.
 
Sounds like you're tight and potentially have poor lifestyle habits. You need to stretch. I stretch 2 hours a day. If I take one day off I feel like you, two days I'm nearly crippled. Americans are retarded and never stretch. An MRI isn't going to show anything. Don't waste money. People get back surgery who have never stretched a day in their life. Half ass shit wont do anything and if you stop the benefits are gone.

Find some yoga on youtube for those areas and do at least 20 hours of stretching a week for a month before you decide it doesnt work. That is on top of the warmups and cooldowns you need to do before and after workouts. Let me know. The other choice is waste 20 hours a week on tv or something and never be healthy. I hope you dont do that it would be a waste.

If you take this seriously you will prevail. Old cars get fixed and run great if a smart, committed mechanic decides he wants it to fucking happen. But if you continue to floor it with the check engine light on, you're in for a short, shitty ride.
 
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How many minutes do you stretch each shoulder for in how many different positions after each workout?

How many minutes do you spend warming up those shoulders?

Does your routine look like the routine of a guy who puts 100% into effort thought preparation and execution of his recovery program every single time? What can you start/stop today that moves you closer to that? How often do you have and act on these thoughts?

MAKE IT FUCKING HAPPEN
 
Is there anything you have done that has made your injuries feel better? I'm not being snide, a lot of people don't draw causal relationships between doing something that makes an injury feel good.

The short answer is stop doing things that hurt and do things that feel better instead. The second part is difficult, but it's worth investing some time in.

- Find some stretches specific to your injuries. I'm partial to stretching with a band when I can, but I do a fair number of yoga stretches like sleeping pigeon, triangle stretch and downward facing dog too. Sit on the floor when you watch tv and you'll be more likely to stretch passively rather than need a dedicated time to stretch if that's too much for you.

- foam rollers and/or a 4" diameter piece of pvc are a godsend for self massage. Role on whatever is sore, it's good for you.

- recovery and mobility work get the blood flowing in a lot of tight joints like shoulders, hips, and wrist. I do a lot of grip-centric work so I use some heavy dexterity balls or small shotputs every day. I warmup in the morning with some 8 lb Indian club swings to warm up my shoulders. I hear swimming is great for hips, but I'm without access to a pool.

There's a lot to consider when rehabbing an injury, but anything that becomes prohibitively painful (like above a 3 or 4 out of 10) or that makes an injury hurt more afterwards is best avoided for now.
 
Hi there,

I have had an ongoing shoulder issue for around 5/6 years and recently it has gotten a lot better, this is through years of trial and error - it still isnt 100 percent but I can now bench and do shoulder work 90 percent of the time with no pain. I know exactly how you feel, I used to take 3/4 months off and then go back to training/gym and its still there!

My advice to you is to see a physiotherapist, honestly the shoulder injury could be absolutely anything- but sounds like impingement to me. I know it is expensive in the states, in the UK its free but I did go to a private one.

The shoulder is such a complex joint , that you-tubing exercises and physio could make the problem worse.
Although saying that lots of scapula engagement helped me massively. I actually avoided benching for years and developed such a weakness in my shoulder , that recently when I have started to bench it has helped the pain.
 
Also regarding foam roller, I would advise against buying one and get a hard massage ball type of thing. Not a hockey ball as they are too hard.

You can get hard rubberised ones - the reason I state this is that these type of balls are much better at getting into shoulders and you will soon find where the pain/tightness is coming from.

Its pretty crazy- I had loads of tension under my armpit and lat - area that felt amazing after it was massaged out- felt like a new man.
 
Forcing myself to deload was a big help, even if I felt pretty good and maybe didn't need it, I started doing it anyway. Make deloads part of your program and stick to it. Exercise must be consistent to make progress......deloads require the same consistency.

Stretching, mobility work, active recovery on off days, staying on top of your nutrition and sleep, and limiting stress are pretty much all conventional wisdom.
 
Hey guys, a lot of info so Ill just reply as a whole here. I stretch for 20 minutes a day. I do the arm behind the head, opposite arm behind the tricep, the kimura stretch, stretch my pecs, doorway stretch, the yoga threading the needle stretch. I use a percussion massager and a lacrosse ball to roll over the tight spots. I changed from side sleeping to back sleeping. The tension by the rear shoulder capsule/infraspinatus is unreal. All the above helps, but it constantly comes back. I have also isolated and did the external rotation and internal rotation exercises. All help, but one day off from stretching or an intense workout sets.me back.

Gonna take baby baby steps. Going to stretch and work on imbalances before progressing further.

Going to prioritize boxing training, as its the most important to me.
 
Recovery takes just as much effort as training its way less fun though.
 
work on getting front squat form to perfection. only go as heavy as you can maintain form. deep pause squats.

pushups

pullups

shadowboxing and running.

thatll work everything and should keep you injury free, and should even open up your hips, stretch your back out, make things better, etc.

the pushups you might find light in comparison to the other two lifts.... get a weight vest, or rig something up so that you can get lower than parallel. full range of motion on all three lifts will do wonder.
 
Hey guys, a lot of info so Ill just reply as a whole here. I stretch for 20 minutes a day. I do the arm behind the head, opposite arm behind the tricep, the kimura stretch, stretch my pecs, doorway stretch, the yoga threading the needle stretch. I use a percussion massager and a lacrosse ball to roll over the tight spots. I changed from side sleeping to back sleeping. The tension by the rear shoulder capsule/infraspinatus is unreal. All the above helps, but it constantly comes back. I have also isolated and did the external rotation and internal rotation exercises. All help, but one day off from stretching or an intense workout sets.me back.

Gonna take baby baby steps. Going to stretch and work on imbalances before progressing further.

Going to prioritize boxing training, as its the most important to me.
A lot of good advice in this thread already. 20 minutes of stretching a day doesn't indicate that stretching is a limiting factor. Of course, there's a variety of stretches that could help you specificly, more or less, but if you feel like you are currently getting relief that's a good sign. However, as beneficial as they are, they don't necessarily change the root cause of why you are having pain. At least that seems to be true in your case.

Unfortunately some people are simply more injury prone than others. I myself have worked through countless of injuries and nagging pains, but it's just how things are. There is of course the whole dietary and lifestyle side of things which is important. Sleep, healthy diet, healthy mindset. In regards to your training, the easiest thing is dictating volume and exercise selection. Lower the volume, don't overdo repetitive patterns, do other exercises that do not hurt, attempt to figure out what works for you. Sometimes that's a hard pill to swallow, especially if you have physical talent or ambitious goals, but fortunately you can often find substitutes that gives you near equal benefits.

However, if I was you, I would seek out a professional like an orthopeadic physical therapist. He/she will be able to examine you, give you tools to rehabilitate your shoulder (and other injuries) and hopefully make a long term plan with your goals as a focus. I would recommend someone who has experience working with athletes/strength trained patients and who actually examines you, and gives you exercises you can use, as well as adjust the program according to your symptoms. If they only want to give you ultrasound and a massage, that's a red flag, and it's on to the next one.
 
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You need to strengthen using light weights and prehab/rehab exercises if stretching isn’t helping
 
Everyone is just guessing as there are so many reasons why you could be hurting yourself and we can't see everything you're doing.

You mentioned hurting yourself deadlifting because of poor form. I'm not going to guess what your problem is, all I will say is all the mobility, foam rolling and recovery work won't make any difference if you're using poor form (especially bracing), poor progression and don't know when to stop a set when things don't feel right.
 
We cant just guess, it could be many things you know, bad form, overtraining, just take it easy and go see a doctor.
 
The big root of my problem is that I was trying to serve too many masters. I wanted to be elite in everything. I wanted to be really strong, be able to run 5 minute miles, do BJJ, do boxing, do weightlifting etc.

What I have learned is that there is only so much energy, time, and resources and you cant be elite at everything. Not many guys can DL 1000lbs, but also run Marathons.

I need to specify more. Boxing is my main focus and besides cardio and some mild strength work, the majority of my training needs to reflect my goals. I felt like I was spreading myself too thin over many disciplines, and every time I was in pain, I thought I was just being weak.

Snatching isnt going to make me a better fighter as much as I like it. Constantly trying to set new PRs gets in the way of boxing. I have tried for years to balance the two and trying to force it just leads to injuries.

Boxing and Cardio only for now. Shadow boxing, heavybag, sparring when gyms reopen, and drill work only. Cycling daily and light jogging when my foot isnt nagging. Stretch daily. Going to take the opposite approach and keep things simple as possible and avoid things that injure me.
 
Mate- please go see a physio.

I made loads of threads about mine and none of the advice I ever got from anyone was right, The shoulder is a very complex joint.

I dont know how much physio is in the states, but a few seshions could change your athletic career for the positive
 
The big root of my problem is that I was trying to serve too many masters. I wanted to be elite in everything. I wanted to be really strong, be able to run 5 minute miles, do BJJ, do boxing, do weightlifting etc.

What I have learned is that there is only so much energy, time, and resources and you cant be elite at everything. Not many guys can DL 1000lbs, but also run Marathons.

I need to specify more. Boxing is my main focus and besides cardio and some mild strength work, the majority of my training needs to reflect my goals. I felt like I was spreading myself too thin over many disciplines, and every time I was in pain, I thought I was just being weak.

Snatching isnt going to make me a better fighter as much as I like it. Constantly trying to set new PRs gets in the way of boxing. I have tried for years to balance the two and trying to force it just leads to injuries.

Boxing and Cardio only for now. Shadow boxing, heavybag, sparring when gyms reopen, and drill work only. Cycling daily and light jogging when my foot isnt nagging. Stretch daily. Going to take the opposite approach and keep things simple as possible and avoid things that injure me.

I did some amateur boxing years ago and one thing many don't appreciate is how much impact your shoulders take in heavy bag work. Schmoes throwing arm punches can flail away all day but if you have good form and hit hard and fast, all that impact is being absorbed by your arms, shoulders and body. The first guy that trained me as a teenager said for that reason he didn't even hit heavy bags anymore, just focus mitts, pad work and sparring. I've had recurring AC joint and rotator cuff injuries from years of bad form in barbell benchpress but would also periodically do a heavy bag session if my gym had one. I've since corrected my BP form by switching to suicide grip with elbows in but hadn't hit bags in a few years. Two months ago my last workout before my gym closed, no one else showed up for BJJ so I did a heavy bag session by myself. And my right shoulder was hurting for a month and a half.

Re. cycling, I've always liked it for active recovery but IMO those tiny hard plastic racing seats are a recipe for making yourself sterile. If it's causing you pain, just get one of those wide cushioned seats that are more comfortable. If it allows you to ride without pain, it's a no brainer.

Re. lifting weights, without fail the ways I've injured myself have been 1) going for 1RM and 2) cranking out crossfit style AMRAP with shitty form on last few reps because "feel the burn, bro." Fuck that, it's not worth it. Always leave one or two reps in the tank and live again to lift another day without injury.

I've trained a lot of different combat sports over the years and am lucky to still be doing it in my mid-40's, but one thing that's helped me was forced multi-year breaks in between job relocations and/or getting tied up with family stuff. In hindsight, that's been critical in letting me recover from nagging injuries and re-starting the combat sport a few years later with fresh mindset.
 
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