Shoulder Really Weak Following Nerve Problem

[Sub7]

This should help clear it up a little, I forgot there was a "T-Bar Bench Press" that west wide uses in addition to the oldschool t-bar/corner press -- here's a video of a 1 handed corner press:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrwAI1rk_Qc

So, it's completely different than the "T-Bar Bench Press". You aren't on a bench at all, but rather standing up, and the bar is wedged in the corner. The two-handed is the same thing, just with two hands. The less you lean into it the more the chest is engaged over the shoulders, but I would really just go with whatever feels most comfortable because it will work both in a very functional manner regardless of how you position your body.

Also, that is a shocking decrease in your bench. How long were you sidelined for?

The fact that your weakest point is at the bottom, and your chin strength is normal, would normally indicate that your chest is the lagging factor here, not your shoulders. However, with such a drastic decrease, there's got to be something else going on. Your overhead press, squat, and deadlift are all relatively normal compared to before? There's no other lift besides your bench that is way off?

In regards to the question on work load / overtraining, I would at least be careful due to the huge performance difference on the bench.. that seems very very odd.

The link is great, thanks so much.
I was unable to do any training whatsoever for only 3-4 days. After those 3-4 days I was able to work lower body right away. Biceps, shoulder (with side laterals, no presses) I began to work after 7 days. Back and chest I worked after a layoff of 15 days or so. The longest layoff was for traps, which I didn't work for more than 4 weeks (because traps were really stiff -at first I attributed the problem to traps pinching the nerves)
the strength losses are more or less as follows

chest: 45% or so
triceps: 30%
biceps: 10%
Shoulders: 15% in laterals (around 35% in shoulder presses)
legs/calves: practically no loss in strength
back: 10%
Traps: 15%

[Sub7]

Okay, I just went back and read your old thread. I had missed it before. I am no expert but here are my thoughts:

If you've ever had any symptoms of thoracic outlet syndrome before, I think adreno is right. If not, you probably need to go see a professional to get this sorted out.

Have you ever tried the test that is indicated here? (top of the page, with the numbered steps)

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/how-t...#axzz1r8Bz8AZI

The first time I tried that, my arms were over a foot from the floor, probably more than 16 inches. At that time, I couldn't complete an overhead squat to save my life, my overhead press was absolutely awful, and any time I put my arms over my head for more than a minute or so at a time they would feel like I'd been doing a combination of curls and tricep extensions for an hour. I would also get random nerve pains near my chest right where it connects to the arm that would scare the shit out of me. I'd get the same thing in my forearms too if I bent them at certain angles, only with my forearm it felt like a blood clot.

So anyway, I started doing a couple different types of thoracic extensions that I found on youtube. I did them twice a day for weeks (I still do them now, just once a day two times a week) and in the beginning the pain was absolutely excruciating. However, the good news is that they worked very well; I no longer have any of the pains described above, and my overhead press is much, much improved.

Just tried the test in the link and had no trouble whatsoever completing it. It was quite easy actually. I am very flexible for a male and that helped a lot.
As of now, there is no tingling, no pain and no twitching so I am assuming that the pinching of the nerve is no longer an issue.
I wish I had the resources to see a specialist, but this is an impossibility at this point.

[Sub7]

I think the reason your triceps and delts are recovery quicker because they are synergistic in many exercises so they likely get more work.

Just for clarification: I really do not think that the above is the case because
1- Even if it was completely idle (I did take 2 week breaks before) chest should have not lost nearly this much power
2- Once I started to work chest it started to regain power at a pretty slow rate
3- Even the syergistic muscles got only a few more workout sessions over the injury period as we're talking about a short duration layoff here. Hence there shouldn't be such a huge difference between chest and the synergistic muscles.

Could one or a few small muscles in the shoulder area be the problem and not the actual pectoralis major (or minor) or any of the 3 heads of the deltoid?
I feel the weakness deep inside and around the shoulder -though this is a very subjective assessment and therefore not very precise. But then again, not the deltoid, nor the triceps are so weak as to be able to explain the immense drop in chesty press strength. Flies too are not as weak as bench presses. So maybe shoulder stability is the issue here? and not the power of the muscles in the chest (and a good counter-argument to that is why shoulder press strength is less impacted than chest press strength if shoulder stability s the issue)...

[Sub7]

Giving this a quick bump to see if anyone has any comments about my last few posts

[ippon]

the strength losses are more or less as follows

chest: 45% or so
triceps: 30%
biceps: 10%
Shoulders: 15% in laterals (around 35% in shoulder presses)
legs/calves: practically no loss in strength
back: 10%
Traps: 15%

Somehow I missed this reply before.

I think the most important thing, health wise, is that you no longer have any indications of nerve pain. That's huge. Since you still have a very substantial decrease in strength it will probably turn out that it was never anything to do with nerves and just a small tear somewhere.

Your bench went way down but not your chest isolation moves and your shoulder press went down but not your lateral raise. It's almost certainly your anterior delt that is the weak link, as that would reduce your strength in several tricep exercises as well.

If I were you, my plan of action would depend on wether or not I was making progress in lifts that use the anterior delt.. if I was making progress, then I'd just slowly keep at it. If not, I would rest it for a while, because without going to a doc it's difficult to know exactly what happened underneath, and I would suspect a small tear.

[Sub7]

Ippon-san,
Thank you so very much for responding. So far, you have put in a substantial amount of your time into this and helped a tremendous amount. I cannot tell you how grateful I am. The post below will be somewhat long and time-consuming; though I hope not excessively... Here it goes, divided into subsections for ease of reading and logical organization.

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE MEANTIME:
Since my last post, I have not had any further nerve issues (or things that one could logically attribute to nerves anyway) such as tingling, spasms and twitches. No pain at rest either -except some tenderness in the shoulder as I will explain below... However, unfortunately, my chest presses have almost not improved at all. I have tried T-Bar presses and had also been doing front dumbbell rises for the anterior deltoid, in addition to trying to work up my chest press slowly. However, this resulted in shoulder pain and looked like it was over-stressing the area. Hence, I stopped doing these and reverted to doing mostly machine flies for chest.

I am making progress in machine flies (using a machine similar to this: http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-8258594-health-club-workout-flies-machine.php) and my left shoulder is pretty much OK even when I do somewhat heavy weights in flies. Though even in this very isolated move there is some shoulder discomfort.
Three weeks ago, I tried doing cable flies on an inclined bench for upper pecs, because I felt that machine flies were not adequately hitting upper chest. Unfortunately, I had to stop them because they too lead to shoulder discomfort. It is a combination of pain and discomfort, but basically the shoulder just won't support this exercise sufficiently, or that's what I feel like.

Now, as far as chest pressing, forget about it! The shoulder joint just has no power. The left (uninjured) side will press the weight easy, but the right side won't be able to get it up. I have tried a few presses here and there as an experiment, just to see if I am making progress, but no I am not really... Still weak as hell in chest presses.

In triceps pushdowns with a V-Bar, I can use almost as much weight as I did before the injury. However, in lying french presses, my strength just won't come back. I made only a little progress in this exercise -though still more than my near-zero improvement in chest press. The interesting thing is that seated shoulder presses have made some nice progress.

Also, amazingly, I can pretty much do the same number of front dumbbell rises with the right and left arms using identical dumbbells.

VISUAL CHECK:
Visually, the right triceps has pretty much caught up with the left (not fully, but close..). The right and left shoulders are pretty much the same size. As far as medial and anterior deltoid, there is pretty little difference on the left vs right side. The right trapezius is just a touch smaller than the left. Biceps had never shrunk, so it is perfectly fine.
However, the right chest is smaller than the left. The middle and lower portion is visibly smaller than the left.

HOW IT FEELS
As I indicated, I do not have shoulder pain in general. When I sleep on my right side, there is a very little something, but it doesn't deserve to be called "pain". Just some tenderness.
Where exactly the problem is has been so very hard to figure out, which is very perplexing. When I try to chest press -whether machine press, free weight press on a flat bench or decline or incline presses- the entire shoulder, but more the frontal deltoid feels weak. But when doing rear delt flies on a fly machine, the right rear deltoid/triceps complex feels weird. You know how the rear delt is pressed against the triceps when doping flies for your posterior deltoid, right? The whole area feels weird and weak; distinctly tender -though right and left side can almost move the same amount of weight in rear delt exercises.
Also what's weird is that everything feels pretty normal when doing triceps pushdowns with a V bar or rope. But when I perform triceps pushdowns by attaching a straight bar and grabbing it with my palms facing away from me, my left triceps feels tender and far weaker than my left.... very strange.

Another thing of note is that when I try to stretch my lats, I get a very slight "pull" on the right lat. But this pull and tenderness is limited to the very top of the muscle, where the back muscles connect to the shoulder area. However, overall latismus and back strength is fine...

MY HYPOTHESES
I, using my very limited and inadequate knowledge, respectfully disagree with a few things you said

"it will probably turn out that it was never anything to do with nerves and just a small tear somewhere."

When I had the pain and was unable to train, the effected muscles were (the following were either in pain or twitching or both. All on the right side): shoulder -both front and side heads of deltoid- chest, triceps, trapezius.
Now, other than a problem with a thick nerve bundle that supplies all of these muscles, what else can possibly explain this situation?
Please correct me if I am wrong, but no small tear can possibly have such wide ranging effects, can it? (unless it is in a very special area and the resulting edema is pressing on the nerve)

Furthermore, the atrophy was immense. I am 100% sure that had I simply not done anything at all and lied in a bed for 2 weeks with no physical movement, the atrophy would be far less. Does this not, once again, point to a nerve issue as opposed to a tear?

The symptoms fit thoracic outlet syndrome very well. Also, I had a wave of pain and tingly sensations periodically shoot through my arm during the 2 weeks I was in pain. Would that not point to a nerve issue as opposed to a tear? In addition, merely repositioning my arm would often help greatly reduce these symptoms, which again is pretty consistent with nerve issues and not very consistent with a tear, no?

Again, please correct me here. I am trying to figure this out and am merely sharing what I am seeing, not disagreeing just to look smart.

As far as the anterior deltoid being the problem right now, how can the frontal deltoid look pretty full and thick -pretty much identical in shape and size on the right and left- and still be the culprit? Or is appearance a poor indicator in such a case?
Also, is it possible to be able to do front dumbbell rises quite effectively if the anterior delt is the issue?

That's all for now Ippon, and thank you again so very much for your time. Please let me know what you think is going on. In the meantime, I will also try to see a doctor about this. I know I should have done so far earlier, but the circumstances here are not very conducive to doing so...

Thanks to all

Sub

[ippon]

Hey bud, sorry for the delayed reply. I picked out some lines from the first section to simplify/reduce things a little bit:

However, unfortunately, my chest presses have almost not improved at all...

I have tried T-Bar presses and had also been doing front dumbbell rises for the anterior deltoid, in addition to trying to work up my chest press slowly. However, this resulted in shoulder pain and looked like it was over-stressing the area. Hence, I stopped doing these and reverted to doing mostly machine flies for chest.

I am making progress in machine flies...

Three weeks ago, I tried doing cable flies on an inclined bench for upper pecs, because I felt that machine flies were not adequately hitting upper chest. Unfortunately, I had to stop them because they too lead to shoulder discomfort...

Now, as far as chest pressing, forget about it!

In triceps pushdowns with a V-Bar, I can use almost as much weight as I did before the injury. However, in lying french presses, my strength just won't come back. I made only a little progress in this exercise -though still more than my near-zero improvement in chest press. The interesting thing is that seated shoulder presses have made some nice progress.

Also, amazingly, I can pretty much do the same number of front dumbbell rises with the right and left arms using identical dumbbells.

Everything besides the last line is pretty much consistent with some sort of shoulder problem. The incline flies for example brought the shoulder in to play more. Same with the french press, far more shoulder involvement there than a v-bar pushdown. I am surprised that the arms are near equal in strength on the front dumbbell raises though, but obviously I don't know for sure that you've got a tear in your anterior delt. I'm just saying that it's probably a shoulder issue, and my prime suspect would be the anterior delt.

When I had the pain and was unable to train, the effected muscles were (the following were either in pain or twitching or both. All on the right side): shoulder -both front and side heads of deltoid- chest, triceps, trapezius.
Now, other than a problem with a thick nerve bundle that supplies all of these muscles, what else can possibly explain this situation?
Please correct me if I am wrong, but no small tear can possibly have such wide ranging effects, can it? (unless it is in a very special area and the resulting edema is pressing on the nerve)

Well, the shoulder is involved in any chest, tricep, and trapezius exercise that you can think of. There is a big difference however in terms of mechanical load from exercise to exercise (like the french press vs v-bar press down).

Furthermore, the atrophy was immense. I am 100% sure that had I simply not done anything at all and lied in a bed for 2 weeks with no physical movement, the atrophy would be far less. Does this not, once again, point to a nerve issue as opposed to a tear?

The symptoms fit thoracic outlet syndrome very well. Also, I had a wave of pain and tingly sensations periodically shoot through my arm during the 2 weeks I was in pain. Would that not point to a nerve issue as opposed to a tear? In addition, merely repositioning my arm would often help greatly reduce these symptoms, which again is pretty consistent with nerve issues and not very consistent with a tear, no?

Again, please correct me here. I am trying to figure this out and am merely sharing what I am seeing, not disagreeing just to look smart.

The extreme atrophy is puzzling. My experience in this issue is based on weight lifting injuries that me and training partners have gone through in the past, and I really don't think that I've ever seen anything exactly like what you're describing. However, I can definitely tell you that pain from tears is not entirely "isolated" like you would think.

As far as the anterior deltoid being the problem right now, how can the frontal deltoid look pretty full and thick -pretty much identical in shape and size on the right and left- and still be the culprit? Or is appearance a poor indicator in such a case?
Also, is it possible to be able to do front dumbbell rises quite effectively if the anterior delt is the issue?

I really wouldn't give any weight to the appearance aspect at all. However as I stated above I'm surprised by your front delt raises.

Really, we need to get someone to chime in that has experience with a similar injury to shed more light.

[Sub7]

Thank you very much for your response. Let me just re-ask one thing to get your opinion on this specifically. Again, primarily because I am curious:

the following were either in pain or twitching or both. All on the right side: shoulder -both front and side heads of deltoid- chest, triceps, trapezius.

Is it conceivable that a tear in one muscle will lead to pain and/or twitching in so many muscle groups? Can a tear even result in such a broad area being in pain or twitching while at rest?

I am talking about pain/twitching while lying down in bed, not having trained in a while. Not talking about lack of strength in the gym.

Thank you again...

[ippon]

Is it conceivable that a tear in one muscle will lead to pain and/or twitching in so many muscle groups? Can a tear even result in such a broad area being in pain or twitching while at rest?

Well again, I'm not saying that you've got a tear in your shoulder.. I'm saying that to me it looks like you've got a problem with your shoulder, and my guess is a tear. Maybe, maybe not. Remember, anytime you tear a muscle you are also causing damage to nerves on some level..

I am talking about pain/twitching while lying down in bed, not having trained in a while. Not talking about lack of strength in the gym.

Yeah I guess that's where we are talking about two different things. Obviously I have no way of knowing what was going on initially. I'm just looking at where you are now. The initial trauma/stimulus could well have affected some motor nerves. However I would think that actually severing nerves without your conscious recollection would be damn near impossible, and you don't have any paralysis or tingling pain right now.. I'm just looking at your lifts and seeing that all multi-joint exercises that use the shoulder are suffering in proportion to shoulder involvement. Unfortunately the only way you're going to know for sure where you're at now is to see a doc.

[Sub7]

Got it.
The good news is that my strength is slowly coming back. I seem to have found a reasonable level of stimulation while avoiding overtraining and will keep at it.

Will certainly report results

Thanks a ton Good Sir

[DeniseXan]

The good news is that my strength is slowly coming back. I seem to have found a reasonable level of stimulation while avoiding overtraining and will keep at it.

Glad to hear that things are looking a bit better.
In my experience, it is absolutely essential to avoid overtraining.

[vazw]

Dear Sub7,
I have the same symptoms as you. Almost identical. I want to see how you are progressing and if your strength is back to normal. Also, I was wondering if you had a flu shot or any other vaccination before the symptoms started. Every curious to hear your progress.
Besr,
V

[Gift3d]

are you sure its a nerve? I've had tendinitis in my rotator cuff before and that pain is brutal, somewhat comfortable by my side or above my head but anywhere in between is unbearable. Maybe go to a doc to confirm whatever the problem is

[musclehead]

Of course it is possible. The twitching could be a sign of a vitamin and mineral deficiency. Magnesium deficiency is thought to cause muscle twitching and magnesium deficiency is very common since magnesium is hard to obtain through food alone and supplementation is needed.