Rotator Cuff Exercises Saved My Golf Game
Up until quite recently I thought I would never play golf again and, having been a life long fan of the game, I was not too happy about that. Rotator cuff exercises helped to rehabilitate my shoulder and got me playing golf again.
I tore my left rotator cuff helping a friend put up a timber garage. Stupid thing to do but very easily done, especially as you age. For some reason we neglect this group of muscles as we get older with the result that most rotator cuff injuries are the domain of the over forties. The other high risk groups are sports people and workers who use their shoulders a lot.
I woke up the following day with a sore shoulder. I knew that I had given it a knock so I assumed that it would just sort itself out over the next few days but instead, it just got worse. My shoulder got more painful and less flexible. Raising my arm to the side or front caused sharp pains in my shoulder. I had trouble getting showered or dressed. Reaching for anything hurt.
My arm deteriorated until I had no option but to give up any form of sports including my golf. I could hardly lift a golf club yet alone take a swing at a ball.
I visited my doctor who referred me to a specialist. He diagnosed a torn rotator cuff and a shoulder impingement. The pain in my shoulder on lifting my arm was being caused by a tendon rubbing against part of my shoulder blade. Each movement had frayed it a bit more making the injury worse.
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I was booked for surgery to release the tendon. This was simple key hole surgery during which the surgeon shaved away a piece of bone to enlarge the channel which the tendon ran through. Th eoperation went well but afterwards the surgeon explained that because of the severity of the tear and my age (late fifties) I was looking at anything up to eighteen months recuperation.
This started with three weeks off resting my arm so that the surgery site could heal. I used this time to find out about shoulder injuries on the internet, slowly. Typing with one hand!
I found out that rotator cuff exercises are a major part of the treatment of virtually all shoulder injuries. These are not exercises that use a lot of weight, far from it. The rotator cuff is a group of relatively small muscles so weights hardly come into it.
More research showed that although a rotator cuff tear is a painful injury it can be helped tremendously by the right kind of exercise. Yes you need to exercise the rotator cuff but you also need to start exercising all the other muscles of the shoulder.
We use twenty two different muscles to move our shoulders so by waking up all the muscles we support the rotator cuff when it moves allowing it to heal more quickly. Recent research has shown that a number of us are walking around with torn rotator cuffs without suffering any pain, due in the main to other shoulder muscles taking over and taking the strain as we move.
I started to exercise gently, taking care not to experience any pain, and gradually built up the number and intensity of exercises over the following weeks. I started to see an improvement quickly and things progressed from there.
Four months after my surgery I am back playing golf and pain free. What do I put this down to?
Resting my shoulder properly post op and letting it start to heal before I did any exercise and then I believe it is down to doing shoulder specific exercises aimed at not just the rotator cuff but the whole shoulder.
Rotator cuff exercises are now part of my daily routine. One surgical procedure is enough for me.
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