tendonitis in forearm...

[rookie]

wellp the label basically says it all... havent taking any time off of training in about 7 months...and in time off i mean just a week to rest my joints and body... i started haveing a little sharp pain doing heavy preacher curls and barbell curls about 4 months ago, but i ignored it, and it slowly got really bad, but i kept working through it...now it hurts to do little things... what can i do to get rid of the tendanidous?? i quit heavy bicep work...i just do high reps now...thinkin about msm, chrondritan(spelling?) and shark cartillage to help with all my aches and pains...i take aspirin before i train as well now which i dont like doing. any advice would be great! thanks guys.:

[CF-OC_gal]

Tendonitis is for life. You'll have to learn to live with it. Ignoring or pushing through the pain is the worst thing you can do as it causes futher damage and can lead to surgery. Go get it diagnosed and go for physiotherapy. Give it a rest so you can start to heal, even when you are not in the gym.


I have it in my elbow. It first showed up about 13 years ago. In my particular case there are certain movements and equipment that aggrevate it like most cable work and movements that rotate the forearm while using a heavy weight. It's not worth fighting it. It is possible to work around it after you get better.

[Khaine]

I had that in my forearm too... Worked wit it and it spread up my arm to my shoulder...

Take two weeks off lifting altogether... Don't irritate it any more than necessary... Training through it is pretty much the dumbest thing you do, it won't disappear if you keep aggravating it...

[luke.w]

if tendonitis is shooting pain from the forearm all the way up the bicep and shoulders then I have this, BUT it only acts up when I've done some major forearm/grip stuff and then train again the next day, I'd say the type of training I've chosen has caused some pain, BUT the type of training I've chosen has helped it also (I had this problem when I was more into 5-day BBsplits, when I arm-wrestled for a few weekends for fun, stupid stuff) I believe the stronger my tendons get the less it bothers me and when it does it's gone the next day only to return when I've hit it "HARD" several days in a row.

for instance 14-flips on my tire made my grip and forearms sore, the next day I bent several pieces of 3/8" short bars (never did as many before), then ripped a phonebook which absolutly killed my lower arms the shooting pain was there, I rested a day and then did cleans,overheads,and thickbar with no problem, and feel stronger today.

rest up and strengthen those tendons, if it's bad, 5-day splits will be murder, and popping asprin/pills to train is a bad bad idea.

[rookie]

i cut out direct bicep work...except a few light sets...i am gonna have surgery in a bit and have to take 3 weeks off so i was thinkin i should tough it out until then...what do u guys think?

[luke.w]

Originally Posted by rookie

i cut out direct bicep work...except a few light sets...i am gonna have surgery in a bit and have to take 3 weeks off so i was thinkin i should tough it out until then...what do u guys think?

you still use the arms in full ROM in any pressing right?, IMO you maybe should just use a differant approch in your training until it's better/stronger, theres so many approches to go for, it's endless.

[rookie]

do you have any suggestions?

[luke.w]

set up a routine that will have your arms rested for couple days inbetween workouts, drop the split if thats what your doing and try full-body workouts 2-3times a week, you'll have to turn down the intesity on some days on certain exercises if it's still causeing problems, and work back up, you'll have to listen to whats going on when deciding how much volume and intesity your doing.

[Dan C]

Tendonitis is often misdiagnosed as a result of trigger points - www.triggerpointbook.com

[Weston]

I had tendonitis in my elbows from heavy lifting and I successfully recovered. Here's what I learned:

1) Warm Up
Your tendons are like dry noodles. If you don't soften them up with heat, then you are going to crack them. Since your tendons are inflamed by bicep curls, then you need to warm up your forearm muscles before curling by squeezing a gripper and doing forearm exercises.

2) Change Up
My tendons get stressed from doing chin-ups with palms facing towards me and my grip about shoulder-width apart. Therefore, I do pull-ups instead with my palms facing away and my grip wider than shoulder-width. Since you are doing barbells curls that lock your palms into a particular plane of motion, you may want to use dumbbells instead and change your palm position so that you are doing hammer curls or reverse curls.

3) Grip It
My tendons got stressed from doing heavy barbell shrugs with safety wraps. I used safety wraps because my grip gave out before my other muscles. From that mistake, I learned to let my grip be my guide in terms of how heavy to go. You may be curling so heavy that the bar is resting in your palms rather than your fingers. This takes pressure off your forearms muscles but puts it on your elbow tendons. You need to instead squeeze the bar to activate your forearm muscles and distribute the load.

4) Drop It
Since it hurts you to do little things, you should seriously think about taking a break from lifting. You look like a young guy. Taking 3 months off from lifting is not going to ruin your life or appearance. Why don't you work on running: high-intensity intervals rather than moderate-intensity endurance? To keep your upper-body fitness, try doing some bodyweight exercises like push-ups, pull-ups, and sit-ups. But rather than training to failure on these, just do sets of 70% of your max reps, and do one set each morning, afternoon, and evening. Your body will thank you for the break and you will be surprised by how cut you get from running and bodyweight exercises. Don't forget to cut back your nutrition intake when you cut back your lifting.

It worked for me!

[rookie]

thanks alot...great advice guys... im currently not doing any upper body movements for the next week...and next week im gonna start back into my program but just do high reps on bicep work and hope that enables my tendons to strengthen...what do you think?