Woke up on the 10th and felt perfectly fine, throughout the day I noticed some pain in my shoulder and by the end of the day I was barely able to lift my arm. Banged out of work and was seen at urgent care and diagnosed with calcific tendonitis and have been in the same condition since. Took some steroids, iced it and monitored with no relief. PCP insisted I start PT and see what happens, but with only a month and a week worth of sick time in the bank, I can't afford to wait. I bypassed him and went right to an ortho for a 2nd opinion. Got a shot of cortisone in the shoulder and advised to monitor for the next few days and see what happens. He's know for being very conservative when it comes to surgical interventions, and even he said it's a pretty bad case of it and may require very minimally invasive intervention to remove the calcification.

Almost 2 weeks without a full nights sleep and no real use of my left arm is really starting to get to me. Here's hoping the cortisone works.

Good luck. Arthritis in both shoulders, knees, ankle, and back. I feel the shoulders the most. 5 minutes of daily moving with arm bands and rotations helps a lot.

I had this exact issue. Go find a sports medicine doctor with a non-invasive focused ultrasound machine, it will take a few treatments, but it worked when the steroid shots, PT (in which I’m a huge believer), and an outpatient invasive treatment over the course of two years all failed.

Frozen shoulder here…

Are you taking any supplements that include calcium? If so, stop.

I have found the best treatment is excercise and stretching the shoulder joints. My own form of PT.

It hurts, but it’s worth it. You need to break up the calcification.
Funny story…my right shoulder has gotten significantly better…reason being, I was throwing a baseball with the kids and threw one as hard as I could. My right shoulder crinkled, cracked, popped. PAIN! Then, relief. My doc said I broke up the calcium and scar tissues in there.

I am not convinced you have a proper diagnosis. Get an MRI.

Dealing with a torn tendon right now and have been for 6 months. It’s been horrible.

Like he said, get a MRI. Once that is done ask your ortho about stem cell injection or platelet injection. I’ve had numerous sports injuries where this fixed it and I avoided surgery. Going through it right now…

Are you taking statins?
I got "frozen shoulder" about 16 yrs ago. The orthopedic surgeon told me it was the statins I was taking at the time. He had me take physical therapy. Took about 8 weeks to get it totally freed up.
Statins can cause a lot of muscle & joint problems.

Both elbows. One of them doesn’t respond to cortisone anymore. The doc said it needs surgery but the recovery time is around 3 months. That’s a lot of time off work. He also said the damage is done so if I can wince through the pain I can have it repaired when I want. It’s going on 20 years now. You have my sympathy for sure.

To answer some questions. I'm not currently taking an RX meds or supplements (Other than prednisone which I was just given). I'm 37 and have no major prior injuries that I'm aware of (At least not in the upper body).

I had no major critical event that I can tie this back to (No tearing, popping, sharp pain, etc), although I did do a lot more heavy lifting than I normally do in the weeks prior.

No current relief from the cortisone although I can lift my arm slightly higher than I could before. I have a follow up with the ortho scheduled for Friday. I'm going to mention ultrasound and stem cells. If I could afford it I would have already flown to Panama to get treatment there.

Well between my last post and yesterday I had improved from about 20 degrees of lift in my arm to about 90 degrees when I saw the ortho. He advised to start PT to work out the rest of the stiffness and that I likely would be able to return to work in appx 2 weeks. Later that night I was able to lift my arm to about 100-110 degrees and I woke up this morning with my arm above my head and realized an hour or two later that I had full range of motion back.

I'm still guarding it a bit and the arm is fairly weak so I'll have to PT that out but to say I'm happy is an understatement.

Head, shoulders, knees and toes,
(Knees and toes...)

And everything in between.

Very glad to hear your shoulder has come around. Please do what the physical therapist says. I am on week 3 of post rotator cuff surgery and week 2 1/2 of PT (they start you right after surgery). Another 10 weeks of PT to go. It's a slow process and painful at times but very very important. After insurance covered PT, I will continue to do PT on my own as 12 weeks of PT will only put you at 30 to 40 percent recovery. 90 to 100 percent maybe will be at the 9 to 12 month mark.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: ajensen,

I agree with the frozen shoulder remarks. Sounds like what my wife had and the only cure is work the free motion back in. But as others have mentioned I'd go to a specialist for a diagnosis.