The Simple answer, yes and no. Why do I say this? Because, while I am not a doctor I know that movement is medicine and has tremendous benefits to healing the body. I will explain what I mean through my own story.
For the last two years I have been in pain. No not in the Sylvia Plath way, where we are all dying. But in genuine pain. I have had this systemic neck and shoulder problem that just seems to be getting more and more annoying with time.
You see, two years ago I had two SLAP tear surgeries. Something that I would strongly advise people to avoid at all costs. These surgeries are big. The shoulder takes 4 months to heal. Anyone good at math, that’s eight months out of the year 2016.
For the first part of that year I couldn’t really work. At the time I worked at a swimming facility and as a result of the surgeries got laid off. I realized harshly that I couldn’t have this be the case and needed to make a change, so during my time I put my head down and did a ton of research into my passion, fitness. At the same time I quit that job and decided to finish my master’s in teaching.
When both operations were done, I ended up in physical therapy and trying a lot of different approaches to rehab. I fell in love with this and understanding the body’s mechanics in every angle possible. With my obsessive compulsive nature I annoyed the hell out of my friends as I tried out a series of soft tissue mobilizations and lacrosse ball massage in every crevice of their body.
When I started training again, serious training, everything felt fine. When you get injured and feel things hurt, you tend to take things slow. After a couple of weeks however things started to feel shitty again. I couldn’t understand why. I did all the rehab, my orthopedist tells me my shoulder is fine, my physical therapist is arguing with me that nothing is out of place. I still feel broken.
Because ego is a bitch, I ignored the symptoms and kept training and still do. I thought, I can fix this, but now realize that it’s just dumb to hope for things to go away on their own. This is the point I am looking to make strongly today.
The body was meant to move. If we don’t move we will not survive. Another fact of life is that the body is prone to injury. We are creatures of habit and repeat the same movements and things over and over again. It’s commonplace these days to hear about full shoulder, hip, and knee replacements when we all we do is low level activity or maybe head to the gym a few days out of the week.
My call to action is never stop moving. Even if you have an injury operate around it. I understand that doctors and a lot of professionals alike, advise against these things, but what I think they mean is try not to repeat the same things to make your situation worse. Take it from me that you can operate around pain and injury. You just need to get smart about how you train.
How?!
1 of 2 ways you could do what I did, quit your job, thrust your life into a state of ambivalence and obscurity, and placing yourself into financial stress while trying to learn biomechanics through hours of youtube videos, or second find a qualified professional who has your best interest at heart and process to educate you. This person should be prioritizing your goals, and giving you what you need so you can get what you want.
Remember that just because life happens doesn’t mean all of your health and fitness goals need to stop. Here at Core Principles, we deal and work around injuries all the time through various ways. You always have the ability to get strong and be a better version the next day.
If you have an injury and still want to get after your health and fitness goals please feel free to contact us at info@coreprinciples-sc.com or on facebook at Core Principles Strength and Conditioning.
