I recently went to an orthopedic doctor for some pain in my shoulder, and he said that I had bursitis caused by my over-flexible joints. He advised me not to do any overhead pressing or any other lifts where my upper arms go more than parallel to the floor.
I want to start Starting Strength again since I haven’t been able to lift at all since starting college again, and was wondering if there are any good alternatives to the military press that would give me a good bang for my buck.
Incline press is the first thing that comes to mind.
‘over-flexible joint’ sounds… strange.
I am not in the business of second guessing doctors, so you might just want to do overhead presses until your upper arms hit parallel with the floor and call that a complete rep.
If I were you, I’d seriously start building some stability in my shoulder sockets. Eric Cressey wrote an article called ‘shoulder savers’ that probably has a lot of goodies in it for you. Things like working the lower traps and other muscles in the shoulder socket that prevent movement. The names don’t come to mind immediately. When they do, I’ll post them.
I guess my point is, once you’ve developed enough stability in your sockets, theoretically, OH presses should become feasible again.
But once again, I am not in the business of second-guessing doctors, so take that with a grain of salt.