T Nation

Tennis Elbow

Bodybuilding
#1

okay, so, in a previous post i said i hadn’t ever been injured. NOT COMPLETELY TRUE. about a year ago i developed tennis elbow (tendonitis) in my right arm primarily. as time went on i began having severe pain in my bicep. not near the tendons but right in the belly of the muscle. my HMO doctor gave me prednizone, some capacin cream and said “learn to live with it”. i hate doctors because we put our faith in them and want to believe them. so, i did just that. i got used to it. until it started hindering my growth (big time). finally i went to a sports doctor who told me “you should never have to get used to this”. he thinks that the tendonitis is causing me to overcompensate with my bicep, a synergistic muscle doing the work of an agonist. since it can’t really do that it is overstressed causing microscopic tears. he said it should clear up in a month or so if i wear a cuff on my brachioradialis, take anti-inflammatories, ice the arm to the max, and lighten up on load/reps. if it doesn’t start to go away in a month, or at least feel better, then he said he’ll put a shot of cortisone in the muscle.

WHAT YA’LL THINK??

#2

[quote]ejatwill wrote:
and lighten up on load/reps. [/quote]

You probably should lighten up severely, as in nothing for a week, then start real real slow and work up. If it begins to hurt again, you didn’t rest it long enough, or you progressed too fast.

#3

I had a similar problem, If it bothers you when you grab things, like a dumbell or bar, work your finger extensors. everytime i tried to grip something or hold something my elbow would be in pain. Talked to some grip guys and they said to work the finger extensors with a rubberband, pain went away almost immediately, no more problem. checkout www.ironmind.com there grip specialists and sell bands of different resistance to work your extensors

#4

I quess your sports doctor is right. And when your biceps is healed you have to find a way to deal with the tendonitis. I’ve had tendonitis since last summer and it began to cause all kind of problems in my arm. The stretch that I use to do to prevent tendonitis didn’t help, because this time I started to do it too late - or so I suppose. It is not the first time I have had tendonitis, but earlier I have managed to fix it by stretching.

I decided to try acupuncture, since it is supposed to work well for tendonitis. And it did. I don’t know why it worked, but I’m satisfied. I don’t say that you have to use acupuncture, but tendonitis seems to be a recurring problem, so it’s better to prevent it in time, just like rotator cuff problems. I personally wont omit stretches any more. (Yeah, right)

#5

i’ve thought about acupuncture. thanks for the tip. The cuff is helping a lot, at least preventing the bicep agony. I ice now twice a day and it seems to help also. we’ll see…

#6

Along with the ice, a hot pack right before exercise seems to help me.

JD

#7

somewhere here there is an article discussing using eccentric only pushdowns to rehab tendonitis. I can’t even remember who wrote it. I’ve done it and it helps tremendously. I get regular tendonitis when I do extensions and pushdowns. Doesn’t bother me when benching. A restriction band helps me through the extensions and pushdowns. It depends on the exercise angle whether I need the band above or below the elbow.

But, lightening up significantly really helps. I can handle plenty of reps, but have to lighten the load. Ice helps too. My doc sent me to a compounding pharmacy and had a topical antiinflammatory made-up for me. It worked great, too.

#8

This post was flagged by the community and is temporarily hidden.

#9

ART (activerelease.com)
Pain free exercises only
Nutriflex
Fish Oils
Ibuprofen
Ice
Stretching

There’s a start :wink:

#10

[quote]ejatwill wrote:
okay, so, in a previous post i said i hadn’t ever been injured. NOT COMPLETELY TRUE. about a year ago i developed tennis elbow (tendonitis) in my right arm primarily. as time went on i began having severe pain in my bicep. not near the tendons but right in the belly of the muscle. my HMO doctor gave me prednizone, some capacin cream and said “learn to live with it”. i hate doctors because we put our faith in them and want to believe them. so, i did just that. i got used to it. until it started hindering my growth (big time). finally i went to a sports doctor who told me “you should never have to get used to this”. he thinks that the tendonitis is causing me to overcompensate with my bicep, a synergistic muscle doing the work of an agonist. since it can’t really do that it is overstressed causing microscopic tears. he said it should clear up in a month or so if i wear a cuff on my brachioradialis, take anti-inflammatories, ice the arm to the max, and lighten up on load/reps. if it doesn’t start to go away in a month, or at least feel better, then he said he’ll put a shot of cortisone in the muscle.

WHAT YA’LL THINK??
[/quote]
Try the HST w/o program to help heal things up a bit.Also check out a website called sportstouch.com,the stretchs and exercises will help.Hope this helps,it worked for me.