[quote]scotty144 wrote:
brino, how was your recovery from your bicep? Mine is pretty well 90%…minus a huge scar…more of a mental issue now than strength…no more heavy curls thats for sure.
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It has only been 9 months since the injury. What hurt most was my wrist and forearm after the surgery. A month after the surgery I could barely lift the weight of my arm. Within 6 months I was back to previous strength. Curls don’t bother it all, but other heavy exercises, like chins and rows, will leave if feeling a “achy” for a day or so. I was hoping that would go away with time. You continue to heal for quite a long time. Tendons take for-freaking-ever.
Aesthetically, there is now a three finger gap between the belly of the muscle and the crook of the elbow when flexed, as opposed to a previous two finger gap. Plus when not flexed, it has no tonus at all. It just goes completely lax and sinks into my arm. I guess I’ll never have pumped up guns again… I’ll just make sure my other arm is directed at the honies. My pec tear is on the same side as the bicep tear. All the more reason to lead with the other side. j/k
I also lost some ROM. Oddly enough, I didn’t lose any extension of the elbow, which is what you’d expect since the muscle is stretched when reattached, but, again counter to what you’d expect, I lost a few degrees of flexion. Guess there goes my pro olympic lifting career too–not that I had one, but; you know.
All in all, it’s not too bad. Recovery kind of sucks. And be a liar if I denied a psych component to it. Once you’ve been seriously injured, there will probably always be a fear aspect, but I for one will not let it stop me. It’s natural to feel fear, no dishonor there. Only dishonor in letting your fears control you.
That said, I got the pec tear while barbell bench pressing; and I’m as certain as one can be at this point that I will never do that exercise again. Here’s why though: that movement never felt right to me. I’ve been lifting 15 years, and it never was right for me. I had a lot of shouler and elbow pain and just stopped bbbp’ing about four years ago. I don’t feel my strength or development suffered. I just emphasized overhead movements, inclines, dipped and used dumbbells for the occassional flat work. Everything was great.
About 5 months ago I got curious to see what I could do with bbbp’ing again. So I worked it in, as smartly as I knew how, did a lot of research on the movement here, and at elitefts, did the accessory and supplemental work, and experimented. Well, I found out what I could do with it–I could tear a pec off. I’m not going to not do chest work again, I’m just not going to bbbp. I don’t think I need it, and I don’t think it’s worth the risk of injury–for me.