So this happened:

It’s all downhill after 30, kids.

Honestly, I know it doesn’t look like much, but so far it’s knocked me out commission for the past four weeks and it’s driving me crazy. Like the old person I am, about four weeks ago I felt a really sharp pain in my shoulder while reaching for a pen at work.

😐

I was not impressed.

I couldn’t help myself from Googling the symptoms. So, like everyone else who thought looking up their symptoms on the internet was a good idea, I came to the conclusion that I had cancer. Well… that or I’d torn something in and around my rotator cuff. After a week of pain so bad that I was holding my arm tucked tightly to my body for fear of hurting it even more, I decided it was finally time to see my family doctor about the problem. At this point I wasn’t able to lift my arm over my head without extreme pain.

The doctor narrowed right in on the pain point and suspected it had something to do with my rotator cuff. I went for an ultrasound and xray the next day and was given a referral to start physiotherapy immediately.

The results came back after a week or so. and thankfully I didn’t have a torn rotator cuff (or cancer, for that matter, thanks Google.). What I did seem to have was a cyst in my rotator cuff region with a lot of fluid around my bicep tendon which was causing inflammation. The physiotherapist had already pretty much suspected that I had tendinitis in my upper bicep after the physical tests he’d done on me, so it was nice to have some reassurance that it wasn’t anything worse. He believes the cyst will get reabsorbed into the body as he works on healing the tendinitis. He tapes me up every time I leave, and surprisingly, that little bit of tape seems to do wonders for arm movement – I almost have full range of motion back in my shoulder with little to no pain.

Unfortunately, this has meant no weight lifting or gymnastics for the past four weeks. It’s been frustrating, to say the least. I had finally gotten to the point in lifting where I wasn’t looking like quite so much of a chump with a barbell across my shoulders doing squats! And I was finally bench pressing more than just the bar itself! Thankfully, I’ve been able to continue playing soccer and keep up with my running, so my exercise hasn’t come to a complete standstill. With the way things are going though, this should be almost completely healed in a few more weeks. *fingers crossed*