After much pain, soul searching, cure searching, kicking with fins and general advise seeking, I've elected to have arthroscopic surgery to treat my "shoulder impingement syndrome" which I guess is tendonitis....The fact that I made the decision before consulting the USMC forum may be inexcusable, but, be that as it may, I'm on the docket for two weeks from today...
The surgery, as I, a layman, understand it, will widen the subacromial space allowing unimpeded movement of my supraspinatus (one of the rotator cuffs) muscle and tendon and biseps tendon....
I ain't looking for sympathy or an explanation...but I'd love to hear from someone who's had this type of procedure and can outline their recovery process...I was planning on making some waves in the 55-59 age group at Coral Gables in May but realize now I may just be a cheerleader...I'm keeping the Chesapeake Bay swim on my June calendar even if I can just kick my way across...I'd love to know what to expect..Thanks
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Former Member
So I can bring some kinda closure to this thread (although you may have thought there was enough said already and was therefore closed) I'm pleased to report I had the surgery a weekago tomorrow where the Doc found the Biceps tendon to be the injured party and the acromium to be the main culprit, and, after a bone scraping and soft tissue cleanup ("like cuttin the grass Bruce" he said) I've had less pain than I feared, have been sleeping through the night right along, even now without meds, made an on deck appearance at practice to tell lane two not to get too comfortable with my absence, am driving as of today (I feel the freedom of a 16 year old gettin his first license), got my stiches removed, was told I could burn my sling unless I wanted it a few more nights for support just while sleeping, start a fairly progressive/aggresive (seems to me anyway) PT program tomorrow and, best of all, can get in the water anytime, like tomorrow (like one week after the knife....yeah man), kicking only at first but adding my arms as I see fit with understanding that I can't rush this thing you've just had a major problem with body invasion surgery etcetcetc blahblahblah, but I don't care, and won't try to rush it too much, I hope, 'cause I feel so good being on the road to recovery....and it's not as bumpy as I thought it'd be....not yet anyway...
Tim.....Laura Winslow's thoughts, advice, support and general willingness to share were, and continue to be, invaluable...We share similar masters swimming histories and psyches so her input has been particularly applicable...Thanks for pluggin me in...I'm pleased to report it sounds like her recovery is going well also.
So...thank you all, and, for now, this thread has a happy ending..
Bruce
So I can bring some kinda closure to this thread (although you may have thought there was enough said already and was therefore closed) I'm pleased to report I had the surgery a weekago tomorrow where the Doc found the Biceps tendon to be the injured party and the acromium to be the main culprit, and, after a bone scraping and soft tissue cleanup ("like cuttin the grass Bruce" he said) I've had less pain than I feared, have been sleeping through the night right along, even now without meds, made an on deck appearance at practice to tell lane two not to get too comfortable with my absence, am driving as of today (I feel the freedom of a 16 year old gettin his first license), got my stiches removed, was told I could burn my sling unless I wanted it a few more nights for support just while sleeping, start a fairly progressive/aggresive (seems to me anyway) PT program tomorrow and, best of all, can get in the water anytime, like tomorrow (like one week after the knife....yeah man), kicking only at first but adding my arms as I see fit with understanding that I can't rush this thing you've just had a major problem with body invasion surgery etcetcetc blahblahblah, but I don't care, and won't try to rush it too much, I hope, 'cause I feel so good being on the road to recovery....and it's not as bumpy as I thought it'd be....not yet anyway...
Tim.....Laura Winslow's thoughts, advice, support and general willingness to share were, and continue to be, invaluable...We share similar masters swimming histories and psyches so her input has been particularly applicable...Thanks for pluggin me in...I'm pleased to report it sounds like her recovery is going well also.
So...thank you all, and, for now, this thread has a happy ending..
Bruce
