Long-term shoulder impingement and pain

[adoringhummus]

I’m a 33 y/o male with a shoulder problem that has kept me out of the gym for 6 years. It seems to be a chronic problem that doesn’t go away with rest time and lack of activity.


The pain was not originally brought on by anything sudden, it was a slow onset as I was lifting weights previously and has evolved over the years since I’ve stopped.


I feel a strong pinching sensation in my left shoulder at the back (area pictured with awful selfie angle) when I raise my arm up in the scapula plane. The pain kicks in when my arm is around 50 - 60° raised and continues until around 140°.


I don’t have any loss of range of motion and can still generally perform daily tasks. I can get my arms above my head easily and feel like I have plenty (maybe too much) flexibility through the joint.


Rotator cuff exercises always make my pain worse — not whilst doing the exercise — but after. Because of this, I’ve never stuck to these exercises for more than a couple of weeks at best. Equally, any gym exercises involving the shoulder also aggravate the pain.


The sleeper stretch does temporarily remove the pain. Also massaging right into the teres minor / insfraspinatus area temporarily removes the pain.


I do also seem to have some achy pain in my SC joint on the same side. I have no idea if this is related.


I have had MRIs on both my SC joint and shoulder and neither shown anything to note.


The pain definitely does feel like impingement. From what I understand, it’s more likely to be internal impingement. But every corrective exercise seems to make the pain worse. Should I just push through this?


I’m frustrated, confused and lost with it.

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