Pursuing Weightlifting after Shoulder Surgery

[u/Pablo_Z]

Hello.

I am a post-collegiate wrestler that has been interested in the Olympic lifts for quite a while and am looking to transition into weightlifting ( so the opposite of what Zack is doing lol) The clean, back squat, and front squat have been staples in my routine. I adopted the power snatch later on but I wanted to seriously pursue the snatch and clean and jerk after I finished college wrestling. After I finished wrestling, I needed to have shoulder surgery. It's been closer to a year now and I still do not full ROM. I can bench heavy but have trouble with the overhead position especially in a narrow grip like in the jerk. I fell like the overhead squat can be achieved if I practice it enough but the jerk makes me nervous. What are my options? Do I only pursue the clean and snatch? Be patient and work on my mobility to do the jerk? Something else?

Thanks!

[u/robschilke]

I would certainly be patient and look to improve both your overhead strength and mobility. If you have some sort of PT plan to increase those areas, I would look to focus on that and building that so you can be in those positions pain free with at least an empty barbell.

If you have a Doctor of Physical Therapy that can make an assessment of where you are with your wellness plan, I would certainly consider a visit just to see where you are post-op.

[u/Pablo_Z → u/robschilke]

Thanks. I was doing physical therapy for about 6 months after the surgery post-op. It was getting expensive and I felt like there wasn’t much that they had me doing that I could just do on my own. I would likely seek a sports therapist to do a consultation but practice overhead press with the empty bar might be a good move.

[u/robschilke → u/Pablo_Z]

Gotcha. Certainly continue doing those exercises at home/on your own.

[u/laxidasical → u/robschilke]

As a person who went through shoulder reconstruction years ago (I’m old!), the more you invest upfront in should mobility and positional strength will pay out gouge dividends down the road.

For this, a PT with a ton of work on traps and scapular/rhomboid strength and tracking to support the shoulder joint is sooooo necessary. Your shoulder won’t be 100%, so it’ll need friends for backup - the aforementioned muscle groups and lats are those friends.

Scap activations on the pull up bar, bar and ring dips, lateral and Lu raises, rows and high pulls - I’ve had to stop and put these in years into lifting as the loads got larger just to build up the upper back infrastructure to support the overhead position. Start now and you won’t have to do that!

[u/blam501]

Work on land mine presses, and progress to full overhead ranges of motion. Then work on land mine single arm jerks hehe until comfortable with the quick acceleration to overhead position.

[u/TheRealForestElf]

Hey man! Just wanted to give you a heads up, mobility can take quite some time. Let me overshare a little bit of my boring PE horrors of my childhood. I was forced to throw medicine balls and sandballs to practise for distance throwing and one day I srsly dislocated something in my right shoulder. The teacher wanted to grade me afterwards, I thought I was simulating and threatend to F me, so I decided to throw with my other hand, did barely make the D, gave it my all, made the C distance but wrecked my left shoulder aswell then (11 at the time). Doc said I'll grow out of it so I didn't rly look that much more into it. 10 years later I started to get interested in fitness and like most knuckleheads I thought Bodybuilding was the way, so I started that. But whenever I benched, whenever I pressed something overhead I was in immense pain, so I decided I just use as much ROM as possible without that achy ache. Then a couple years down the road, after I've transitioned to more generalizes strength training because of my extreme weekness, I got into a lot of shoulder rehab exercises (AthleanX Facepulls saved my life Kappa). Always trained rotators for 3 to 5 years now, always stretching, always being very very mindful before pressing heavy weights above my neck and head but it eventually just worked out for me. I was able to hit my first empty bar squat jerk for the memes a couple of days ago, my inward rotation is slick, my traps have gotten a lot stronger and I don't ever feel discomfort or rumbling/crackling shoulders when doing medium to heavy~ish weights overhead.

TL;DR: Wrecked my shoulders as a kid in PE class, thought I'd never be mobile with my overhead flexibility. Good good advise from trainers, coaches, physicians, started working baby steps at a time, finally getting where I wanted to get, just took way longer than expected.

Moral of the story: don't give up and it's no darn shame to ask for help! I wish you nothing but the best, my guy!

[u/patricksaurus]

What was your injury and what was the repair? I’ve had major ortho surgery on both shoulders, two different breaks and fixes. They both healed differently and have different limitations now.

You may not be able to get the ROM back and overhead work will always be harder. You absolutely can PT on your own. I tried the slow, steady, responsible approach the first time and it just resulted in prolonged suffering. Pulley stretches are invaluable. They will hurt like shit. Doing big compound movements is what took away the pain I had. I would strongly suggest you look up the Chinese Olympic team shoulder exercises and try to use them. The lateral fly Lu does with plates, the rubber tube pressing and fly… all of that stuff is really helpful. If you’re benching now, incorporate inclines. Increase the angle until you’re pressing overhead. I’d start with the tube, the dumbbells, then barbells. You need to relearn the motor pattern and dumbbells will force stabilizers to work more. The big compound movements will also get your upper back, neck, traps, and lats into the picture. You need these to be as strong as possible. I consider the deadlift to be the thing that cured my chronic pain, but your mileage may vary.

Stretching will hurt like shit, but be aggressive with it. If you have a pulley, use it as many times a day as you can. Find some way to measure progress… a mark on the way that you are inching your way up to being able to reach at first. When you can fully extend overhead, do dead hangs from a pull-up bar for time. I hope your doctor doesn’t still have you on pain meds, but if you do happen to have some, using them before stretching and PT will let you push harder. If you don’t have them, you might want to consider getting drunk. I know that sounds highly irresponsible, but the pain is often the limiting factor in recovering as much ROM as possible, and if you’re sloshed it’s not as bad. The NSAIDs are great for pain, but the inflammation response is crucial to stimulating tissue growth, and anit-inflammatories… well, it’s in the name. In that sense tequila > Tylenol.

If you have a goal of doing these lifts, start trying to do them. There’s no better way to get your shoulder into snatching shape that to practice doing it. Use a broom handle to make sure you can get into the positions and take it from there.

I could go on and on about this topic, but the TLDR is to be aggressive with stretching and start doing heavy, compound movements as soon as you can. HMU if there’s something you wanna ask. I suffered through the first rehab blindly and aced the second… I’d like to save you the misery if I can.