Frozen Shoulder Syndrome Really Hurts...

I got the same after sleeping on the couch. It helps to keep the arm bent at the elbow.

Try not to sleep on your front as this puts pressure on the shoulder.

When the pain is at its worst try gently exercising the arm, dont carry anything with the arm as this will pull on the muscles, even something as light as a book.

Depending on your age, could take up to 6 months before the pain subsides.

DD,

KN is right. Go to a good orthopedic dr. You may have torn a rotator cuff in the bad shoulder. I have torn both of mine and had to have surgery to repair them. I wish you the best!

Truly it sounds like a torn rotator cuff muscle or a burst bursal sack to me. An ortho specialist can tell and also determine if you can live with it as it slowly heals (prescribing specific exercises to prod it along), or if there is a need for surgery to stitch it back in place.

Numbness from sleeping on the arm should have faded inside a day or two. Since it didn't I would go for an MRI of the shoulder and see what's what.

Frankly, since I have my own recent shoulder problems, I think not talking to a doctor about it is silly, as well as possibly dangerous.

Right after my accident in May, although still very sick (literally at death's door, but not knowing it yet) I overhead lifted some old broken refrigerators and washing machines (that had accumulated here over the decades of running rental properties) into the back of my pickup truck so I could take them to the scrap yard for extra cash. I had decided there was no point to spending the money to get them running again since the rental properties they would go into had already been sold by me. I had no help (which was stupid) and I was weak from the damage the acid had done to me and the pneumonia and other stuff that resulted. One of the refrigerators was an extra large one and very heavy. Just getting it outside involved removal of a door first. At the truck I started with a 'deadlift' motion and went on to an attempt at 'clean and jerk' but that failed to topple the refrigerator into the back of the truck. I needed another 3 inches. I shifted position and used the same shoulder muscles used for a behind the head 'military press' and found the 3 inches. Unfortunately I also heard a loud Psssh noise come out of my shoulder along with incredible pain just as the refrigerator finally fell into the truck. At the salvage yard ir was later determined the weight of that refrigerator was 380 pounds.

Back in the early 80s I had experienced (after being thrown off a parapet) something called an inferior dislocation of my shoulder. Trust me, you don't want one. It took almost a decade of weight training before that didn't trouble me anymore. I had thought it fully healed. Since May I have learned no dislocation ever fully heals. There will always everafter be some looseness to the joint. Since I went into the hospital on the point of death anyway a few days later I had them MRI the shoulder which was basically useless at that time. The loud Psssssh noise was the sound of my shoulder's bursal sack bursting under the load and squirting out the contents into my blood stream. A bursal sack is a little jelly sack between our bones at the joints. It helps avoid damage. Unfortunately if it bursts, this allows additional bone movement and a rotator cuff tendon then also tore. Hence the pain and an arm limp at my side. Also some nerve damage from torn nerve fibers. Ouch.

I am happy to say the doctors and I jointly decided although surgery was an option, we wouldn't do it yet and instead see if the arm heals like it did last time. So what was the benefit of consulting the doctor?

A refillable prescription for Meloxicam. That was a BIG benefit. Now I can take one before sleeping, roll onto that shoulder at night while asleep, and not instantly wake up screaming. To me, that was a plus. Also I have regained full movement of the arm. I still have some numbness in my hands, but way less than before. Two months ago, I lacked enough finger dexterity to pick up a quarter. Today I can pick up dimes with no problem. I can do a curl again (but not too heavy). I still can't put any weight on the curling bar to do an overhead lift with, but at least I can get the empty curling bar up there. I am sure that with continual exercise the shoulder will heal again. In any case I am lightyears ahead of where I was with the arm hanging limply at my side and having to be picked up with the other hand to get dressed, as it was in May.

Ian - I once loved a woman who had a faulty chair collapse under her. She hit an electrical outlet box with her shoulder. A year later a very nasty bone cancer began at the same spot. She died from it a year later in 1988 at 34 years of age. Those impacts on bone where the padding is thin need to be monitored.