Have you had tendinitis?

NorthCascades

I've seen my PCP about this, and a sports doctor too. We had a lot to talk about and they both gave me some great advice. But we didn't have time to talk about everything.

What I'd like to hear about is how long after the pain stopped (which hasn't happened yet, but it's heading in that direction) did it take before were you able to use that body part without inflaming it again? The two doctors gave me very different answers about how long it would take me to heal, I trust my PCP more, but this is a slightly different question, and other people's experience is a useful guide.

LAT1963

I'd like to know this too. I currently have a partial posterior tibialis tear that took a year to correctly diagnose and now I've been in an air cast 3 months and still have debilitating pain if I try to walk without the cast (despite orthotics).

LKArgh

It depends on the tendon

Chieflrg

Tendonitis and tendonaphy are very complex and hardly predictable for recovery time table. The same can be said for pain as a indicator on how things are recoverying or not.

I've have experienced tendonitis or tendonaphy persumedly from a combination of my progressive joint autoimmune disease, age, and poor load management.

I experience pain 24/7 every day of the year so I can't comment when the "pain stopped".

I can confidently state it will go away if you practice resistance training with appropriate load management opposed to say getting a cortisone shot.

Current evidence shows that people who choose to go the shot route do in fact have worse outcomes a year later to healing than the people who resistance train with appropriate load managemant.

Also NSAIDS may help with the pain but aren't shown to actually do anything for healing and actually slows the process down since swelling is lessened which slows the immune system.

I would certainly suggest finding a plan for resistance training with proper load management.

NorthCascades

Chieflrg wrote: »

I can confidently state it will go away if you practice resistance training with appropriate load management opposed to say getting a cortisone shot.

Current evidence shows that people who choose to go the shot route do in fact have worse outcomes a year later to healing than the people who resistance train with appropriate load managemant.

Also NSAIDS may help with the pain but aren't shown to actually do anything for healing and actually slows the process down since swelling is lessened which slows the immune system.

I'm sorry to hear yours is still with you constantly. 😭

What you said makes a lot of sense. I know for back injuries (friend had one) that bed rest is the worst thing. My doctor wants me in physical therapy. I've still got too much pain, but look forward to being able to. I've been doing a foot and ankle strengthening exercise for a year because it helps with skiing, I plan to start at a low volume when I can.

Doctor also put me on a lot of "vitamin I" ibuprofen. It's been helping at least as much as the vicodin. Also heat and ice.

NorthCascades

LAT1963 wrote: »

I'd like to know this too. I currently have a partial posterior tibialis tear that took a year to correctly diagnose and now I've been in an air cast 3 months and still have debilitating pain if I try to walk without the cast (despite orthotics).

I'm so sorry to hear. I can relate to debilitating pain from walking. A week ago just putting the wrong shoes on made me want to cry.

nutmegoreo

Bilateral tendinitis from being a massage therapist many years ago. When it was first diagnosed it was so bad I could barely hold a fork. That was in 2001. It still flairs up if I do heavy repetitive stuff (putting together furniture using a manual screwdriver, handwriting for a longer period of time). Some activities are worse than others. I can type for extended periods without problems.

ETA: It took nearly a year for the pain to become manageable. The best pain control came from topical NSAIDS.

mom23mangos

It took me about a year and I’m still very cautious. I avoid exercises that I know are more likely to cause a flare up and get creative with other ways to train that area.

NorthCascades

Mine seems to be in the peroneus brevis. Both feet. It's been a month and much less awful now, but walking more than a little bit is very painful. Tight shoes are unbearable.

I'm a Nordic skier, and my season begins in about 3 months. 😬 I really hope I don't get a mile up the trail and then realize I have to walk back. 🤕

If I was made of Legos, I could just replace my feet.

mcemino2

I had tendinitis in both forearm/biceps, it probably was close to 2 years before the pain started to subside.

SnifterPug

I have it in the elbow. Have had it since March. I don't need pain relief for it but I stopped aggravating it as soon as it reared its ugly head. It's getting a lot better. So long as I don't exercise through pain and do my rehab exercises it continues to improve - slooooooooooooowly. I can now do an eccentric pull up without pain so long as I wear a support. But it was trying to do pull ups that started it off in the first place so I have to be careful.

tlpina82

I am never going to forget the name of this monster: "extensor hallucis longus"
AKA that tendon on top of your big toe.

I bought a new shoe and it bent in the wrong place, crushing the darn nerve with every step. 2 weeks of pain turned into a tendinitis diagnosis.

It;s been a year now and I have to be careful with my movements. I have no problem working the calves or walking and running in general, but when swimming, I have to tape the bigtoe to the toe next to it to avoid it from "free flowing".
If I don't, it will be a week of limping.

Azdak

I did not read this through to the end, but I have found this site to provide good information for injury treatment. I have used a number of their recommendations for other injuries with clients and have found them helpful.


https://runnersconnect.net/peroneal-tendinitis-tendonitis/

Hollis100

NorthCascades wrote: »

I've seen my PCP about this, and a sports doctor too. We had a lot to talk about and they both gave me some great advice. But we didn't have time to talk about everything.

What I'd like to hear about is how long after the pain stopped (which hasn't happened yet, but it's heading in that direction) did it take before were you able to use that body part without inflaming it again? The two doctors gave me very different answers about how long it would take me to heal, I trust my PCP more, but this is a slightly different question, and other people's experience is a useful guide.

I developed tendonitis in my arms and shoulders after I took an antibiotic. It was agonizing at first, and then slowly improved. It took a solid five months for all the pain to go away. After that, I avoided exercises with my arms and shoulders for several months more, worrying the tendons were still weakened and might tear.

My PCP was useless. He agreed I had a problem, and agreed the antibiotic caused it, but made no suggestions.

Editing to add I read about my problem and took magnesium pills, which some people with the same problem said helped them. I don't know if the extra magnesium helped or not, but I did take it for several months. If I remember correctly, there's a limit to how much you can safely take, so I followed those guidelines.

_BlahBlah_BlackSheep_

I had Achilles tendinitis that was pretty severe. I did 3 months of physical therapy for it. I can't say how long the timeline for healing was, because I continued to work out normally the whole time, in addition to doing PT exercises. It bothered me periodically for a while after finishing PT, but nothing bad enough to go back for another session.

jemhh

I had Achilles tendinitis and, like @_BlahBlah_BlackSheep_, I never stopped using the body part or working out. My doctor told me not to and my PT said that if my pain got to a 4 (I think that's what it was) to pull back a bit but not to stop lifting. I did have to stop wearing high heels for awhile but 4-6 weeks of PT 2-3 times a week was enough for me to be fine.

I still do some of the exercises I did in PT as part of my regular routine now.

NorthCascades

Azdak wrote: »

I did not read this through to the end, but I have found this site to provide good information for injury treatment. I have used a number of their recommendations for other injuries with clients and have found them helpful.


https://runnersconnect.net/peroneal-tendinitis-tendonitis/

Oh, man. This makes me squeamish. Medical problems is one of the things that had always frightened me. I can see blood, but reading about possibly having a ruptured tendon and needing surgery ... 🤢

I've got a good job but it's a contract, I'm not an FTE, and as such I don't have medical insurance. I think an MRI is about $4k here (based on a friend who got a spinal hernia).

Right after this happened, the pain was worse than a broken rib and collapsed lung. They were giving me morphine in an IV drip. These days, I can get hours with no pain at all if I don't use it. Walking is still painful, especially in tight shoes. I think I'm on track for a full recovery.

The article you linked to gives me some advice on what to do for PT. It also says this particular tendon is so early injured we don't have good data on what works best. Which tells me not to spend a lot of money on experts at this point. Instead I'm going to continue the hot/cold, walk but not much, and start the gentle rolling exercise they recommend. I'll start bodyweight only single leg deadlifts when I'm able.

On the bright side, they're letting me work 100% from home. And the coffee shop down the street will bring a latte to my front door if my feet hurt.

dbanks80

@mddmbanks

I want my husband to read this thread as he constantly suffers from tendonitis all over wrists, ankles etc...

Interested to see how others heal and/or prevent.

DancingMoosie

I have Achilles tendonitis. Some days are worse than others. On the worse days, I avoid high-impact aerobics and do extra stretching, sometimes ice and elevate before bed. I have also reduced my runs. I usually only need ibuprofen after running. I stretch my ankles/calves more. I am hoping to increase my runs again as the weather cools. Hopefully I can ease into it and not cause a flare.

puffbrat

The initial condition took a year of medications, pt, brace, and surgery. Flare-ups vary from 2 days to a month depending on how aggravated it is and how well I reduce the aggravation. I have been having a pretty bad flare-up right now for about 2 weeks.

Chieflrg

NorthCascades wrote: »

Chieflrg wrote: »

I can confidently state it will go away if you practice resistance training with appropriate load management opposed to say getting a cortisone shot.

Current evidence shows that people who choose to go the shot route do in fact have worse outcomes a year later to healing than the people who resistance train with appropriate load managemant.

Also NSAIDS may help with the pain but aren't shown to actually do anything for healing and actually slows the process down since swelling is lessened which slows the immune system.

I'm sorry to hear yours is still with you constantly. 😭

What you said makes a lot of sense. I know for back injuries (friend had one) that bed rest is the worst thing. My doctor wants me in physical therapy. I've still got too much pain, but look forward to being able to. I've been doing a foot and ankle strengthening exercise for a year because it helps with skiing, I plan to start at a low volume when I can.

Doctor also put me on a lot of "vitamin I" ibuprofen. It's been helping at least as much as the vicodin. Also heat and ice.

Here is well written article you might find useful. It isn't speaking of the Achilles specifically, but it is well rounded about tendonitis and tendonaphy while citing the evidence of how to train and set volume etc... It even touches on how pain is often misinterpreted in these cases. I'm highly invested into pain science due to my progressive disease. Some of this info you can read in the link is the exact info that took me from a wheel chair/cane to being a competitive powerlifter on the bigger side of 50. So often people "think" pain means to stop, which isn't the case where trama hasn't occurred. I've used this same type of info to help rehab others dealing with simular issues.

Important tangent: Pain is a widely misunderstood phenomenon, with many misinterpreting pain as a direct indication of tissue damage. While pain neuroscience is beyond the scope of this article, it is imperative to understand that pain is a protective mechanism of the body and not simply a reflection of the tissue state. While pain does indeed strongly correlate to tissue damage in acute traumatic events, this association is diminished over time, and tissue physiology does not predict pain response in chronic conditions. Therefore, do not panic if you experience low levels of pain, you are (probably) not doing significant harm and you are (probably) not experiencing a major setback. (For more on the topic of pain, please read this free full text from Lorimer Moseley

https://www.strongerbyscience.com/squatting-with-patellar-tendinopathy/