Torn bicep muscle?

Another bagpiper in my band had a bicep that was 80% torn and recently had surgery. She is an artist who makes pottery and was told that it was that motion that likely tore it. Her recovery was set back by just minor finger movements one day while she sat in on band practice. I think her advice would be not to try to rush through the recovery by becoming too active too soon.

I had one. I did not have surgery. The first week it occurred everyone that saw me assumed I would need it. Everyone meaning trainers at the gym including one who did have surgery. One arm looked like Popeye. I did about six months of therapy. I never stopped working out. I did modify things weight wise or if I felt a pull/tugging or pain. I just stopped therapy in December and at that time the doctor said to me when he first saw it he thought it was pretty bad and that I would need surgery. Of course he didn't tell me that initially and I'm glad he didn't cause I probably would have freaked out. It's still a little hard to touch than the non injured arm but it's not something that is noticeable to anyone but me. My weights went back to preinjury or increased. I was having a problem with unassisted pull ups but I'm able to do those again as well.

I had a torn subscapularis tendon caused by curling too much weight. I let it go for years and when I finally had a doctor look at it.

Had an MRI that came up negative and the doc improperly "diagnosed" it as a strained bicep tendon, which attaches near and is very close to the bicep tendon. Got several steroid shots in that tendon but it did not good because it was the wrong one.

After another year, I complained about the unresolved pain and got another MRI but this one was w/a contrast dye. This is what revealed the torn subscapularis tendon which was "repaired" surgically.

However, ti took about 3 years after the surgery for the pain in the shoulder to (all but) go away. I still experience some pain in the shoulder when making certain movements but that is a rare event now.

Moral of this story: If your doc makes a diagnosis and renders treatment and the pain doesn't go away w/in a reasonable time. Ask for a further diagnosis and a 2nd opinion by another doc if need be. If properly diagnoses and treated, the pain should go away and there is something wrong if it doesn't.