Anyone have experience with shoulder pain from working out?

Shoulders are super complex. Lots of Dx possible. You can find websites that outline a bunch of movements to narrow down the possibilities. When I was having intermittent sharp shoulder pain with increasing frequency, I really studied several shoulder Dx sites and ultimately decided I wasn’t confident that I could adequately follow the steps to isolate the problem.

Eventually I had pain at rest, not just when reaching for something. Eventually it interfered with sleep and ADLs. I saw my GP first and that was a mistake. He treats a bunch of local NBA players so I thought he would know something about shoulders. Total waste of a copay. He referred an orthopedic surgeon specializing in shoulders after a 2 minute chat we could have had on the phone. He did say his advice is to do what you are doing — rest, heat, ice— for a month or until pain interferes with sleep and/or ADLs. I would look for a shoulder specialist in your area and start there. He/she will probably order an X-ray (which he probably has in the office) but the more helpful part is the exam where he checks your range of motion and strength in different positions. If he suspects tissue tears, he/she will want a MRI, and not sure but I think those can be spendy. I didn’t need one.

FWIW, my Dx was adhesive capsulitis (“frozen shoulder “). He said it was totally unrelated to my workouts and gave me a stack of exercises that hurt like a *kitten* and eventually they worked with no surgery or big steroid shots. Good luck. I know it hurts bad.

An orthopedist should be able to diagnose you and refer you for physical therapy if necessary. I hurt my shoulder doing a push up challenge. Then, because it hurt, I did my best not to use it for several weeks and it froze. I got so I couldn't lift my arm above chest high. I went to an orthopedist and he said it was either a torn rotator or bursitis. He gave me a steroid shot in case it was bursitis, which did nothing, then referred me to a physical therapist. I did about 3 months of PT, then another year and a half of doing the exercises on my own before the pain was completely gone.

I, too, developed shoulder pain out of the blue. And I, too, was diagnosed with frozen shoulder. It took a few weeks before my range of motion was really compromised; I couldn't reach for things in cupboards, reach up to my head, lift my arm to the side, etc. without pain. Couldn't sleep, had to prop up my arm. I went to physical therapy for a while, but if you check out the websites, it can take a long time to recover. It's been a year and while I'm no longer in pain all the time and have most of my range of motion back, I can't do pushups yet. Not even on my knees. I hope that gets better as I get stronger on that side. It's literally a pain. Hope it goes faster for you!