So..what does a broken arm feel like?

[LG Gone Wild]

I've had this pain in my left arm for a while now (many days) and it is getting worse. It started up at my shoulder and I thought I irritated my rotator cuff. It hurts in certain positions and it keeps me up at night. The pain is now kind of in my left bicep but it feels deep, like a bone pain. Used to just annoy me at night but now it is constant. I've continued to exercise but have tried to work around the rotator cuff thing. Can't really work around the bicep thing though.

 

Stress fracture, maybe? I can't point to an incident such as a fall or a sudden pain during exercise.

[Pink Fairy]

I broke my elbow when I was eleven, and it was clear as could be that it was broken. I screamed from the pain, and my arm swelled up to an abnormally huge size and turned purple.

 

Even if your arm isn't broken, your symptoms don't sound like normal, "I just hurt my arm" symptoms. Seems like a trip to the doctor is in order. :grouphug:

[TravelingChris]

I have broken 9 bones and some were very obvious right from the start and others took a longer while but I have never had a stress fracture. I think those are usually in the lower legs or feet. There can be many things wrong other than a fracture and many of these can be helped. I would see a doctor.

[hornblower]

I would think it's more likely to be bursitis or a frozen shoulder or a pinched nerve in your neck. Between my parents & myself, we've had all 3 & they all presented this way. Took ages to fully clear up btw.

[AngieW in Texas]

Bursitis can present this way. I got it from spending the day at Schlitterbahn (a water park). I spent most of the day in an innertube with my arms up over the sides in the wave river. It actually took several months before I could use my arms normally. I still have to be careful about the positions that I sleep in and that was 3 years.

[JudyJudyJudy]

It sounds as though the pain is coming from your shoulder. Most likely you did injure your rotator cuff. A year and a half ago I broke my elbow and had two injuries to my shoulder, and I'm still having some major issues. I have to physically move my arm to make it go in the correct direction.

[gingersmom]

I had a frozen shoulder and your symptoms sound similar.

 

Run do not walk to the doctor!!!

 

A frozen shoulder (left untreated) is pure hell! (ask me how I know)

[LG Gone Wild]

Well, I am not encouraged! :tongue_smilie:

 

I did have someone pop my elbow weeks before the rotator cuff thing. It was during jiu-jitsu. It popped and though it was unsettling, it didn't swell and it didn't hurt ... until I got cold. Then it hurt a lot but it got better. Then the pain in the shoulder developed and then the bicep thing.

 

What is frozen shoulder? What is bursitis?

[JudyJudyJudy]

You can read about frozen shoulder here and bursitis here. If you can find a kinesiologist or a chiropractor who specializes in kinesiology, I'd give him/her a try. I got better results in one visit to my chiropractor/kinesiologist than I did in three visits to a physical therapist; in fact, the PT made my shoulder worse in the process of working on my elbow. Unfortunately, due to financial issues right now, I can't afford more visits.

[gingersmom]

A frozen shoulder is pure evil. It took me 2 years (and nearly a year of physical therapy) before I could lift my arm up over my head. I can't do it as straight as the other arm but it is way better than it ever has been.

 

Do you know how hard it is to put on/take off a bra when you can't put your arm behind your back?

 

In my simplified version a frozen shoulder is when you have an injury and all the muscles and tendons and other stuff in the area literally get frozen. They are stuck together. Physical therapy (they give you exercises to do with them and and at home, gentle and not so gentle manipulation (I had to drug up before seeing therapist) plus heat and massage is supposed to loosen up the lesions.

 

I would seriously check in with a doctor just to rule everything out. Don't be foolish like me and wait. I now have a lifetime of explaining why I can't lift my right arm up straight in the air.

[Aileen E.]

As soon as you mentioned that the pain had spread from your shoulder to deep in your bicep, my immediate thought was tendinitis. I had it last summer and it feels just like what you describe. Tendinitis is an inflammation of the tendons and ligaments, usually caused by the stress of repetitive movement. It's not like a regular injury, where you feel something tear or snap, and then the pain starts.

 

I had been painting my house and scrubbing carpet glue from my wood floors in the days prior to the onset of the pain, but I didn't make the connection at first because I didn't remember injuring myself, and the pain started sometime during the night while I was sleeping, not while I was working. At first I thought I had pulled a muscle without realizing it, or I had 'slept wrong' or something. By the second night the pain had spread down to my bicep, and two days later I couldn't raise my arm more than two inches without experiencing sharp, shooting pain down my arm.

 

If this is what you have, you do need to go to the doctor and I suggest you don't wait too long. I waited a week and by the time I got to the doctor, calcium deposits had started to build around the ligaments in my shoulder. I was treated with oral steroids, a heating pad and ibuprofen for the pain. I was better in a couple of days and I haven't had any trouble with my shoulder since, but if left untreated, acute tendinitis can become chronic.

 

I would have a doctor look at it in any case. Pain in your arm sever enough to keep you up at night is just not normal!

 

I hope it isn't anything too bad and that you feel better soon. :)