I got my MRI back from the doc… And it looks like I dodged a bullet. They said I’ve got some inflammation in various muscles and tendons connecting around the elbow joint, the most serious being the ones that attach to the lateral epicondyle, which is the condition for tennis elbow. They gave me some anti-inflammatory cream to put on a couple times a day and recommended that I see someone 1-2x for tissue therapy to get things all squared away. I did some research on my own on the ol’ interwebs and the symptoms and causes of tennis elbow align exactly with what I’ve had going on, and it sounds like it’s pretty common and very treatable. I had already been getting some tissue work done, but now that I have a conclusive diagnosis, the treatment can be much more targeted rather than shooting in the dark.

So…. It seems like I’ve made a big deal out of all this with my knee and elbow, which have turned out to not need any surgery, and have fairly routine treatment methods. If you’re asking yourself if I’ll get back to it like I was anytime soon, I most certainly will not. This has been a huge wakeup call in the best of ways, as in it scared the hell out of me, but the end result will be that I can return to normal once things are healed. I’ve learned a whole lot more about the importance of taking care of your body through this process, and even though it’s been a pretty good sized delay, I’m really grateful the lesson.

As far as the weights go, I’m still getting in there and trying to stay active without doing things that makes my elbow swell or my knee sore. No direct arm work, and I’m being very careful with my pressing and pulling, as well as my leg work. Paul has given me a really good warmup routine that’ll switch things up from what I’ve been doing with Craig for a while to target some of the weaknesses in my hip and TFL that could have been leading to my knee on that side getting hurt.

It looks like I’m doing a lot of volume below, but since the weight I’m using is so light, and the rest periods are so short, it’s not a big stress to my body and it doesn’t long. I’m just going in there and feeling my body and getting blood moving.

Calves, Hams, Glutes, Lower-back (P-Chain)

Warm up:

McGill Big 3, lunges, side leg raises, clam shells, plank variation, dead bugs

Seated calf raises SS w/ machine glute kick backs

Standing calf raises SS w/ machine kick back variation (Golds has a lot of butt machines)

Abductor machine SS w/ Adductor machine

Seated hamstring curls

Lying hamstring curls

DB stiff leg dead lift

Bodyweight reverse hypers on a bench

Back

Warm up:

McGill Big 3, T-spine mobility/activation, planks & dead bugs

Machine pulldowns

Machine rows

Single arm cable pull down

Single arm DB row

cable pullovers

Reverse flies

Shrugs