Alright, I know I'm far from the only person here who has had surgery for a mess-up shoulder. Question for anyone who has experience: What kind of issues did you have later on? At what point do you begin to differentiate between "yeah, I have a messed-up shoulder that was mostly fixed" and "oh f***, I screwed it up again."? What kind of long-term limitations did you have after shoulder surgery, and were you informed of them, or did you just figure them out on your own?
AC3 separation in 1988 that was misdiagnosed and mistreated by the Navy. Several months after getting out my civilian orthopod said that they had really screwed the pooch and that my rotator cuff had probably been torn, too.
Fast forward to 1998 and my shoulder started to bother me again. I had an impingement that was getting worse and worse, then got underway on a lifeboat for a SAR case in very rough seas and either tore my rotator cuff again or it was already torn and I made it worse. After 12 months of limited duty, PT, no operation but some very painful joint manipulation I was back to full duty. I was in the Coast Guard and got treated at the Bremerton Navy Hospital. This orthopod was as good as the 1988 doctor was bad. He recommended that I not ever bench press again and that if I did that the weights be light and my arm doesn't go past 90 degrees. He recommended that I do a lot of push ups, pull ups, etc. Swimming was also recommended as long as I didn't overstress my shoulder.
In 2006 I had another minor tear of that rotator cuff. The civilian orthopod recommended rest, PT and told me to keep using it.
No surgeries, the two civilians and one good Navy doctor all said that after 18 months or so you really can't tell the difference between somebody who had surgery and somebody who didn't except for the scars. I have no real limitations in daily life, I can do push ups, pull ups, reach over my head, behind my back, etc. When we train on handcuffing I take a pass on being the subject because I don't have as much flexibility and my shoulder gets sore if people wrench on it a little too hard. I have arthritis and bursitis but if I continue to exercise that seems to keep pain to a minimum. After having my shoulder freeze and my right elbow freeze up on me one of the doctors said that I be aware of the fact that I evidently get a lot of scar tissue that causes me to have a frozen shoulder, elbow, etc. and should be ready for that if I tear something else again. I also can't sleep on my left side for very long.
My biggest limitation, oddly enough, is that my shoulder gets sore on long bike rides. It is less noticeable on my mountain bike because the position is more upright than on my Bianchi road bike. The solution I came up with for that was to start riding recumbents last summer. No more shoulder or elbow pain and no more bike seat jammed up between my butt cheeks!
I know this probably doesn't fit what you were looking for since I didn't have surgery but you might want to get a second opinion before letting somebody cut. I know two other people who had the same injuries and had surgery, both of them needed to have bone spurs and growth removed. The same doctor cut on both and told both of them that if he could have avoided operating on them he would have. I lost track of one guy, he retired, the other is fit for full duty and has no real issues.
