Reoccurring AC joint issues (Help please)

[acjointhurts]

I’ve been having serious shoulder pain for awhile now, especially when doing dips, bench press and shoulder press. After going to a few doctors I’ve decided to seek advice from other people who lift, it’ll take a while for me to type out the full summary of the issues, but please read it if you’ve had shoulder pain or think you could offer useful advice.
I started lifting probably about 5-6 years ago, just doing the major compounds, bench, squat, deadlift and military press. Around two years, sometime in the spring of 2019 I shifted to basically just benching (I know not very smart, but I was like 15 and just wanted a big bench press number) but after a few months of benching heavy I started to get serious shoulder pain, so I took around 6 months off, and started lifting again he next fall. But after maybe a month or so the shoulder pain returned, and then one day while benching my shoulder made an awful noise and kinda popped in the middle of a set. This shoulder pain was in my left shoulder, the first time it was in my right shoulder. This happened probably around early December, and I didn’t try to lift again until late February- early March of 2020. I started with real light weight and worked my way back into benching heavy. I grew up doing 5x5’s on bench as heavy as possible, and that’s what I enjoy doing, and finally I worked back into being able to do them again. But only for about 3 weeks and then my shoulder gave out again. Seeing as it was the third time my shoulder was causing me severe pain I decided I wasn’t just gunna quit everything for the pain just to come back, so I kept doing lighter bench, and various cable and dumbbell chest exercises. For shoulders I continued doing military press, lateral raises and front raises, and some other variants of basically the same movements. My shoulder got better doing these so I kept doing them and began to re implement bench press this September. I started with in the 15 Rep range and had worked all the way down into the 8 Rep range, only doing close grip because I’d heard it was better for shoulder health. My goal was to get back to 5x5’s with wide grip. However I never got that far, after maybe 2-4 weeks doing dips and close grip for sets of 8 my shoulder gave again (left one bad, right one hurts a little) so finally I went to the doctor in November, they diagnosed rotator cuff tendinitis, I rehabbed rotator cuffs for around 8-10 weeks with no improvements so I went to a sports orthopedic. They diagnosed Distal Clavicular Osteolysis. I got the cortisone shot, it did nothing. I’m tired of not doing heavy bench, and want to work my way back. But right now light dumbbell bench and pushups is all I can do and they hurt. I don’t know if I should just keep doing what I can and ignoring the pain, or if I should do the the surgery where they remove part of the bone. I’ve heard a lot of guys say they just stopped benching and just do cables and stuff. I don’t want to do that, I got into lifting because I loved seeing my bench press and OHP numbers go up. So I guess what I’m asking is what do y’all think the best course of action is to get me back to my goals, now that I’ve given y’all an 8 paragraph summary of the issue.

[sowilson]

cliffs? and never was the word "row" mentioned. So, you only press, don't pull, have no routine, and your unbalanced as can be. You wonder why you're in pain??????? Well, now you have issues that probably won't fix themselves. So, find a good orthopedic surgeon (probably someone who is a pro sports team doctor) and get a proper diagnosis. Hopefully a good round of PT plus working out with a real S&C coach will be all you need. If you've f'd stuff up and need surgery then you need surgery. In the meantime become familiar with with the AC/RC/Scap exercises for shoulders. Look up "Throwers 10" (named for the rehab exercises usually performed by overhead athletes, namely pitchers).

[acjointhurts]

cliffs? and never was the word "row" mentioned. So, you only press, don't pull, have no routine, and your unbalanced as can be. You wonder why you're in pain??????? Well, now you have issues that probably won't fix themselves. So, find a good orthopedic surgeon (probably someone who is a pro sports team doctor) and get a proper diagnosis. Hopefully a good round of PT plus working out with a real S&C coach will be all you need. If you've f'd stuff up and need surgery then you need surgery. In the meantime become familiar with with the AC/RC/Scap exercises for shoulders. Look up "Throwers 10" (named for the rehab exercises usually performed by overhead athletes, namely pitchers).

Your correct, for the most part. I worked with a really good S&C coach when I played highschool sports, but once I quit I focused only on push movements yes, however recently I’ve discovered that as part of my problem and have been doing lots of pull-ups, rows, deadlifts, RDLs, shrugs, and other lat exercises plus a variety of other back exercises. But your right the problem originated from me not knowing what I was doing and lifting to hard on one movement only.