Today I would like to share my personal experience during physique injury and how I was able to train during pain and how I 80% healed the injury without the need to perform a surgery! It was approximately 3 and half months ago when I first started having pain on my right shoulder, it was sharp pain every time I preform overhead movements or bench press with high instability , to cut the story short I decided to do MRI to identify the exact issue and the results came in with “SLAP Tear” in my right shoulder, the doctor said that I most likely need a surgery to heal my tear….

I couldn’t believe that my only choice was surgery (post-surgery recovery period is 6 months), I decided to do my own research to heal my injury without surgery and here is how I was able to recover my injury almost 90% now with the following steps:



Trained around the injury. This means that you continue to train hard, but avoid anything that hurts. That means anything. If something hurts even a little, all you’re doing is prolonging the recovery process.  Lay off the injured area and train the rest of your body.

Nutrition: not only because nutrition is often underrated and overlooked, but also because it's likely the most important factor in injury recovery.

Body and posture adjustment and posture straighten exercises, I was going to the chiropractor twice a week for this one.

Strengthen the muscles around your injured area by doing full range of motion exercises with light weight, the physical therapy will advise you on certain exercises to help with gaining your range of motion.

Completely rest for 2 weeks only. And by rest, I mean completely stop doing movements that cause you pain until you are healed. 2 weeks out from the gym will not cause you to lose any muscle mass.

Ice and heat the injury, 10 minutes each time or use “The RICE Method”.


One of the other nonsurgical methods that benefits me a lot is P-wave & laser, these 2 methods helped reducing the inflammation around the injured are.

Anti-Inflammatory pills, I took them during my 2 weeks of complete resting.

Deep Tissue massage to loosing up the tense muscles.


Use Proper Form and Warm Up Properly.

What caused the injury? A sub-acute injury is one that builds up over months or years. These can be the most frustrating injuries of all because although you can still train, you can't train at your maximum intensity level and performance is hampered.

Written by

Adam Azawi

Syntrax Elite |  Physique Competitor | Fitness Photographer

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