Left bicep won't fully flex - no injury - seems like nerve problem

[thelojones]

Greetings

So nearly 3 weeks ago i was hanging out with the family in the evening and went to show off my gains to my wife and my left bicep wouldn't fully flex, it was mostly mush. Right bicep hard as a rock. I ran down to my weights and tried a 5 lb curl and could barely do any without cheating

There was no known injury, no pain, no event that i can think of that caused this.

It seem to get better for a few days and i could curl a 20 lb'er but then it got worse again a couple days later. My masseuse friend worked over my left side from back to fingers and the next day It felt pretty good and was able to get a decent back/bicep day in. Couple days later it was back to being weak.

I went to see a sports medicine ortho doc who specializes in elbow to shoulder and he had never seen anything like it, of course. He asked if i had a stroke, none that i know of i said. He used an ultrasound to check out the muscle and tendons and everything looked perfect. He followed the nerve and showed it to me at the elbow. He noticed that the nerve, directly under where they put the giant needle in at the blood bank to draw, had a pocket of what looked to him like fluid around it.

He said it's possible they went through the vein and poked the nerve. I do recall it being an extra painful insertion with a straw sized needle, but that was 4 weeks earlier. He put me on 50MG pregnisone for 5 days to see if it would help and reduce any swelling, pull out the fluid. Been on for 4 days now and no real difference yet.

A bit after the pregnisone he wants to have some nerve tests done, an EMG conduction study.

So while i'm waiting i thought i'd run this by you folks and see if there were any thoughts. I've iced it, heated it, stretched it, poked it, hit it, cried at it, asked it real nice... anything else i can do to heal this supposed nerve problem?


me: 44 yo, 5' 9.5", 186lbs, on 100mg weekly TRT for 8 months. Blood is all great now but had a high RBC episode a months ago and had to give away a couple pints to get it down from 57 hematocrit. Started working out 4 months ago.

[600@50]

If it truly is nerve damage from your giving blood I think I would have to bring this to the attention of the blood bank where you donated. In the meantime it seems like you're doing everything you should be doing. Ice and heat everyday and massage the area to stimulate blood flow. Nerves can take a while to heal so patience is what you need now. Maybe some acupuncture therapy would help. And keep trying to do your bicep work to stimulate the nerves and muscle. You don't need atrophy due to lack of stimulus.

[almostgone]

Greetings

So nearly 3 weeks ago i was hanging out with the family in the evening and went to show off my gains to my wife and my left bicep wouldn't fully flex, it was mostly mush. Right bicep hard as a rock. I ran down to my weights and tried a 5 lb curl and could barely do any without cheating

There was no known injury, no pain, no event that i can think of that caused this.

It seem to get better for a few days and i could curl a 20 lb'er but then it got worse again a couple days later. My masseuse friend worked over my left side from back to fingers and the next day It felt pretty good and was able to get a decent back/bicep day in. Couple days later it was back to being weak.

I went to see a sports medicine ortho doc who specializes in elbow to shoulder and he had never seen anything like it, of course. He asked if i had a stroke, none that i know of i said. He used an ultrasound to check out the muscle and tendons and everything looked perfect. He followed the nerve and showed it to me at the elbow. He noticed that the nerve, directly under where they put the giant needle in at the blood bank to draw, had a pocket of what looked to him like fluid around it.

He said it's possible they went through the vein and poked the nerve. I do recall it being an extra painful insertion with a straw sized needle, but that was 4 weeks earlier. He put me on 50MG pregnisone for 5 days to see if it would help and reduce any swelling, pull out the fluid. Been on for 4 days now and no real difference yet.

A bit after the pregnisone he wants to have some nerve tests done, an EMG conduction study.

So while i'm waiting i thought i'd run this by you folks and see if there were any thoughts. I've iced it, heated it, stretched it, poked it, hit it, cried at it, asked it real nice... anything else i can do to heal this supposed nerve problem?


me: 44 yo, 5' 9.5", 186lbs, on 100mg weekly TRT for 8 months. Blood is all great now but had a high RBC episode a months ago and had to give away a couple pints to get it down from 57 hematocrit. Started working out 4 months ago.

Hmm....weird. I've been.prescribed prednisolone for.injuries in the past, but it was usually a dose pack containing (I believe) 7-10 days of pills set up so you taking a large dose the first day and then tapering down each day afterwards until the full course was taken.
Really do hope that it improves for you ASAP. Please keep up posted w/updates.

[BG]

^^^I've always tapered it myself.

OP I tore my bicep off last year and have the same issue. My bi and tri. Please keep us updated interested in the final outcome. Good luck.

[thelojones]

Update:

short version:
bicep started working again last week, 6/24, and is probably a week away from being back to full size and use after it atrophied a bit.

long version:
I did the prednisone 6/14 thru 6/18 with no noticeable difference through 6/24. On the 24th i went on for the morning EMG appointment. They tested the nerves in my hand up through my elbow on my left arm (didn't do bicep nerves yet), then repeated the tests on my right arm to compare.

They didn't like something in the results so they started testing my leg also. After a couple hours total they said i have slow nerves and should go see a neurologist and check for some disease, genetics, environmental poisoning, etc. Since they got sidetracked and ran out of time they never did get to testing my bicep

So at this point my bicep has atrophied a bit, its about .25" smaller and much narrower than the right. Later after my appointment while i'm at work i notice that my arm feels different, when i try to flex it actually feels like its trying to flex though still mush on top the lower fibers are a bit harder.

It looks like the bicep is starting to work, i do rubber bands and light weights over the next few days and it continues to plump back up. My back/bicep day yesterday went real well, i was able to do most all the usual back stuff near my previous weights. As you can imagine its real hard to do back without a bicep.

As of today the left bicep nearly as wide and about 90% as hard as the right! I theorize that the EMG nerve zapping in my arm stimulated the nerves somewhere else and kicked started their recovery. I will post a follow up after my neuro appointment just to round off the thread.

[yettibecsuse]

Did u check if it was a bicept tear, on the ultrasound; I have had one repaired - reattached and a slight tear in the other. One of the 2 head's of the bicept can tear at the insertions or in the middle

[thelojones]

yes he looked all through it with the ultrasound and didn't see any tears or anything.

[almostgone]

Thanks for the update, thelo. It sounds promising that you're regaining some use of your bicep. Please do post an update after your neuro appointment. There are several of us here following this thread. Best wishes for a speedy recovery!!

[thelojones]

Another update after neuro: they didn't find anything so thats good. Did a bunch of blood tests which all passed and they said come back in a couple months to recheck all my nerve speeds...

Took a week off for vacation and healing. bicep is still smaller and weaker than right but progressing fast. came back and can now do full Back/bicep workouts and even increased all my weights buy 15 pounds past my previous max (8 rep max).

Will update again after next neuro visit but I'm happy my workouts can return to normal