I've been doing excessive weightlifting for years. Now that i took up martial arts, when i try to hit, i feel intense pain, due to my joints having received so much strain. Will they ever heal? Or is my journey in martial arts over before it even starts?
Sorry bout the clip. Just remembered the scene and posted without watching it. Didn't remember the language.
Short answer. Yes,and no. I am 41 with several joint issues. I train hard and rest harder. I have learned to adapt my training to pains. Sometimes all of my coaches are respectful enough to respect that. That is the key. A good group to train with. By the way ask your Dr. He or she trains in the healing art not the beating art like most of us
It's never over I once got to a place where I had that nagging thought in the back of my mind, it wasn't joint pain from weight lifting but one day I was doing pull-ups and a major tendon on the right side of my body moved, messed up my shoulder, made it hard to breath, let alone punch. I had long been training in Hung Gar and Tai Chi already, and I thought I may have to give both up because of it. Thankfully I learned that a lot of the times the pain we feel when doing something, punching or kicking or whatever, is caused by a tendon or bone catching a piece of flesh, muscle, or other softer tissue and then pulling on it. Whenever this happens, it hurts, a lot, but with the proper stretching, learning to feel out your own body, and a certain method I have figured out you'll be able to undo a lot of this damage, but be ready for a long and painful road as 'untwisting' these bound up areas is just as painful as twisting them up in the first place. The method I spoke of primarily focuses on feeling tension. We often stretch our bodies into a position that we'll feel a pull or some kind of tension, thinking that's what we want since it gives us nice feedback. But this feeling is just the caught piece of tissue being crushed or tugged on, which is counter-intuitive to fixing the affected area. Instead, the next time you notice you are rolling your shoulder unconsciously or whatever joint may be bothering you, begin to try moving it in -exactly the opposite- direction. If you imagine a piece of meat being on a hook, and you tug the meat, you'll feel it pulling on the hook, tearing and ripping, but if you push the meat up toward the hook, it'll loosen it's grip around the hook and allow you to remove it. This is the same fundamental principle you have to consider when trying to apply this method. It seems easy, but it isn't, so try it slowly and remember to always move toward 'the path of least resistance'. Link removed.
That's only a question your doctor can answer by referring you to an orthopaedic surgeon, or a physical therapist, or both. For what it's worth, I can't do my beloved kicking right now because I'm waiting for my second hip replacement (I'm 31). But I'm boxing five days a week and lifting weights in a way that doesn't hurt. There is always something else you can do.
