Tendon issues in arms

I'm wondering if anyone else on s4me is having tendon issues in the arms/elbows. I use the computer, but to be honest it's a modest amount. I had a work-up for auto-immune conditions but they were all negative with no antibodies to the connective tissue orders, only a very slightly positive ana. I'm kinda baffled as if it's not rsi as I'm not straining them and not auto-immune how they could have developed and not gone away (I'm also fairly young for these kinds of issues).

I don't really know where to look to fix them (supplements are too hard on my stomach) and how to figure out what it is. But, I guess another nagging idea is that it's part of me/cfs, but I didn't have it for years previously and it doesn't seem to have a positive relationship in symptomic appearance to fatigue, brain fog, etc..

 

yes your ? both arms elbows wrist . at some point years ago i was told it was inflammation of the fascia where tendons attach to the bones. if you can tolerate ibruprofen a short course of that may be helpful .but best to run it by your gp .

 

I've had some 'soft tissue' issues appear over the past few years. There is a small area where my tricep meets my elbow joint on the back of my arm that gets sore and it just won't 'heal'. I also have issues with the area around the base of my thumb on that hand. No injury for either, but they just won't sort themselves out. Any sort of repetitive actions (such as typing for the thumb) and they just start up again. The base of my thumb is actually always sort of swollen. Like an overcooked steak. But it's not super swollen or red, so the physio just wasn't interested. She didn't know what it was. I'm 99% sure both are ME related.

 

Inflammation of the fascia is exactly the conclusion I came to after lots of google-based research. I know this is an issue for me because the whole right side of my leg (the IT band) is very tough (hardened), tendinous, and sensitive. There are parts where it almost feels scarred, and it affects the adjacent muscles.

 

@Jonathan Edwards Any input here, our resident rhumy?

 

I have heaps of tendon and ligament problems, from shoulder to ankle. Just talking arms I have recurrent issues with: left rotator cuff, right biceps tendinopathy, left and right tennis as well as golfer's elbow - without ever having played either sport - plus left and right wrist flexor tendonitis on both sides as well as right thumb. Currently only the rotator cuff and the biceps tendinopathy are bothersome, the others come and go.

No hint of autoimmunity in my case either and there doesn't seem to be a link with ME severity.

The only thing that makes me speculate about a possible connection with ME is that my first encounters with tendon problems (ankle) happened just as I was going into a sort of remission, sadly temporary, after my initial ME episode. I think there's been some suggestions that maybe our collagen gets broken down more or something similar, so I wonder if maybe my tendons got weaker during those years with ME but nothing happened then because I was so sedentary but once I started to be more active the tendons couldn't handle it?

My tendons seem very weak in that it doesn't take very much at all for them to get injured. The last time my rotator cuff went ping was when I opened a ranch slider door. And I have to be very careful about using devices or elbows or wrists play up again very quickly.

Here is a very extensive review of tendon problems and the various hypotheses about causes. The short version is nobody really knows. However, several of the proposed mechanisms thought to be involved in tendon injury or healing sound familiar, e.g. glucose & lactate metabolism, and hypoxia but until much more is known about both ME and about tendon problems we won't know if there's any link or some of us are just unlucky to be hit by both.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7037288/

I've never found anything that helps apart from using the affected body part as little as possible and waiting it out. Tendons are very slow to heal. Sometimes when there's clear inflammation anti-inflammatory painkillers help a little but mostly not. On the wrists I found bracing somewhat helpful. I haven't tried it on the elbow or shoulder.

My husband is currently battling Achilles tendinopathy and his physio strapped his calf and advised initial rest followed by very gentle mobilisation (range of motion type stuff) followed by exercises to very gradually build up load capacity. Warned it could take several months to recover. Not what you want to hear I guess...

 

Somehow, in my early 30's, I managed to injury my shoulder - really the right rotator cuff. It wasn't bad if my arm was at my side, but it could be very painful if I put my arm above or behind my head for a while and then lowered it. Unfortunately, that's something I do while sleeping, so sometimes I would wake up with very intense pain. I tried tying my arm to my waist before going to bed, but that often did not work (it's not easy to effectively tie one arm to your waist).

The injury came and went a couple of times until eventually it would not go away on its own.

I finally went to a doctor who gave me some kind of steroid injection in the shoulder and some simple exercise instructions. He also recommended running warm water from the shower onto my shoulder for several minutes each day.

It took a week or so, but my shoulder finally started to improve. It healed and it hasn't really bothered me since, although I sometimes get a fleeting reminder of the pain when I raise my arm above my head in a particular way.

I wasn't too sure about getting the steroid shot, but I don't think the problem would have healed without it. I think it was one of those things where the inflammation and swelling had created a vicious circle that was preventing recovery.

 

I've had issues with my tendons for the past 11 years, a few years after the onset of ME/CFS. At first I thought it was connected to piano playing, but I had to stop that. This also didn't explain why I got problems in my feet/other areas too eventually. My physio said it was some kind of problem where they meet the bones. My tissue also felt more and more gummy and weird esp on one side. We don't know why. (I had to stop playing the piano, obviously.)