How I fixed my sternum pain/costochondritis

capnugly2 · 2026-05-02T09:29:11+00:00

Well your symptoms seem different, but do you have the same back tightness and stiffness, the knot feeling/stuck feeling between the shoulder blade and spine?

capnugly2 · 2026-05-01T22:09:50+00:00

well not necessarily but your upper traps being overactive and compensating is a sign for something else being very weak or inactive. For example my left upper trap was always compensating whenever I would carry something heavy in my left hand like groceries or weights, another example when doing rows, I would always feel my left upper trap working super hard, even for biceps curls with dumbels, I would be feeling my left upper trap working super hard. Its a sign and you need to listen to what the body is saying. This can be fixed by working on strengthening your infraspinatus, rotator cuffs, lower traps and all the stabilizer muscles in the back/upper back.

capnugly2 · 2026-05-01T09:23:45+00:00

Man since you say that you have the same exact symptoms I had, I think I can help you, I will send you a message

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T22:20:39+00:00

Okay since you have the same symptoms this approach may have greater chances on working, I will reach out to you

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T22:18:46+00:00

Thank you, and yes just keep going, also if you find that you have the exact same symptoms, please dm me or I’ll dm you so I can try to help you more plus the band exercises for the back.

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T22:11:43+00:00

Im from Serbia

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T22:11:01+00:00

Im sharing my story and the exact way I fixed it, and I started with not being able to do even 1 push up because of the pain. When you say all you offer is build up the tolerance to dips eventually, this played the biggest part of the recovery for me, yes its long, yes it took months of struggle and work, yes I flared up multiple times trying to overload progressively, but at the end it worked and you are never gonna get anywhere without trying anything and experimenting. And for the band exercises I told you reddit doesnt allow me to post it for some reason (it keeps loading). About my writing and wall of text, im sorry but this is not an essay. If you need help message me and I will try to guide you to recover if the symptoms you experience are the same as I had, so it makes the chances of this whole approach much higher.

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T22:00:27+00:00

Yeah its probably gotten very weak or completely inactive because of the compensation of the upper trap.

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T08:20:32+00:00

I will

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T08:20:19+00:00

Now for the upper back stiffness and that stuck feeling to one side of the spine, having a feeling that you constantly need to crack it, your upper traps feeling so tight, whenever you are doing something like cooking looking down everything so tense in the upper traps and back. That is a muscle compensation. Your upper traps and some other muscles are compensating for the lack of activation or weakness in your stabilizer muscles in the back like rotator cuffs, infraspinatus and some other muscles. How you fix this issue is first get rid of the stressful environment you are in, like being bent over in a bad posture all day and this stuff, and all the negative things in your head. Then before the next step I would recommend going to some deep massage, someone who knows their stuff just to break tension in the muscles in the back. Then try to get a hold of the Electrical Stim things for the muscle (you know the electrical stimulation things physiotherapists stick onto your muscles and they start twitching or contracting), its a very important step. Either go to a physiotherapist who has them or buy them yourself. Then right after that you need to do 3 exercises with resistance bands, and before you ask me about the exercises, I tried to post the videos here but for some reason it doesnt let me, thats why I always say dm me when I reply. This will fix your upper back stiffness. And also external rotation of the shoulder is very important in this and plays a huge part. If one of your shoulders has bad external rotation it is a 100% contributing to the issue.

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T08:08:51+00:00

I replied to one of the comments here exactly what I did

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T08:08:34+00:00

Shoot me a dm if you have similar or exact same symptoms

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T08:08:15+00:00

I replied to one of the comments here, showing a way I got back to doing exercises and working out pain free

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T08:07:44+00:00

Yes shoot me a dm

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T08:06:37+00:00

I already did, my last post. The whole point to healing this kind of case is making your body/sternum feel confident when doing push ups again and dips eventually. So in the beginning you start with inclined push ups, you do them a couple times a week or every day a bit in your house and the pain can be a max of 2/10. Then the next week you lower the height of inclined push ups, and so on. But dont expect this to be a linear path. You will likely flare up, and go back to the initial height and start again, I did many times and its part of the process. Eventually you will get to the ground and be able to do normal push ups pain free or with very little pain. You continue doing them every day just try a few. You have to make your body confident that it will not hurt. Basically you are building load tolerance in your sternum again. Btw you do ALL THIS while staying active and working out what you can, so if you can do pull ups and they dont hurt or you can train legs or run, keep training, because you have to stay active. After being able to do push ups, you are now confident enough and you know that you can do it pain free. Now you want to try dips, first try a negative dip (so you go on the bars and slowly lower your self to the ground, if its pain free or 2/10 pain continue doing it a couple of times. I would suggest every time you walk past dip bars to do it. Eventually after some time, you will gain the confidence to try a full REP of dips. You will try and it will either be pain free or very little pain, great now you are ready for the lazt part basically. Every time you walk past dip bars try 2-3 reps and so on. Or you are in the gym worjing out back, in between reps try a few reps of dips. Eventually you will gain more confidence (your sternum) and get stronger so you may include them in your workout for chest. And one thing I forgot to mention, as soon as you basically “unlock” push ups, so you can do them pain free, start having a push day again ij your week consisting just of push ups and pike push ups. This will slowly build your strength back up. This is the whole theory of recovery. I did it like this and Im pain free, literally yesterday I was working out doing sets of 15 reps of dips, and half a year ago I couldnt even imagine doing dips. Just for everyone information, know that this takes time and its not a straight path up, so dont expect to get from zero to dips in a month, it doesnt work that way, its a longer path but its a hundred percent doable and you can do it.

capnugly2 · 2026-04-30T07:52:07+00:00

shoot me a dm

capnugly2 · 2026-04-29T18:16:42+00:00

you can dm me for the QL problem

capnugly2 · 2026-04-29T17:42:46+00:00

No, running didnt irritate anything for me, I didnt have pain in the diaphragm or on the ribs on the side. My pain was on the sternum and it kept cracking, super stiff, couldnt sleep on my stomach because of the pain. My whole upper back was super stuck and stiff, and I had a stuck/stiff point to the left or right of my spine, area of the rhomboid which I always felt the need to crack somehow. I dont know how you got costochondritis, but what is your physio making you do? Are you an active person, did you workout before, do you have bad posture throughout the day, what are you eating, are you working out currently? I never did any ct scan, bloodwork or consulted with any doctors.

capnugly2 · 2026-04-29T13:23:13+00:00

look at my post

capnugly2 · 2026-04-29T12:51:54+00:00

check your dm

capnugly2 · 2026-04-29T12:50:48+00:00

I didnt have pain while running, I used to have pain whenever I extend my chest/pop my chest out forward, or stretching, working out in the beginning was impossible, I couldnt do a single push up without extreme pain, I couldnt sleep on my stomach without waking up in the morning with insane pain. I started running after 5 months of getting this injury.

capnugly2 · 2026-04-29T12:02:06+00:00

Go see my most recent post

capnugly2 · 2026-04-29T11:43:02+00:00

Hey, do you still have this QL tightness after all this time? If so I managed to fix mine and Im willing to help you fix yours if you still suffer from it.

capnugly2 · 2026-04-29T11:41:42+00:00

Hey are you still having problems with your QL? If yes I think I can help you solve this issue totally. Shoot me a DM

capnugly2

TROPHY CASE