23M Formerly Very Active — Costochondritis Has Completely Derailed My Life
Hey everyone, I was recently diagnosed with costochondritis and would really appreciate any advice from people who’ve dealt with it before because I’m honestly struggling to get back to feeling like myself.
For some background, I’m a 23M and being active is a huge part of my life. I lift, run, play sports, or do some kind of workout basically every day. About 2 months ago, I strained my neck while lifting, and I think continuing to work out afterward ended up aggravating my chest and led to costo.
For the first month, the pain honestly wasn’t terrible. I knew lifting and sports probably weren’t helping, so I switched to light stationary biking every day for about 30–45 minutes around 70–75 RPM just so I could still move and sweat a little. Multiple times I felt like I was getting 80% better, but every time I started lifting again, I came back too fast and too heavy and ended up flaring it up worse each time.
At this point, my biggest issue by far is my ribs and upper back around my shoulder blades. The chest pain itself has improved a lot compared to the beginning, but now I constantly feel pain, pressure, tightness, and aching in my ribs, upper back, and around my shoulder blades basically all day. Even when I’m just sitting, I can feel the tightness and pressure in my upper back and ribs. Whenever I do almost anything, even something simple like walking, cleaning, or cooking, I feel pain in my ribs that can radiate up toward my armpit along with pressure and discomfort in my upper back.
One of the biggest challenges is that I work as an MBB consultant, so I’m on my laptop constantly, and I’ll admit my posture probably hasn’t helped. What’s frustrating is that even walking for 15–30 minutes can cause a huge amount of pressure and aching around my shoulder blades, upper back, and ribs, and sometimes it feels like it flares everything up just from that alone.
I recently bought a Backpod and have been foam rolling my upper back regularly, but I feel like I’ve hit a wall with progress. Right now it honestly feels like I can’t do anything without irritating it somehow, and I’m starting to feel stuck in a hole I can’t get out of.
Working out and being active has always been one of the biggest parts of my life, so not being able to train or even get a proper sweat in has taken a pretty serious toll on my mental health.
If anyone has gone through something similar and has advice on what finally helped them improve, whether it’s rehab work, stretching, posture changes, recovery timelines, or anything else, I’d genuinely appreciate it a lot. Thanks to anyone who took the time to read this.