Hi BBM,
I am 18 and have been struggling with pain in my right hip since March and have not been able to squat / deadlift as a result since about April which is when I stopped due to the pain. In short, I have been to a few orthopedists and physiotherapists and nothing seemed to helped and I recently went to a private doctor who is supposed to be an expert in the field and he said that he suspects that I have femoroacetabular impingement and as a result a tear in my labrum (something along those lines, I didn’t completely understand), and although I first need to do an MRI test to confirm this is what I have, if it is this then the doctor recommended surgery. I know it is probably too early, but I wanted to know how I should keep training after the surgery if I do need it, because I assume training for strength might not be the best idea following a surgery, and I was wondering whether I should be squatting at all afterwards, and if so should I be doing high-bar / low-bar / doesn’t matter (I used to do low-bar squats, and I saw Eric Helms talking about how he switched to doing high-bar squats and front squats following the same surgery).
I would recommend first listening to our recent podcast on FAI syndrome prior to pursuing these interventions.
A consultation with one of our BBM rehab clinicians would likely be of benefit to you here as well to get individualized advice.
Hey Josh,
I’m going to piggyback on what Austin said and highly recommend listening to our podcast on FAI. There is a HIGH rate of morphological changes in hips that used to be called FAI but now we know are normal variants. This has made most much less likely to rush to surgery as the outcomes are not spectacular. It is hard to give definitive advice on a forum as there is nuance to every case such as training history, current programming, sports played and a host of other questions. If you do not elect to have the surgery I would say, with good guidance, you have an excellent chance of getting over your symptoms and training. If you do elect to have surgery, there is absolutely no contraindication to squatting in the future. I would be VERY clear with your surgeon that this is what your goals include if you do elect to follow up with him and get his expectations on his likelihood of you returning to squatting and what his timeline for that would be.
I looked for the podcast about FAI and could not find it, what is the title / number of the podcast exactly?
About getting a consultation, I am not in a position where I can currently afford it, and the reason I am thinking a surgery might be the best way to go is not only because I went to a few doctors now who all recommended surgery, but because I cannot see myself managing to deal with symptoms any other way since my ultimate goal is to get back to training regularly and right now I feel pain just walking normally or if I even slightly lift my leg up.
I also have another question which has nothing to do with the original question (I am not sure if this is the place to ask), which is how should I train right now if my goal is hypertrophy? I assume I should go for a program which is focused on upper body development, and if this is the case do you guys here at BBM have any programs as such?
If you are experiencing symptoms I would advocate for your primary goal to be symptoms management with hypertrophy and strength sitting secondary to that. If this has gotten to the point where you are considering surgery as an option it would likely be counter productive to try and run a high volume program geared towards hypertrophy for your symptoms. This may actually be a contributing factor to your ongoing symptoms if your propensity is to continue attempting to train hard through symptoms. This is often an instance where you need to work around the issue and slowly reintroduce movements to which you are sensitized.