Softball injury related to growth spurt

Have your girls had injuries from playing softball due to sudden growth spurt?

DD has been going to PT for the last 2 weeks. After a 3 hour practice she started complaining that her back is sore. Sports medicine doctor diagnosed her as having little leaguer's shoulder after a MRI scan, but she has been having pain in the back near her shoulder blade. We are doing a bunch of exercises but the PT also mentioned that her muscles and ligaments probably have not kept up with her bone growth. I have posted some of the pics of our PT routines in my blog.

Have you had this issue with your DD? how long did it take to heal? It has been a month since DD has done any sports now. She is 12 and had a huge growth spurt within the last year. She plays pitcher, 3rd base, outfield and also basketball!

Thanks for your time.

DD is a pitcher and has been dealing with this for almost 2 years.She hurt her back skipping in Oct.2012 and did nothing but physio for the 4 months after.The pain is also near her left shoulder blade (she is a right handed pitcher)Doctors and PTs have said the same thing (growth spurt due to tendons & ligaments not keeping up to bone growth).She grew 4 inches last year and 1 inch so far this year and at 5'11 inches just turned 13 in Feb.

The pain has not been as bad lately as we believe her growth has slowed.We always ice after practice and only pitch until she begins to feel tired which is just before she feels pain.My daughter played through the season last year and was quite successful on the rubber with her travel team considering the pain she was feeling after every game and practice.

Tell your daughter to hang in there and let her know she should not feel guilty if she can't practice due to the pain,it will get better.My DD rarely has pain in her back now and my wife and I believe that our daughter is a better,tougher player for fighting through this the last 2 years.

We treated her injury as her doctors instructed us to do with plenty of rest.As I said earlier she did nothing but Physio for 4 months after her injury and in winter with her team did drills until she felt tired not sore.
My wife and I had no way of knowing when her back was sore while she pitched in a game,we would find out after she finished her innings that she was a little sore.It was not okay to play through pain and she knows now to pull herself out of the game if it bothers her.
I didn't say my daughter was tough for playing through pain I said my daughter is a better,tougher player for fighting through this meaning there were countless times that she had to sit out of practices and games over the season due to her injury.Watching the other girls on her team practice and play the games were frustrating for her.

Thanks. I guess my DD is not the only one. I am glad to hear that you DD is better after 4 months of PT. Something to look forward to.

I agree. My DD is out till the orthopedist releases her to play SB again. Not worth it to play with pain. More over her team is got too many players, so we may end up skipping the entire summer.

Out in Left Field said:

Your limits on pitch counts as a parent are way too high and there appears to be chronic pain from lack of rest while competing. That's the problem. Prevention; prevent the pain after pitching (either through correcting mechanics, strength improvements, or more rest/less pitches) as it should not be there. Then you don't have to 'sit out' and recover from the overuse injury at all. How is that for a plan?

Click to expand...

I am at a loss to see any values for pitch counts posted anywhere in this thread. Yet you in you infinite wisdom have determined them to be way too high??? And you have gone so far to offer a diagnosis. Amazing. You must have a crystal ball or maybe an in at the psychic friends network.

We are dealing with an injury right now. Thought maybe it was overuse from doing a 2.5 hour practice at middle school and then driving straight to a league game to pitch. It's actually a genetic issue with her joints and flexibility. Everyone can bend their arm at the elbow, but she can do it in the other direction as well... While this allows for her to use her arms like rubber bands and have the speed of girls much older than her, it's not a normal thing. The PT said there's no "neutral" point for her. She "cheats" every time she just simply lifts her arms. I was the same way as a kid but I didn't play softball and definitely wasn't a pitcher! My sports were soccer and volleyball. With muscle tone it should bring some balance to her joints so we have a long road to building the proper support muscles. Right now she's just sore if she uses that arm too much and doesn't focus on keeping the shoulder blades and everything else in place. We're flexible to the point we could get our arms back in front of us if we were handcuffed. I call her Gumby and it doesn't help that she's so tall and long limb'd. I imagine we'll have to start all over when she hits her last puberty growth spurt.

riseball said:

I am at a loss to see any values for pitch counts posted anywhere in this thread. Yet you in you infinite wisdom have determined them to be way too high??? And you have gone so far to offer a diagnosis. Amazing. You must have a crystal ball or maybe an in at the psychic friends network.

Click to expand...

That's what OILF does. Most readers here just skip over his idiotic posts.

Just my observation but I am seeing a lot more growth plate issues with the 10U & 12U divisions. As a kid, I don't remember my friends at this age having these injuries? Maybe we were too young to notice it or we parents now are quick to run to the doctor for a diagnosis but it does seem to be more frequent.

Wouldn't be surprised that there is a correlation between growth plate injuries and year round sports, specializing in one sport, more competitive youth sports, and longer, more intense practices?

My DD has dealt with the exact same issue. It started following her fall high school season, where an aggressive schedule towards the end had her pitching in 4-5 games per week. Pain, tightness and soreness around her left shoulder and down by her left shoulder blade (she is a left handed pitcher). Upon looking at the xrays, the orthopedic surgeon noted that her growth plates in her shoulder are still wide open (DD is 15). He was pretty shocked - DD's growth spurt was delayed a good three years past what is normal for her peers. Interestingly, DD has celiac - she cannot tolerate any gluten (wheat products) of any kind, something that we discovered last August. We cut out the gluten for good and DD has been growing ever since.

The good news was that there was no permanent damage and several months of rest and PT have worked wonders. The physical therapist even commended DD on her work ethic, something that I was shocked to hear, given DD's around the house penchant for doing as little work as humanly possible, but happily surprised nonetheless - ha ha