So I'm wondering if anybody has gone through this, and how the various stages went. Mostly as a reality check against my own experience.
After four weeks of solid rehab work (detailed below), i seem to be in a new stage. Nothing feels the way it did before the injury, and nothing feels as bad as it did at its worst. Crazy as this may sound, I would rather feel the way I do now than the way I did before the injury. Even though I probably can't come close to my previous bench 1RM. That day will come, patience, patience.
1) A "bad shoulder day" now happens only if I sleep on it, and even the worst days are only in the morning
2) I completely forget about it for hours at a stretch
3) I can bench and press empty bars and not pay a price. I can do lateral raises, front raises, and flyes (all with light rehab weight) and not pay a price, and actually feel like I got a workout.
The transition into this stage
1) Face pulls, on recovery days, 3-4 sets of 25-30. Began at 15# 4 weeks ago, now at 25#
2) Rear Delt Flyes, with 5# bands. Settled on the 5# bands two weeks ago, have gone from sets of 15 to sets of 25
3) Lying External Rotations, with 3#. Have worked up from sets of 10 to at least one set of 20, but later sets drop down
4) Stretching the pec minor. The towel method is my favorite, but you can do it without the towel at your desk whenever you want
5) Soft tissue work with the lacrosse ball. This is the easiest one to skip if it doesn't hurt at any particular moment, but doing this pre-emptively seems to be a big deal.
So I think I'm in a stage I'll call "rebuild" where the rear delt work has made it possible to do rehab weights on pressing movements, and I can continue to increase the weights on pressing movements beginner-style, that is, 5# per session.
Anybody else had any similar experience? Advice? Rebuttals?