Describe your frozen shoulder pain

Hi.

Recently, I got tentatively diagnosed with frozen shoulder. Still waiting for MRI, but I don't think that will happen any time soon with COVID-19 restrictions. So I wanted to hear some opinions from folks here whether I really have frozen shoulder, or is this something else.

Basically, my physio diagnosed it based on mostly one thing: that I'm unable to rotate my arm outwards, even when I relax my muscles and let someone else move my arm. I read that this is the hallmark of frozen shoulder. However, the weird thing is that my pain is located in upper arm only. My shoulder doesn't hurt (or sometimes hurts a little bit, but 90% of the pain is in the upper arm). The pain is either on the front (along the biceps) or on the back (along the triceps). Often, both at the same time. I also noticed that my muscles around shoulder (most notably pectorals and upper trapezius) are constantly very tense/contracted.

Does this really sound like frozen shoulder?

The pain is worse at night. Especially when I lie down on my back. When I lie on my good side, there is much less pain, and this is really the only position I can get some sleep in. I keep waking up every few hours, and it is very difficult to get back to sleep afterwards. During the day, it is better, especially if I avoid movements that cause pain. I try to do gentle ROM exercises. I cannot do any stretching or strengthening exercises, because they result in pain that sometimes lasts for over a day. And again, the pain is located in the front and in the back of upper arm, but not much in the shoulder. My biceps and triceps are becoming weaker and smaller, and I cannot do anything about it, which I find scary and depressing (I used to exercise 3 - 4 times a week, but I have not exercised at all since March). It even hurts me when I go for walks - I think it is the downward movement of the arm that is provoked by steps that somehow stretches my biceps tendon and causes pain, but I cannot be sure.

And a bit of history how this started for me (not sure if this is relevant):

In September 2019 I developed a sharp pain in my biceps long tendon area (the onset was from zero pain to 100% pain within a few hours - it was just getting worse throughout the day). No obvious reason for it. My doctor thinks it was either muscle tear or some impingement, although Ultrasound and X-Ray showed nothing. I was not able to lift my arm in front of me more than around 45 degrees. I avoided that move for the first month, and then once the pain lessened, I started exercising and stretching all muscles in my upper arm slowly. It was going well, the pain was pretty much gone by December 2019. I continued with exercises, and then around February/March 2020 I started feeling a bit of pain in my upper arm during stretches, and sometimes after strengthening exercises. I kept going with exercises and tried to ignore the pain, but it was progressively getting worse and worse. By the middle of April, it became unbearable. The pain was so intense I couldn't sleep for two nights. So I put a makeshift sling to immobilize my arm, and took Aleeve for 10 days. It helped with the pain, but once I took the sling off after 10 days, my shoulder wouldn't move without pain. That was end of April, and my physio diagnosed me with frozen shoulder. Since then, it has not really changed much. I do my gentle ROM exercises many times a day, but they don't seem to help.

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