Will I someday walk like that? I'll undoubtedly walk slower as I age and if I live long enough, I'll likely someday need a cane and then a walker and then an assistant to push me around in a wheelchair, like that used by Mr. Potter in "It's a Wonderful Life." But will I walk around with my hands behind my back, like Groucho Marx? (In case you're not keeping score, I've so far referenced World War II, "It's a Wonderful Life" and Groucho Marx. Modern culture!)
The answer (the question again: Will I walk around with my hands behind my back?) is an unconditional no.
Not because I'll be too spry to walk like that. Or because I'll feel like it looks old or anything like that. The reason I won't walk like that is that it would hurt my shoulders too much.
I don't have terrible shoulders in the way a former pitcher or painter or gymnast might have (do painters have bad shoulders? It seems like they should). But I've had my share of shoulder trouble (I had a "frozen shoulder" around the time the pandemic started, a common, a very uncomfortable thing where your shoulder really hurts and takes three years to gradually get better).
If you're over 40, you've likely had some shoulder problems, although it's possible that you haven't talked to a doctor about it (about one-third of humans admit to shoulder pain, making it one of the most common medical complaints). If you're over 40, you've almost assuredly had some sort of damage to your shoulder – an opinion based on science.
Earlier this year, a study published by JAMA Internal Medicine (not related to Carl Carlson's 1981 hit, "She's a Bad Mama Jama," a pop culture reference that's only 45 years old, so much newer than Groucho Marx) reported that 99% of adults over 40 have at least one abnormality in a rotator cuff, based on magnetic resonance imaging.
More than 99% of us have damaged shoulders!
The study concluded that not all rotator cuff injuries hurt. The authors suggested that doctors using MRIs to diagnose shoulder pain could leave to unnecessary treatment, since everyone has shoulder damage.
My conclusion was different: 99% of us have shoulder injuries!
So how can so many old people walk around hunched slightly forward with their hands clasped behind their backs? Doesn't it hurt? It hurts me!
First, some basics if you're not a doctor. Or if like me, your understanding of rotator cuffs ends with the knowledge that a torn rotator cuff leads to surgery for baseball pitchers.
The rotator cuff is not a single thing; it's a group of tendons and muscles that keep the upper arm bone in your shoulder socket. Damage to it can cause pain. Or not.
The study in question was based on information on patients in Finland (leading to colleagues of those who published the paper to continually ask, "Is it Finish(ed)?" and then laugh.) and included a variety of possible injuries to the rotator cuff, from degrees of tears to tendinopathy.
The study also showed that the older you got, the more likely you were to have more severe injuries to your rotator cuff, a finding that lines up with a recent conversation I had with a friend who is probably close to 70 and was coming off a torn rotator cuff that happened while he was opening a can of pickles.
He tore his rotator cuff taking the lid off a jar of pickles!
Alas, the study's findings didn't help me much. Although most older people don't walk around with hands behind their backs, enough do that it makes me think either they've somehow avoided hurting their shoulders or that they're tougher than me.
Or perhaps, as Groucho Marx once said, "Age is not a particularly interesting subject. Anyone can get old. All you have to do is live long enough."
And have some sort of rotator cuff injury.
Reach Brad Stanhope (but stretch before reaching) at bradstanhope@outlook.com.
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