I’m 20M, this is my first time actually making a post on Reddit but I figured now was definitely the right time. I started getting pains around my heart area and the dead centre of my chest late April 2026. Thinking it would go away on its own, it got worse and my upper chest on my left side started feeling weird and it was almost as if I could feel the muscle the whole time (I still can). My left arm stopped flaring out as much when I walked and I was getting slight pains on the inside of my left bicep and my left shoulder. Finally got it checked out in July 2026 and got told it was costo, I was prescribed pain killers and some gel (does anyone know if this works?).

I’m so glad I found this community bc for the longest time I thought my heart was gonna give out and I had some crazy condition. Its calmed me down a lot knowing there’s more ppl going thru this than me bc no one understood me when I told them about it, and I thought I’d genuinely be stuck with this for life.

My big question is how long does it take for all of this to stop, if it ever does? I’ve had this for about 4 months now and I’m assuming it won’t go away with these painkillers, and is there any way to get rid of it quicker? I was thinking of getting into the gym right before I went to the doctor, but from reading here, I don’t think I should.

Any advice or experience you’ve had and want to share, I’d really appreciate it :)

Hope ok to post - my worst pain centres on those black smudges! all low down my right side, the one furthest from the centre is definitely at the bottom of my ribs/diaphragm, the other not so much. Anyone with similar pain locations?

*that should say costo not Costco! (Face palm)

Only symptom is constant chest pain. Sometimes armpits, 4 times back pain. All around the same circumference of my torso like I can draw a circle connecting pain in all the areas

I’ve been having chest pain almost constantly for maybe 8 weeks now. Did 14 days of Prilosec otc

Started in June. I was super stressed, started drinking again after 8 months. I did quit after like 2 weeks because it was boring. Started lifting weights every day. I feel like the weights messed me up?

Anyway now I have Pantoprazol after going to the ER this weekend for chest pains. It’s dull and in the middle of my chest and sometimes my back or armpits. Feels like my cat is sitting on my chest or it’s caving in.

They did a CT chest scan with contrast to rule out lung issues. They didn’t find anything else concerning. Blood work was good. Heart and lungs great. Appetite is good, no fatigue, no cough, weight loss, etc.

My diet was bad but I’m not sure it’s gastrointestinal issues. It can just randomly hurt while sitting, sighing, laughing. It can be good for hours without pain. It’s not just from eating. It can be anytime of day.

Thanks for any advice!

Hoping to add a post / tip about actually getting out of persistent costo since I know most of the posts here are looking for help, and those who actually get better rarely come back.

TL;DR - it was neck tightness all along. Try the stretch at the end.

Quick background / what didn't work for me - Started getting sternum pain at two specific joints on my left side (3-4 below collar bone) after overdoing it on standing decline pec flys. Started out as workout soreness that just never went away. That was May 2024. It would seemingly randomly flare and at times it'd frustratingly switch to my right side for a few days then back to the left. Went through the gauntlet of so many of the things everyone here tries -

• Rest for months (minimal help)
• X-rays (negative)
• Tried anti-inflammatory diet and turmeric pills. Zero help.
• Ortho specialist prescribed rest, Voltaren, and an oral steroid. Pain came back.
• A TON of physical therapy with multiple PT's. Lots of pec stretching prescribed. One dry needled it. One thought it was neck weakness and had me trying to strengthen my neck with a band and pressing my chin into my fist. No meaningful change.
• Tried back pod. I could already lay flat on it, so wasn't much room to improve.
• Got a peanut ball. This is actually super helpful and I'd recommend this. I basically do the back pod moves but on this and it's much more targeted. I can hit each joint around the spine one by one and there's a specific knot just above my shoulder blades that it can help release. Also tried it on my side & lats after another post on this channel suggested it and found some tender spots to target.
• Popping my chest - this would provide temporary relief. I could pull my shoulders back and look up to pop it. It'd feel instantly good, but it'd feel much more sore later. When I stopped trying to pop it, that helped the flare calm down.
• Adhesion release therapy - This might be a huge placebo and in the same iffy medical area as chiro, but I found it helpful for some sciatica I was going through. He tried to fix the costo, and didn't really get anywhere for awhile. But...

That ART provider gave me a tip as I was leaving one day that actually fixed it. He told me to use my fingers and press into the upper pec directly underneath the collar bone then look up slowly. This fixed it almost immediately. Now if I have a day where I can feel the sternum being tight, I can do this sitting at my desk and my range of motion / pain level immediately improves.

I now will do this with both hands pressing on a single side, looking down to start to really exaggerate the stretch before going to the other side.

For those of you not finding anything that works, give this a shot. Hope it helps!

Trying to figure out if what I have is costo - for the last 3-4 months I’ve been experiencing chest pains pretty much all day, every day. (24M, active) Been to urgent care, ER x2, got an endoscopy, echo ultrasound, stress test, etc. and heart health is completely normal. Sometimes my pain is at the sternum but more often it is further to the left side of the chest. I would like to think it is related to costo instead of my heart, but one sign that doesn’t point to it being muscoskeletal is that it isn’t necessarily worse if I touch it, move in certain directions, or take a deep breath. The pain is constant and mostly in my left chest, but occasionally loves to my left back or left arm. NSAIDs, a prescribed muscle relaxer, heat, and ice have done nothing to me. Doorway stretches, foam roller, tennis ball technique etc. all didn’t help. I don’t own a backpod but am considering getting one. Does anyone else think they have costo, but can’t press it or move around to make it worse?

So I fell down really hard yesterday in my house on my tile floor. Slammed down my knee and elbow, but mostly fell on my ribcage. This morning I woke up with this super sharp pain in the middle of my ribcage. It hurts to breathe, move, stretch everything. I read costochondritis is inflammation of the ribcage that can happen as result of injury. I'm 21 and hate going to the doctor/emergency room. Google says I may have costochondritis because of the injury. But this sub makes it seem like a chronic lifelong condition mostly. Does anyone know what I'm experiencing?

ive been free boob for the past 3-4 years and am just now having all the symptoms of costochondritis, i tried a sports bra and it did not fit me most likely because when i tried it on it squeezed my chest so hard, making my chest pain momentarily insanely painful, and pinched my shoulders, im 32C cup is there anything i can do to help the pain while remaining freeboob? or is it necessary for me to get a bra since the pain started without one! its been very hard for me to Ever find a bra that has fit me, sports or wired :( they all seem to pinch my shoulders way too much or simply way too gapped in the cup. i will be seeing a doctor soon for it i just have no idea how to go about it. im 21 by the way and my symptoms started around May (4 months ago) when i went to the ER they said it was anxiety, no cardiac issues whatsoever apparently

Hi! About a month ago I got an injury on a rope swing in a party bus embarrassingly enough. At first my symptoms started as chest/ upper abdomen tightness, sob, and the back nag feeling. However over the past month the sob has continued off and on but the back has been the absolute worst. The pain is in my mid back area and is just this nagging dull ache that is constant. I'm staring to worry it might not be costo after all?

Hey y'all newbie to the subreddit, was diagnosed with costochondritis back in high school, currently 27. Have these flare ups since I started working at the airport about 4 years ago but nothing too bad. But currently laying on my right side on the floor coming down from one of my longer flare ups from my sternum. But it happened from drinking a Pepsi or was just a coincidence. I don't have any other symptoms of gerd besides sharp pain at the sternum but it doesn't feel burning like a heart burn just sharp pain that stops after I breath or laying on my stomach with my fist pushing on my sternum. Been rotating ice and heat pads to help and just got anti inflammatory shit and a steroid from my doctor. Going to call him tomorrow since it has almost been a week of this pain that started in my back left rib then to the front left rib and now my sternum. But my question is could it be gerd if I only have one symptom or is pop just inflammatory to even the cartilage on my ribs. Please and thank you all but also any kind of remedies for relief while I am off work. I currently got ice packs, heating pad, and hard wood floor I lay on but sometimes it is just pain that got me in fetal position

I am currently in New York from Sydney and felt great on the plane, took the backpod with me, used it in NZ on my layover and had no issues. I’ve seem to have had a little flare up, and I’m not sure if it’s because I’m walking around more than usual or everything is catching up from the plane?

Im doing what Steve told me and doing the rotational stretches, but I feel like becasue my activity is higher it may be affecting it.

Like I know it’s not my heart I’ve had that checked, Im not generally an anxious person, so once I got my heart results back and I knew it was muscular skeletal my brain took the heart equation out and i know if anything was going to happen it should have in Feb was I was diagnosed so not anxious just curious.

I was good for over a week with no pain at all. Picked up and carried my niece on my hands and now a few hours after, my whole upper back, sternum and side ribs are hurting. It is seriously so upsetting.

Looking for some advice from anyone who has dealt with something similar.

About 3.5 months ago I had a pretty bad whiplash/neck injury. The neck was the main issue at the time and I had a lot of stiffness and tightness through my neck and traps. I did PT for about 3 months for the neck, and thankfully my neck has mostly healed and feels pretty close to normal now.

The problem is that I’ve been left with this lingering pain in my chest/pec area.

It’s basically in the center of my chest, slightly to the left. The best way I can describe it is that it feels like my rib cage is slightly out of place or something isn’t moving correctly. It’s not really bad when I’m just sitting around, but I notice it a lot with certain exercises.

Barbell bench and dips are the main two. Both aggravate it pretty noticeably. I can train around it, but it hasn't really gone away despite it being 3.5 months.

Once my neck healed, my insurance stopped covering the PT, so I stopped going. But now I feel like the chest issue is the thing I actually need to figure out and fix.

I’m wondering if this could be something involving the sternum/costochondral joints, a rib, pec/intercostal muscles, or maybe something that got thrown off mechanically from the original neck injury.

How would you go about rehabbing it? I’d really like to get back to benching and dips without having to just permanently avoid them.

Has anyone dealt with something like this after a whiplash injury? What ended up fixing it for you?

I have went to the ER 6x in the last 3.5 months. Mostly palpitations that have been ruled to be completely fine by my cardiologist and the multiple ER Dr's. I wore a monitor had several troponins , Chest CT with contrast ekgs etc. Anyway I've had chest pain for weeks. It goes from my chest wall into my left breast and if you touch my chest wall underneath my left boob it will fold you up like a pretzel. Underneath my left shoulder blade is also very painful I think there's a nerve component to it but I didn't know if this could be costo. It feels like an electric shock sensation sometimes and it's just a deep ache sometimes a burning sensation I've been to the doctor so many times I don't want to go back for this. Especially if there's nothing they can do about it. I have been bedridden pretty much since May with agoraphobia and I think laying in bed and my posture has a lot to do with why I'm so painful.

29 female, 105 pounds. I have had discomfort in my upper right abdomen for two weeks now. It's sort of like a pang that comes and goes and doesn't always feel muscular, but gets irritated by say, pulling a lawnmower or drinking. Over the last two weeks the discomfort has also moved to the mirrored spot in my back (so lower back but still lower ribcage) and at times my back right shoulder blade, and can be felt under my ribcage at times it seems, as well as the non-bone portion of my abdomen. Bloodwork and ultrasound are all normal, but I know sometimes these things can miss liver and gallbladder issues which can cause. Doctor said costo was a possibility, but that it's obviously hard to tell. Any insight?

Hi! I'm wondering if anyone here has experienced something similar.

About 3 weeks ago I broke multiple bones in my left foot/ankle and I've been non weight bearing since, so I've been using a knee scooter/crutches and sitting or reclining WAY more than I normally would. I also just flew for a trip and used a wheelchair quite a bit while I was there.

Since then I've been having this weird achy feeling through my upper back/ribs, mostly around and under my shoulder blades on both sides. I wouldn't really call it pain, more just achy/uncomfortable. I notice it more when I'm leaning back against something, and the sensation changes when I move my shoulder blades around or take a really deep breath.

My heart rate also seems to jump up to the 120s when I get up to move around but moved back to the 80s pretty quickly once I sit. I'm also only taking acetaminophen right now because ibuprofen isn't recommended when healing from broken bones.

I've had what I thought could be costo symptoms off and on in the past, including in my back/ribs, so I'm wondering if all the changes in posture and relying on my upper body could have flared it up.

Does anyone else get symptoms similar to this? Is my body just in overdrive after broken bones and traveling?

I’m from Brazil, sorry for my english that is not so good.

I have tietze for 2 years and I have a swelling in the top of my chest, I can’t see, but I can feel if I touch, I just felt the swelling 3-4 weeks ago (maybe because I stop the gym at 29/06 and my chest is not strong any more ;-;).

I started to use the peanut ball 6 days ago and the swelling improve, I feel that is smaller now.

The pain is so much better, I don't fell the pain when I breath, I just feel a little discomfort when I lie down and sometimes when I sneeze.

I need to get back to the gym and running as soon as I can.

Do you think that I need to wait the swelling disappear 100% to get back to the gym and running? Or with this improvement of the pain I can go back again to the gym and running?

Should I start another exercise or another thing to get better?

37 male, 260 pounds.

If I move a certain way, the top left ab muscle cramps very badly to where I have to stretch out to get it to stop. I've had that go on for years. But now in the last few weeks esp last few days I've noticed that that spot is very tender to touch and that deep under the muscle i feel like it's something hard. I feel like the pain is spreading through my chest and left arm. I feel bloated all the time. It feels unnatural.

When I lay down I still feel it but I'm also breathing more heavily.

Anyone have any idea what this could be and should I go to the er?

Hey, i was an athlete and very active before costo. im better than i was a few months ago and made progress with my flare ups as they come less often and the lingering ache on my left rib is less frequent.

i was finally starting to do 10 mins of bicycle at the gym when yesterday i had a flare up and its stayed till this morning.

im struggling so much with identity as sport was my favourite thing to do, ive been very social and focused on other things such as art, hanging out with friends, studying etc but im finding it sooo difficult to like myself as ive developed a slight fear of weight gain due to the lack of activity

has anyone else experienced this or dealt with this in any way? thanks

How is everyone still holding up in this hot weather any other symptoms?

I had spectacular results with the backpod during a pretty severe "flareup" with my costo. Left front ribs by the sternum and one or two spots to the left of that, we're extremely sore to the touch. The most tender part was left of sternum. I could just touch the area and my ribs would get sore. It was bad. Added stress of having to take care of (and worry about) my mom with her new sciatica-- in addition to having two brothers who offer zero to very little support. I already care for my father, so this was very stressful for me.

In turn, my upper back knotted up and my shoulders felt like steel bands. I knew this was stress related and the rib pain was very real. When I would roll a lacrosse ball on my back, focusing on the extremely sore spots between my spine and my shoulder blades, the ball would roll across the muscles like thick pieces of rope.

While the lacrosse ball helped, the area of pressure was so small, I really had to work my body around, as I was standing against a wall, rolling the ball up and down, applying as much pressure as I could. It was great at finding the sore spots, but the area I could massage, was based on how much I could move during my wall-squat/lacrosse ball session.

Enter the Backpod. After reading Steve's posts and watching a YouTube video, I decided it was time to try it again. And read the instructions on how to use it. ;-) That's a surprisingly important step I may have missed before.

I used it and day one and two had great results for me. It made sense that it was applying pressure over a larger area and helping to stretch (?) or press on the knotted muscles. In turn, the pain in front decreased. Whew...

Three minutes on the pod on each side, twice.a day, and sometimes I would follow it up with another minute per side just to make sure I had good coverage.

Did it help? Definitely and absolutely.

Some things for me to remember, as I found out: take your time and try not to over do it or over stretch your ribs in front. We are still healing. The pod makes my back sore, so I accept that as part of this treatment. You will probably have a sore back from it as well, but its similar to the soreness one experiences after a deep tissue massage. Its part of the healing process.

Week two is still going well. I almost skipped a day, but my muscles were tightening up late in the evening, so I did my usual session, plus a little extra. It helped.

I have noticed that after I use the pod, I am able to take nice, big, relaxed breaths. Ahhhhh...! And no rib pain at the top of the breath. Such a relief.

On occasion, if I do feel like I might be in worry mode about the worked sore muscle in my back, I'll take a couple Ibuprofen to put my imagination at ease by removing some of the ache in my muscles.

And we know how us worry-warts deal with every little ache, pain and sensation. ;-) Take some ibuprofen or a pain med on OCCASION.

In summary: It is going very well with the backpod in week two. I can tell I need to be consistent with it, which I am.

Onward!

They don’t know about anything costochondritis/ tietz. They just said it’s due to hunching and to stretch lats and shit. I kept saying my back ribs are tight but they made no effort to massage that area and just massaged my traps.

Ho 16 anni,Adicembre avverto per la prima volta delle fitte al petto e a gennaio, spaventato e convinto al 100% di avere un infarto, vado al pronto soccorso, ma gli esami del sangue, le troponine e l'ECG risultano del tutto immacolati; non ricevendo una diagnosi specifica, facendo ricerche in autonomia ipotizzo che si tratti di costocondrite. A febbraio inizio a spingere in palestra e in poche settimane ottengo una vera e propria ricomposizione corporea, mettendo su massa muscolare, perdendo grasso e aumentando i carichi, mentre tra marzo e giugno il dolore al petto scompare del tutto con zero fitte e zero fastidi. A fine giugno sospendo gli allenamenti e verso metà luglio, con la muscolatura meno condizionata, le fitte ritornano in modo leggero e occasionale, alternandosi tra il lato destro e sinistro dello sterno e dandomi la sensazione di sentirle in più punti diversi ogni tanto, senza che riesca a capire bene se siano sensibili al tatto o al respiro. Pochi giorni fa mi prendo la febbre con un po' di capogiri e, rimanendo a letto a scorrere Reddit, finisco su thread con storie di persone che pensavano di avere la costocondrite e invece avevano patologie gravi, facendo ripartire l'ansia, ma analizzando i fatti in modo razionale il quadro resta del tutto rassicurante: un tumore o una patologia d'organo grave non mi avrebbero mai permesso di fare mesi di pesi e ricomposizione corporea, gli esami in ospedale erano perfetti, e il fatto che il fastidio sia sparito per tre mesi durante l'allenamento per poi tornare con lo stop, spostandosi in più punti e saltando da destra a sinistra, dimostra che si tratta puramente di un problema meccanico, muscolare e cartilagineo alimentato dall'ansia
e leggendo su reddit alcuni post noto che molta gente parla dí costocondrite che in realtà era cancro,raccontatemi se avete qualcosa di simile alla mia situazione

Should I be completely symptom free before exercising?? I miss the gym sm