Rotator cuff repair is measured in months, not weeks. These pages walk the year one stretch at a time, using the same day-by-day content the app ships.
Published programs disagree about dates and agree about order. These are the stretches the timeline moves through, with the day ranges the app uses:
Days 0–14 · roughly week 1 to 3
The sling protects the repair while everything settles — and, frustrating as it is, it's part of what makes early rest possible. Little to no active use of the arm: protection is real treatment, not the absence of it.
Days 15–41 · roughly week 3 to 6
The arm gets moved — by a therapist, gravity, or your other arm — while the repaired tendon is never asked to work. When this starts genuinely differs by protocol; the order it follows never does.
Days 42–83 · roughly week 7 to 12
The shoulder's own muscles take over in stages — assisted first, then alone. Start dates span more than two months across published programs; the sequence is the universal part.
Days 84–159 · roughly week 13 to 23
Holds first, then resisted work through range — and every published program keeps resistance off the repair until roughly the three-to-four-month mark. Comfort arrives before strength, and the gap is normal.
Days 160–365 · roughly week 23 to 53
Return to load, work, and overhead life is measured, not dated — strength and control your therapist checks. Recovery keeps compounding well after the shoulder feels usable.
Week 1 · days 0–6
The first week is the sling, the nerve block wearing off, and finding somewhere to sleep — the stretch where protecting the repair is the entire job.
Week 2 · days 7–13
Week two brings the first post-operative visit, the one rule that carries all year, and the point published sources put sleep at its worst.
Week 3 · days 14–20
In week three the shoulder starts feeling easier while the repair is not, and passive motion begins on some protocols and deliberately waits on others.
Week 4 · days 21–27
Week four is one-armed logistics, questions about work, and the first stretch where nothing visible changes and a great deal underneath does.
Week 5 · days 28–34
Week five raises driving, the middle rung between being moved and moving yourself, and the first unhelpful comparisons with other people's slings.
Week 6 · days 36–41
By week six the arm can be moved further than it can lift, the sling question comes up, and a recovery with a job attached to it starts to weigh.
Weeks 7–9 · days 43–62
Weeks seven to nine are where active motion begins on many protocols: the sling leaving on the surgeon's word, the first assisted reach overhead, and the widening gap between range and strength.
Weeks 10–12 · days 63–83
Weeks ten to twelve are the quiet middle — motion handed back, resistance deliberately withheld, and visible progress slowing while the biology underneath does not.
Weeks 13–15 · days 85–104
Weeks thirteen to fifteen cross the three-month mark, where the first resisted work appears on many protocols and the shoulder starts looking recovered to everyone else.
Weeks 16–19 · days 105–132
Weeks sixteen to nineteen are the stretch with no landmarks in it: overhead returning as capacity rather than as a moment, and progression handed out one step at a time.
Weeks 20–23 · days 134–160
Weeks twenty to twenty-three run to five months, where most people feel mostly recovered and what remains becomes trainable rather than automatic.
Weeks 24–27 · days 161–188
Weeks twenty-four to twenty-seven cross six months, where written protocols thin out, clearance arrives as a series of smaller permissions, and a quarter of the year is still ahead.
Weeks 28–30 · days 190–209
Weeks twenty-eight to thirty are the seventh month: overhead arriving in stages, the measurable half of the recovery still open, and the landmarks spacing further apart.
Weeks 31–33 · days 210–230
Weeks thirty-one to thirty-three are where formal therapy often ends on an administrative date rather than a clinical one, and maintenance becomes the last part of the recovery.
Weeks 34–37 · days 231–258
Weeks thirty-four to thirty-seven cover the eighth month, where what is still changing is quality rather than quantity, and the daily cards begin pointing toward a handover.
Weeks 38–53 · days 259–365
Weeks thirty-eight to fifty-two carry the last quarter of the year to the twelve-month mark, where the cards taper by design and the shoulder is still described as improving.
Every page is assembled from the dated content that ships inside the app, and every statement in it traces to a claim row backed by a published protocol or a peer-reviewed study. The references page lists all of them in full.
These pages are the year in stretches. The app is the year one day at a time: a single dated card, keyed to your surgery date and to the surgical details that change the timeline, with the map of what is ahead.
Coming to the App Store — Fall 2026.
Vallecito Labs is a one-person software company in Portland, Oregon. These pages are assembled from the content that ships inside The Comeback, which is synthesized from published rehabilitation protocols and peer-reviewed literature. Company facts and contact details are on the press kit.