I already liked you a lot, but I like you even more after this post dude. Modeling good eating habits is one of the most important jobs as a parent, and little girls in particular are going to have to fight that battle their WHOLE goddamn lives. You’re doing something awesome here.
I’ve always been a big fan of the “hands” method when it comes to measuring food. Wendler and Meadows have written about it among others. A palm sized serving of meat tends to be about a serving (4oz), thumb sized servings for fats, veggies you can measure out fist sized portions, carbs…I wasn’t paying attention there, haha.
I really appreciate. Though this be only the Internet, I respect the values you appear to hold - comments like this and from @chonglorduno are meaningful to me.
Absolutely agree. My little girl is 8 and extraordinarily athletic (she’s in every sport) and already worried about being thicker than other girls because she hears about it from her friends. In fact, I spoke to another mom (whom I really like and respect as a parent) about not talking about her own weight anymore when she’s working out; her daughter hears it and then says it to her friends and round-and-round the toxic mentality goes. I’ve started turning on CrossFit videos and the Titan games and even old American Gladiators just casually so all the women on TV are athletes instead of the stereotype model. Then we just talk about how strong they are - it’s awesome.
For sure. My problem is I use it more in terms of “how many handfuls can I get down?” Seriously, though, the calorie-counting is a crutch. It’s not hard to eat a little less when I want to lose a little weight or eat a little more… well, all the time. Right now I don’t care - I’m pretending I’m in high school and just pushing my activity.
To that point, today I continued to bastardize what I really can’t even accurately call a program anymore and do a shoulder pump day with some cardio, calves and abs.
My daughter just turned eight. I think we’re fortunate that she goes to a dual language school. She is one of a handful of white kids; the rest are Hispanic. The Hispanic culture is way different than ours and I think that’s a good thing in the body image aspect. As far as I know, no one has said a thing to her.
I’m the same way with treats. If there are nuts, or Heaven forbid M&Ms, in the house then I’m grabbing a handful every time I walk past them. I guess I should start putting them out of the way instead of on the path I take to get anywhere in the house.
That’s outstanding. It’s insane the neuroses we create for ourselves.
Ha! We were joking recently because my wife said something like “I swear I bought Oreos.” Yeah, like I wasn’t going to find them…
A little catching up to do.
I did back and bis the other day - not on the program, but I’m pretty far past pretending I’m doing a program at this point. I’m eat-pray-live finding myself before I jump back into a relationship, perhaps? Seriously, though, I need to stop thinking I’m going to do something different; I know what I like.
Yesterday I did Spenga with my wife, which I think is similar to orange theory if you’re familiar with that. I liked the spin part, and the “strength” portion was essentially more cardio. It was good that we did something like that together.
Today I did more legs
Conditioning: 10 rounds:
Prowler 180lbs x (what I’m guessing is) 40m
5 keg squats This is no longer a simple 10 minutes of elliptical - this is hard. Much more enjoyable and I’m progressing more quickly. The oomph it takes out of my lifting is for real, though. I don’t know how Alsruhe does this first.
Butt Blaster
30/12 x 3
Squats Im just accepting that these are weaker now (maybe I’ll blame covid so I can feel like a social media hero!) and staying light enough that I’m not using joints. I’m embracing the non-competitive bodybuilder I am at heart.
45/8
135/8
185/5
185/5
225/20
Walking Lunges
20# sandbag/ 10 steps per leg x 4 sets
Push today!
I’ve built a pretty good rhythm with how I’m doing my lifting and getting all my cardio in each week and not being miserable. I’ve not dialed in my portion control, but eh; we’ll get there.
Had some cortisone in my right knee yesterday, and now I can definitely tell I should have gone ahead and done the left as well. The arthritis progresses, as arthritis does; I believe one modification will be that all my squats will be to a box from here on.
Incline Bench
45/10
135/4
185/8 x 2
Wow I pooped out here!
Machine Press
30/8
90/8
130/8
175/10 + 6 + 4 + 3
Stretch Push-ups
BW/20 x 2
DB Rear Delt
15/25 x 3
DB Y Raise
15/12 x 3
Spider Crawls x 3 sets
Incline Tri Kickout
15/10
20/10
25/10
30/10
Press down
70/12
100/10 x 3
I’ve started moving more cardio to non-lifting or lighter lifting days, but keeping off my 3 heavier lifting days. I’m finding I can get in more weekly minutes but feel less dead.
My knees have long been pretty arthritic. I had a couple surgeries and then a couple more minor injuries I just ignored in my old job, and it just builds up over time. I’m supposed to stay on a regimen of cortisone, which I forget to do until my numbers go way down, and now we’re about to try some hyaluronic acid injections I’m pretty excited about (because my company makes them so I can get them at cost!). My right knee was bothering me the most this time, so I didn’t have him inject the left, but the cortisone has done so much for the right I can now tell, by the difference, how swollen my left actually is - so I’ll get that one done in a couple weeks when I go back for the gel.
Anyway, they’re actually doing pretty well. A few years ago, it was “let’s see if we can hold off the replacements until 40,” then it was 45, and the other day we left it a little more open-ended… like maybe more like 60 like a normal person. Typically, when they start hurting, I’ll lighten up and do box squats and sit back into lunges and things like that and I do ok. I’ve just gotten a little worse about being able to “tell” when they hurt, so that stuff should just be permanent modifications in my programming - I’m not trying to have a 600lbs. squat so who cares?
I hope I’m not coming off as whiny. I’m completely fine. I mostly get myself into trouble when I start wanting to think I’m a young athlete or push heavy stuff and I’m just not willing to deal with the toll it takes anymore - that’s all a question of goal vs. anything else, I think.
I appreciate you jumping in! I’m terrible about keeping up with logs, especially you popular gents that have 9000 posts between the times I’ve looked. That doesn’t mean I care any less about you, though; on the contrary, I hope things are great and I’ll pop over to take a look as well!
I was shocked to hear you had it, don’t think I’ve heard you mention it before, definitely not whining. Although you look like you’ve got a solid reason to be pure gym bro and just drop legs out completely!
@simo74@alex_uk Thanks gents!
I bro out anyway… this is just my excuse!
I had a couple back and a couple knee surgeries (hand and shoulder, too, but they aren’t a big deal… actually a hernia while we’re at it!), but I’m honestly fine. Sometimes I get a little stiff or whatever, but it’s a bit easier to blame “the old high school track injury” than to do the boring stuff to take care of it you know? What hurts me is the same as everyone else - I try to do something too heavy, too fast vs. owning weights.
Anyway, pity party complete. Time to take some arm photos.
I find myself contemplating this approach. Thanks to my hip surgery, I know that my hip joints aren’t great. There was blood on the head of the femur indicating that things are not as they should be. During the flare up, I had a follow-up MRI and they took some shots of my right hip for comparison. I was being nosy and read the report while I was waiting to see the doctor and saw that my right hip labrum is torn (my surgery was to repair the left hip labrum). To top it all off, my dad had a hip replacement last week. He’s never had any major injuries or issues and then out of nowhere he’s darn near crippled by pain. He goes to the doc and has no cartilage left.
I contemplate whether or not squatting and deadlifting are good ideas. Why do I do them? I could drop squats and be fine, but I really enjoy deadlifts and cleans. I think deadlifts are probably the most damaging since I occasionally pick up 400-500 lbs. That’s a lot of weight and it has to be jamming the head of my femur into the socket of my pelvis and that can’t be good for soft tissue.
I haven’t bought into the idea that lifting destroys your joints; I just wonder about my own personal situation since I have knowledge about my current state and now have some hereditary things to consider.
And then I think about what I’d do if I eliminated squats and deads. Wouldn’t leg presses and lunges put similar pressure/strain on the joints? If I’m worried about the joint in that manner, then I’m left with leg extensions and curls, and that four way hip machine that some gyms have (stand on one leg and do abduction, adduction, extension, and flexion with the other).
After I have this discussion with myself, I really come up with no answers LOL!
The only downfall of replacements is that you’re not supposed to run or jump on them. I don’t really do much of that these days but I like knowing that I can. I’ll never stop training a body part completely. I might move away from the big stuff to machines or something less popular, but I’ll never shut it down.
I barely trained last week and guess what - I had zero hip pain or tight muscles in my usual spots. I’ve trained twice this week and the pain is back (by pain, I mean tight, angry muscles that have to be beat into submission with tissue work).
Well, there are a couple downsides of replacements to include:
They don’t last forever - the younger you get them, the more likely you’ll do it again
Each subsequent replacement will have less anatomy (femoral head in your case) to work with, so they become more difficult and less viable
They certainly aren’t free (cost, pain, rehab time, etc.)
Surgery carries inherent risks and implants even more so
If you need it, you need it, but delaying is still best.
On the flip side, I certainly am not of the mind you should not do what you enjoy doing to save yourself for some future state. How much sense would that make? “I’ll never deadlift again, even though I love deadlifting, because it might hurt my hips to a point where I won’t be able to… deadlift.” Stupid. We don’t get younger; we may as well enjoy the horsepower we’ve got! No Ragrats!
Anyway, are there modifications that would help? Maybe pull from pins so there is less hip flexion or put it later in your session so you use less weight? Reverse bands to pull you out of the bottom?
I’m obviously a whore for the Meadows’ stuff, but I really do think there is a lot to the sequencing and modifications for longevity.
Plus, like business, just put all your work where you want return. You don’t care about squats, and they definitely take a toll on your hips whether it’s as damaging as deadlifts or not. You want to deadlift, so why not just do that and minimize the beating you take everywhere else (i.e. just drop squats)?
Good point, but it also can have an effect on this:
The older I get and the longer I deal with some sort of hip or back pain, the more I question my “Why?” Why am I doing _______? For squats, I know I can build strong legs with something like leg press. That’s what I did when I was younger and my ability to run and jump was fine. My current hangup is the bracing aspect. I know my squat is limited by my core. If I have strong legs then I want to be able to use them in a real life setting and the core/bracing is part of that.
Anyway, this is all inner-dialogue type stuff. I’ll keep doing what I’m currently doing until it doesn’t work. Box squats might be my first modification.
@Frank_C Well, we all have to do our own risk/ benefit analysis, but to be fair - I said things “you enjoy” not “things you feel like you should do.” I don’t get the impression you enjoy squats. Why not save all the wear and tear for deadlifts, to extend how long you can do those, and just do some planks or something if core bracing is all you want out of squats? Just pontificating.
I’m considering it. I actually kind of went that way a while back, but 5/3/1 brought me back to the basics. If I had a leg press then I would definitely think about switching to that. I’m training at home most of the time so that leaves squats or some sort of single leg exercise. And I think we can all agree that squats are less terrible than single leg exercises…especially pistol squats.