I can't

 

Just move.

I've talked to several people about lifting and they immediately tell me that "they can't."  "No I can't, I have a bad back; and if I'm on my feet too long my knee gives out."  Quite the predicament eh?  What you have before you is a vicious cycle.  You can't work out because you don't work out.  You have a hard time moving about because you have a lack of muscle.  Lack of muscle makes it very difficult to move comfortably; it also puts a huge strain on your joints.  When there is strain on your joints with no muscle, bad things happen to your body. 

I remember a conversation when I ever so gently tried to introduce just the idea of a bit of movement to a non moving person.  "What if, you just..."  I started to ask and was quickly stopped "I can't."  I tried again "maybe if you only..." I gently continued.  No, "I can't."  So I stopped, it was getting no where.  I so badly wanted to help but when someone does not want help, you cannot help. 

Muscle atrophy is when muscles waste away. The main reason for muscle wasting is a lack of physical activity.

When you don't move, you lose muscle; which makes it difficult to move.  Many people in this predicament fail to look at the big picture; where it all started.  The lack of movement starts it; then you might have weight gain which makes it even harder to move.  The cycle begins and picks up momentum the longer you are sedentary.  So ya gotta move.  Of course that first step is tough; and it should be a very small and slow one;  but you should take it.  You can get yourself out of the vicious cycle by simply stepping out.  Picture a circle, picture you going round and round, but not moving; until one day you stick a foot out of the circle and end it then and there. 

The less you move, the harder it is to move; and it gets harder the older we get.  As we age the more muscle we lose; so we must keep moving and moving well to simply retain our muscle.  If you want to be strong you must lift, pull, hoist and push to promote growth.  Moving will make you strong; which will make it easier to move.  I hate that our society has a pill for everything.  If you have a lack of muscle and hurt when you move, there's a pill for that.  How about a steroid injection?  That'll fix everything, right?  Wrong.  If you continue to not move; you will continue to have problems.  The only thing that will help you to feel better when you move, is moving.  You can continue to take the pills and shots but it is only masking the problem, no muscle. 

The work in WORK OUT

My exertion face.  

Work - exertion or effort to produce or accomplish something.  

Out - to a state of exhaustion, extinction or depletion.

Okay, lets talk about the 'work' in work out.  Working out does not mean to simply go to the gym; lots of people go to the gym and don't work out.  Others go to the gym and actually go through the motions but don't realistically 'work' in so far as the definition of work goes.  They are moving, they even look like they think that they are working out but there is no actual 'work' going on.  Sadly, this is just a waste of time.  Okay, they are moving which is better than not moving; but they could actually be getting results which they are not going to get with no exertion. 

Result based work outs require exertion.  This means that you must push your body to do things that do not come easily.  If you can easily bend from side to side then it is doing nothing as far as getting you into shape.  Maybe if you do it all day long it might; but if you want to see and/or feel results you must exert yourself.  That does not mean that you need to lift crazy amounts of weights or do outrageous numbers of repetitions.  It means that you need to push your body passed it's mushy comfy zone.  

If you want to become stronger; then you must lift something that requires exertion.  Not a bucket load of exertion to start out; just enough so that you have a bit of a challenge.  The stronger you get the harder you can push, exert.  Building strength should be done in baby steps; otherwise you can end up hurting yourself which defeats the purpose of working out entirely.  

I really hate to see people wasting their time at the gym; when all it would take is a little bit of work for them to feel and see some results.  With just a little push in the work department you will feel stronger.  Feeling strong is an amazing thing.  Things that use to be heavy are no longer; things you couldn't do before, now you can.  Just push a little; there must be some 'work' in your work out.  Otherwise you're just wasting your time; don't waste your time, get strong.  

Like magic? Injury fixed?

Photo from http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/

When you exercise or participate in sport type activities there is always the risk of injury.  Everything from a hurt finger to monumental accidents can happen.  As you get older you get smarter (hopefully) about what to do and what not to do.  But there will still be the occasional accident.  If you don't live life then you won't get hurt but that's no way to live right?  So, I have had my share of lifting incidents; most have hit me due to stupidity but not all.  The most recent one hit me from a blind spot.  I don't know when it happened or what happened; one day I had a painful shoulder.  It didn't hurt all the time, just when I lifted my arm straight up in front of me and rotated slightly to the left.  Many people offered that it was a rotator cuff injury and may need surgery.  But I was sure that it wasn't.  I could do everything; even lift heavy as long as I didn't put my arm in that one specific position.

So this injury plagued me for months and months until a couple of weeks ago.  I was doing light flies, where you lie on your back and basically fly with weights.  I'd only done them once the week before; testing the shoulder to see if all was okay and it seemed good.  So having finished I went to get up; but two guys had decided to take up the spot literally 3" from my feet to chat; so I was unable to get up properly.  I had to do a twisty type thing instead, not good.  (Another chapter for Gym Etiquette)  Anyway when I did I felt it popped and I heard it.  I was sure that I'd screwed myself for a year of more pain.  I was fuming at these guys who had caused it.  I grabbed my arm in sling position and head for home, brewing.

It hut, it hurt really badly; but as the days passed I forgot about it.  Until one day as I reached for a glass in the kitchen and realized that it didn't hurt anymore.  The shooting pain that was associated to the very movement I was making was absent, gone.  I moved my arm around, testing the weak spot that I had grown accustom to over the last months and it had vanished.  So I've done some thinking.  Was it a tendon that had slipped out of place and slipped back in on that fly day?  After much research I think that I had an impingement that wiggled free somehow.   The pain I felt was exactly as described, but is now gone.  I do still have a very tiny weakness there that I am very aware of.  I am ultra careful when lifting anywhere near it.

Not everything needs surgery.  So many people will jump to a "you need surgery" conclusion.  A couple of years back I had injured my shoulders when I first got back into lifting.  I lifted too heavy too soon, it was all my fault.  I visited the Dr., had an MRI and she told me that I had an extra piece of bone on each shoulder that needed shaving off.  She said it was rare but something I was born with.  That extra bone was causing all sorts of problems, including pain.  Well, I'm not a take advice from Dr's., type of person so shook my head and left.  If I had always had it then why was it just now bothering me?  I rested, really rested my shoulders and presto.  It did take about three months to get them back to normal but I'm fine and feel no pain there anymore.

That extra bone point was a turning point in my lifting.  From that moment I took extra precaution when lifting, form and poundage.  It was my lifting "ah ha" moment.  The moment I realized that I was no longer 23 and lifting.  :)