Five years ago, I made this post detailing my fitness goal of being to carry my (now) wife ~10 metres from the couch to the bed while asleep. This community made very helpful replies about how to achieve this. I incorporated your suggestions (zercher squats, weighted walking lunges, raised split squats, farmer carry, uneven carry) into a workout plan rotating major muscle groups that I've been using ever since.

Did I achieve my goal? In short, no. But I stuck with the plan as best I could and had some unexpected wins.

I had been aiming to lift 3-4x/week, which never happened. Over the last five years, I've had to take some very long breaks from lifting (a medically-complicated pregnancy concluding in an extended hospital stay, a devastating climbing fall injury, IVF). Life impeded frequency of lifting (parenting, switching to a new job with very heavy hours) and its quality (persistent iron deficiency and other medical issues). Besides the big breaks, though, I've managed to continue lift 1-2 times a week for the last 5 years.

I never was able to carry my partner from couch to bed. At the time we were both ~130 lbs, now both 145 lbs. We moved out of that apartment and into a house with the bedroom upstairs from the living room, and carrying her up the stairs is both probably never possible and too dangerous.

But continuing to lift over years has had impacts. The numbers for my big lifts have gone up:

Deadlift - 7 reps x 3 sets. Went from 85lbs barbell to 145lbs

Shoulder press - 7x3, from 20lbs each dumbbell to 30lbs each

Back squat - 7x3, from 75lbs barbell to 125lbs (full ROM)

Bench press - 7x3, from 25lbs each dumbbell to 30lbs each

I'm proud of the numbers going up, if modestly. But the real gains have been functional. I can now carry a kayak or paddleboard easily under one arm, I can lift mattress corners to tuck in a fitted sheet, I can move around small pieces of furniture myself. I can rack/unrack 45 lb plates at the gym easily and carry lighter plates with one hand like they’re nothing. Doing long hours of fieldwork with a heavy pack and lifting bags of gear (seasonally part of my job) is no problem. Most importantly, I could carry my baby for hours on end and even as a toddler can easily carry him on my hip, up and down the stairs, or in a hiking carrier for as long as he likes. I'm proud I can still get off the floor with him in my arms without using my hands.

There have been downsides. Lifting heavy + creatine + postpartum & perimenopausal weight gain means I've bulked up and had to go up a clothing size. I constantly feel inadequate while lifting: beating myself up for not fitting in more time for exercise around parenting, work, and chores. I get actually angry that I can't do things that look effortless for men (moving queen mattresses, putting a kayak on a roof rack, small chest freezer, etc.). For some reason, despite also still bouldering 1-2x/week, my grip strength still sucks. I feel frustrated by my limitations.

However, I'm happy I didn't give up. Now, my goal has shifted: I want to be better able to lift large awkward heavy objects around the house, and to carry my child in event of an emergency for as long as I possibly can. My wife is on her own for dragging her exhausted self up to bed, haha.

I’ve gotten pretty strong with consistent strength training over the years. But I don’t look like I’m strong. I’m just curious what exercises look really impressive to people who don’t work out/strength train on a regular basis.

Hello! I've made posts on this subreddit before and everyone here has been very helpful.

Important context: I do not have access to a gym and the only dumbbells I own are 2x 2kg and 1x5kg.

I wanted to try dumbbell exercises first because I'm so weak I struggle with wall pushups.

I did my first upper body dumbbell workout today and I used very small weights (2kg) and I mostly/only felt the exercises in my forearms, wrists and fingers rather than the intended muscles.

What am I doing wrong and how can I fix it?

Can swimming be a substitute for running?

I'm 44F, predominately a runner (~60k/week) and swimmer (~3k/week with a club). I am very active outside of this, with kids and an active dog. I average 15,000 steps a day, more in the summer.

I've lifted in the past - I completed most of Caroline Girvan's YouTube video series - but don't really enjoy it.

However, now that I'm approaching that *magical age* I recognize that I need to add a weight routine into the mix. I want to keep my bone health and mobility as I age.

Considering I hate weights, is there a 15-20 minute routine that I could do once or twice a week to accomplish this? I have a home gym with resistance bands, an Olympic squat rack, and 2x adjustable dumbbells (5-25 lbs each).

Are there two or three arm and leg (or upper and lower body) exercises each that would get the job done?

I’m 52yo and I’ve been weight training on and off for 30+ years, mostly at home with dumbbells. I don’t have any particular goals, beyond staying strong as I get older. I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in my 20s, so managing my energy levels and working around fatigue is a key factor for me. I lift weights three times per week (compound supersets - squat variation + shoulders, lunge variation + chest, deadlift variation + back) and do Pilates and accessories a couple of times per week too. I’m not too concerned about cardio, as I walk my huge dog for at least 90 minutes per day too.

My question is, do you think it would negatively affect my progress if, on the days I lift weights, I were to space it throughout the day? So superset 1 x 3 rounds before work, superset 2 x 3 rounds at lunchtime, and superset 3 after work? It feels like this would help me manage my energy, but I’m wondering if anyone has experience of working out like this?

i recently started running and i’m not sure how to run while i’m on my period. i only wear pads and i feel like any excess activity causes leaks but i cant use anything else like tampons or cups. i also get a lot of pain that radiates down my legs from my hips to my ankles when im on my period which make it hard to be active. i’d really appreciate any tips!

Could you please recommend a free app for someone completely new to the gym who wants a quick and easy way to count their macros/calories and make sure they're getting enough protein to hit their muscle building goals without obsessing over food? Preferably something that also supports barcode scanning and AI calorie estimation to make things as effortless as possible. Thanks!

I’ve posted on here before regarding building on T3 exercises for the GZCLP program and all the information was really helpful so i figured I’d do it again :)

I’m on week 3 of this program. I’m really liking it so far because I’m very busy and can normally get it done in 1 hour.

My problem is that I used to workout excessively/unhealthily. I do love weight lifting and i’m trying to get back into it in a healthy way. How do you guys feel after a workout? I’m used to ending a workout absolutely fatigued and it wasn’t really sustainable. This program doesn’t leave me feeling super fatigued and it’s early enough that i’m not seeing visual results. So I’m fighting the part of my brain that says I’m not going hard enough, sweating enough, burning enough calories (even though i don’t track since it’s triggering for me).

I’m also better about getting protein which i know helps with energy and muscle recovery so that may play a role too. Lmk what you guys think. I appreciate you all 🙏🏻.

Has anyone else had this? The only thing that helps is drastically reducing weight/reps, but I'm trying to do progressive overload. Otherwise I'm brain foggy and fatigued for 1-2 days.

I eat enough carbs, I take magnesium every night and a multivitamin every morning. I eat healthy, whole foods and get plenty of sleep.

This only happens when weight lifting, I'm fine with hours and hours of cardio.

I've been weightlifting for about a year and it's been happening most of that time, but I think more so as I've gotten stronger and my lifts are heavier. It's so bad I need a nap that day and have trouble concentrating at work.

One thing to note is I experience almost no muscle soreness after my workouts, even before I started scaling back to have less fatigue, which is weird. I used to go to CrossFit for years and quit during covid, but during that time I would get extreme muscle soreness sometimes, but never fatigue and brain fog, even though the workouts were much more intense. Am I just getting old? I otherwise feel great doing every other activity and generally in my life.

Goals and constraints

My main goal is to build a lot of muscle and get stronger. I currently have VERY little muscle and quite a bit of body fat, so I’m basically starting from scratch. I’d like to build a noticeable amount of muscle over time rather than just lose weight or get “toned.”

The biggest problem is that I don't have access to a gym. I also don't have weights or any proper equipment at home, just resistance bands.

I’ve looked through the recommended routines, but most of them seem to require weights/gym equipment that I don't have, so I'm trying to figure out what I can realistically do at home with what I have.

I'm mainly looking for advice on whether my current routine is enough to actually build muscle, what exercises I should add/change, and how I should progressively make it harder.

Background

I'm a woman, 5'5" and 125 lbs. I'm a complete beginner when it comes to resistance training and currently have very little muscle.

I haven't followed any proper lifting programs before. I've mainly been trying to put together something simple that I can actually do consistently at home.

Diet and recovery

I try to eat around 90–100g of protein every day.

I also walk for around 30 minutes every day.

Other than that, I don't have any major recovery factors that I think would affect my training.

Program Details

I'm currently alternating between an upper-body day and a lower-body day.

Day 1 – Upper Body

• Countertop push-ups: 4x10–12
• Resistance band rows (long band, focusing on squeezing my back): 4x12
• Band overhead press: 3x12
• Band bicep curls: 3x12
• Dead bugs: 3x12 per side

Day 2 – Lower Body

• Squats: 4x12
• Lunges: 4x10 per leg
• Single-leg glute bridges: 4x15
• Plank: 3x15

I alternate between these two days and take a rest day when I feel like I need one. I also do a 30-minute walk every day.

I don't really have a formal programming method behind this. I basically chose exercises that I could do with the equipment I have and tried to cover my upper body, lower body and core.

For progressive overload, my idea was to increase the resistance of the band, increase reps, or make the exercise harder once the current version becomes easy. I'm not sure if that's specific enough or if there's a better way to do this with bands.

I also don't currently have a specific deload or RPE system because I'm very new to training.

I'm particularly unsure about whether I'm actually training all the major muscle groups enough, or if I'm missing important movements. I'm also not sure whether resistance bands will be enough to build a significant amount of muscle as I get stronger.

I'd really appreciate recommendations for specific exercises I could add or replace, especially exercises that work well with resistance bands and no gym equipment.

I'd also love recommendations for good YouTube videos showing proper form for these exercises. I'm still learning and don't want to accidentally do the movements incorrectly.

If you think there's a better beginner-friendly routine I could follow with just resistance bands/bodyweight, I'm open to that too. I'm mostly trying to find something I can actually stick with and use to build as much muscle as possible given my limitations.

Thanks!!

The place for all of your fitness based interpersonal advice (is someone being creepy at the gym? Is your family telling you you’re getting too muscular? Do you want to date your personal trainer?), but also the place to talk about motivation, self-esteem and body image, and all the ways fitness affects your life. This thread is for those in need of (and willing to lend) a sympathetic ear.

Want to ask how mothers juggle family and fitness? How to structure Intermittent Fasting? When to work out when you do night shift? How to deal with being the only person in your friend group who works out? If you're feeling emotional, want to up your mental game, or need ideas for how to juggle everything on your plate, this is the place for you!

Yesterday this post from u/SevereTell sparked some really interesting discussion and inspired another question from me:

Has anyone successfully learned to be more active everyday and has internalized it so much that it just becomes natural and part of your day-to-day? Can you share your progress and how long did it take you?

I’ve been intentionally trying to be more active — lifting 3x weekly and 10k steps a day. It’s been going on for almost a year now (longest I’ve ever stuck to), and yes, I have a decent adherence to those goals but my god they’re mentally draining. They’re all things I need to peel myself off the couch to do. It doesn’t feel natural or easy.

I see so many active people in the post saying that they just “can’t not be doing stuff”, and it’s so hard for me to relate. I was never naturally active, not even as a kid, I was never one to run around but just wanna sit and read. And now that I have a pretty mentally demanding 9-6ish job, everyday after work, if it’s not with the last ounce of discipline, I’d be happily couch rotting.

So maybe my real question is: does it really get easier at some point? I’m fine with accepting that it will forever be difficult for me but just tell me 😭

Recently started becoming active and now I have so many little nuisances that I need to do more efficiently. I’m starting my last semester of college as a commuter in two weeks and am scared if I will have way too much on my plate.

So please take a look at this list of problems I’m encountering, and suggest me some ways to make them more efficient:

- Producing more laundry (roughly 5-6 extra fits per week from the sweat)
- Needing to shower after every workout, and going straight to school. I can’t gym after classes. I wear a hijab so wet tied up hair isn’t the best!!
- To add on, I have to carry so much (my school bag, my lunch bag, my gym clothes which will be sweaty, my water bottle)
- Macro tracking

I’m probably missing some but there are soooo many little things that add up. Please give me any tips lol thank you 🙏🏼

Hi! I am trying to get started with weight training for a variety of reasons. I've done it before but usually in conjunction with a goodly amount of cardio, and it's been a while since I actually went to a gym. My goals are improved health and fitness, nothing really specific beyond that.

My situation is, there's a Planet Fitness two blocks from where I work and I'm considering trying to go a couple of times a week on my lunch hour. I have a long commute and kids at home, so if I can make this work it might be my best chance to get in regular exercise.

The problem is that even though it's close, I'll be pressed for time, and I'll have to change into and back out of workout clothes. My job is business casual and I can't do gym clothes and wet hair there, besides for the time it would take to wash up. Like I said, my gym frame of reference involves cardio where the whole point is maximum sweat. Very 90's/early oughts of me, I know. Is it realistically possible to get in a basic but worthwhile weight workout in 30 minutes without sweating enough to need a shower after? If I'm not dripping after, will I have accomplished anything?

I'll happily take recs on routines or relevant resources if you have any handy, or general thoughts on lunch break workouts. Thank you in advance!

OK- longtime lurker looking for advice. sorry for the length, I’m on high dose prednisone and have a lot of thoughts .

Ive always been a solid lady, took me 40 years to lean into that and lift weights partially to celebrate my strength. GLP-1s (took those for one year) helped me celebrate it more because they pulled fat off which showed some muscle, fixed my A1C, instantly made my bad back painless (hereditary pars defect), and completely stopped decades long disordered eating (not an ED, just eating past fullness, like a subjective binge)

yesterday docs finally diagnosed with an allergy to all Glp-1s after I tried three and broke out into horrible hives every time I tried to move to a moderate dose. I even tried to hide the hives for a while each time, do not recommend.

so here I am, frankly pretty bummed, but trying to still celebrate my strength. I don’t want to gaslight myself that if I *just try hard enough* I’m going to fix my A1C and my back and see a number on the scale that’s “good“ and make huge changes. I know that’s not true, because I was the same body fat percentage at my highest weight and my lowest (26%), and I’ve got to constantly work to drop the “good” and “bad” number thing

What measurements can I use to reinforce progress for strength and fitness that might be less triggering? Thanks for reading and any ideas!

Found out earlier this year that I’m at 33% body fat which is almost all abdominal and visceral. Since then, I’ve started to slowly build healthier habits to reduce my cardiovascular risk (both diabetes and heart disease in my family) but I’ve never lived like this before lol.

At baseline I’ve always been a size S in clothes, I never worked out or lifted weights and have minimal muscle mass, previously walked <2k steps a day, my only form of exercise is hiking a few times a year, and I mostly eat processed carbs and only like protein when it’s fried.

Now I’m lifting three times a week, trying to aim for 8k steps a day, trying to cook meals at home and hit 90g of protein a day, today I’m going to my first yoga class bc I’m horribly inflexible, and slowly upping my fiber intake from essentially zero. I’ve introduced these changes slowly since Spring and I’m seeing essentially zero changes in the mirror (probably bc I’m still binging shin ramen and Ben and Jerry’s weekly, old habits die hard) but it’s wild how I’m now constantly doing something. Before I used to sit around at work and then come home, order fried chicken, and sit in the couch til bedtime. Now I’m constantly at the grocery store or cooking or washing dishes or doing laundry to make sure I have clean gym clothes or going for a walk bc my step count is too low or I guess today I’m going to a yoga class bc I can’t be trusted to stretch at home lol. Does it just stay like this forever?? I kind of miss couch rotting but now when I do it I’m aware of how shitty and stiff I feel. What the hell?

Update: holy crap I didn’t expect this many responses, thank you everyone for sharing! I’m back from yoga, got in a 2 mile walk after and made some lunch. Reading comments while I put off washing dishes LOL. Just to clarify, I didn’t mean for this post to sound like I was complaining about my appearance, this isn’t really about aesthetics for me. Like hell yeah it would be cool to be ripped but I’m more focused on like… not aging miserably. I think the title was misleading in that regard, sorry. I posted bc I really am just truly baffled by how much free time I had before to couch rot BECAUSE I wasn’t taking care of myself vs how I’m constantly doing stuff to care for myself now, and how much that entails that other people were doing automatically all along. Kind of along the lines of “you never know what’s going on in someone’s home behind closed doors,” I thought we were all just eating dinner and watching TV LOL. Now I’m on the other side like damn, you people live like this??? Really appreciate all your perspectives and encouragement as I adjust to this healthier lifestyle!

Update#2: u/KactusEvergreen made another post articulating my actual question without all my additional spazziness lol, wanted to shout it out and thank her!

EDIT: Thank you all for the great suggestions! I went with Glo 7-day trial and searched for Iyengar yoga...there was lots of good content! Nikki Costello, for example, had some great videos.

Hi!

I've done PILATES for many years and am used to (and strongly prefer) heavily cued instruction -- and by cues, I mean not just telling me where to move my body parts, but which muscles to engage; highly descriptive ways of talking about that engagement beyond 'tighten'; use of metaphors to stimulate right muscular groups or sequences of action; occasional brief explanations as to *why* you engage this part but not that part.

I would love to do YOGA, but every video/instructor I come across that has lots of cuing is VERY surface..."move yourself into plank, rock forward and back on your toes, slowly lower yourself to the ground." That's not enough for me! I want to hear about how I should "move yourself into plank by pushing your palms into the ground while corseting your stomach, keeping your pelvis strong and heavy, and drawing your inner things up and in." (I totally made that up.)

I have tried in-person yoga classes of many stripes and have not come across an instructor who gives this detailed form of cueing.

SO, that's my long wind-up to ask: does anyone have any *detailed cue-heavy* yoga video recommendations? Paid or unpaid is fine!

I have huge flexibility issues. I need lots of detailed cuing or muscles/parts that should not take over take over...and I don't learn about where I need to push myself to increase my range of motion.

Thank you for any help!

Hello I bought the Merach duel ab machine and just did 80 but I feel like i was doing something wrong I felt it more in my arms than in my abs from pulling myself up not sure how to do it without holding on tightly and pulling myself up? I have it on the lowest height as I am a beginner