Programming while overworked.

[worksalot]

I need to have some advice on how to program training when the work hours are very irregular, and tiredness varies a lot from day to day.


Some background information.

31 male. 5'7. Basically very unfit till I began SS almost one year ago.

Stats before/after (in lbs)
Weight 136 --> 163

Squat 50 --> 180 (5x3)
Bench 50 --> 175 (3x3)
OHP 45 --> 105 (3x3)
DL 135 --> 290 (5x1)


Workload outside of the gym
I work in healthcare.
My hours are very irregular. Some weeks I works in shifts (which alternate between days, evenings and nights in pretty random manner, i.e. it's not a 4-evenings week, but rather I'll have to work 3 days, 2 evenings, and 1 night, for example). Other weeks I work as regular 7-day in rows about 9-10 hours a day + on-call 24/24 for the week. Some nights, I get to sleep the whole night. Other nights, I get 7-8 calls, and I barely get to sleep. In average, it's around 1-2 calls per night. All in all, I work 28 days per month average, excluding vacations weeks, of which I have 6 per year.

The end result of this crazy schedule is that my level of energy (and of SNC fatigue) varies a lot from training session to training session and makes LP very hard to maintain. All in all, I never was able to consistenly maintain a 3 day program. Some weeks I'm able to train 3 times, some other I was a walking zombie, and was sleeping all the little time I was not working, so didn't train a single time. Obviously, I was not doing the program, and this shows in the lackluster progress I achieved in a year.

The last ~ 2 months, I was able to train between 2 and 3 times a day, depending on the workload, and my weights has been stalling. Now, I had one week of, and suddenly I was able to both train 3 times a week, and progress easily in my lifts from training session to training session. Obviously, I'm still a novice, but "functionnaly" an intermediate while working, the lack of sleep not allowing novice recuperation.


Question
The question is, how to program an intermediate program when my sleep quality/tiredness/SNC fatigue varies so much from day to day. All programs I've seen have some version of Heavy-Light-Medium (or volume-recovery-intensity) pattern through the week, which supposes I'm fully recovered on the heavy days, which might not be my case on some weeks, if that week I hadn't slept at all the night before. Basically, I'd need a program where the order of the Heavy-Light-Medium days can change from week to week in almost random fashion to fit the random fluctuations of my rest levels. I'm not sure if that's even acheivable. If not, what's my best option ? Note that changing work is not an option, I really need the money at least for the next two years.

[David Mitchell]

I am curious to see how others reply, but if it were me I would try 72 hours between sessions. Assuming that with two days off you will probably get at least a good night's sleep on one of those nights. Run this as an LP for as long as you can and then as a heavy / medium or heavy / light and see how it goes.

EDIT - replaced "a short time" with "as long as you can".