Training with my wife

[Gene61]

We are on the geezer side of the spectrum: 61 and 56. Just started SS 90 days ago. I started with a bare bar and the wife started with those pre-weighted bars because she couldn't handle the 45lb standard bar. We are taking it slow, but making good progress (from a very low level of strength fitness). She's now on the main bar (and more) for all the basic exercises in the program.

I'm the "manual reader" in the family and so read Rippetoe's books and became the "coach."

Interestingly, we found out about Rip's program from a book about improving your marriage called "No Cheating, No Dying." The husband of the author was really into Starting Strength and his wife thought it was pretty cool and talked about his workouts in the book. Got me interested and my wife interested too.

Anyone else out there training with their wife (husband)? How do you deal with disparity in progress? (My wife is a bit unhappy that I can progress faster.) What do you do when you get out of sync because one or the other missed a workout? In our case one of us just repeats the prior workout exercises.

I like it. Its a good "couples" thing to do. Any long time training couples have suggestions for keeping it going?

[FatButWeak]

Im both jealous and glad Im not you!

Its great that your wife is amenable to working out with you, especially on an awesome and fruitful program like SS. I wish mine was. However, training with a wife/girlfriend is a known...difficulty? It can be tricky.

You should both proceed cautiously and slowly, treating your improvements as part of the fun. And getting stronger is fun. Your wife should understand that even old guys will proceed much faster than women due to certain biological realities, and that wont change. Nevertheless, I would purchase microweights as quickly as possible and treat her .5 pound strength increases as more impressive than your 5 pound gains. That should keep both of you plenty motivated.

Godspeed.

[Gene61]

Thanks for the advice. I'll order the micro weights right away.

[Mr_Rogers]

Anyone else out there training with their wife (husband)? How do you deal with disparity in progress? (My wife is a bit unhappy that I can progress faster.) What do you do when you get out of sync because one or the other missed a workout? In our case one of us just repeats the prior workout exercises.

I like it. Its a good "couples" thing to do. Any long time training couples have suggestions for keeping it going?

+1 for microloading. The biggest jump I let the Mrs. make is 5lbs and I imagine I'll soon have to change that to 2.5lbs or less which won't be an issue.

I'm fortunate enough to be able to train in our basement so I've built two platforms. One for squatting and pressing and the other is for olympic lifting and deadlifting. We're on slightly different programs, she's doing SS but we've substituted rows (because she can't do chin-ups/pull-ups) for power cleans, she has a torn meniscus (or MCL I can't remember) in her right and jumping aggravates it. I'm doing some more geared towards weightlifting which works out perfectly as we rarely need the same platform at the same time.

She's a professional forester so she either works really late or is out of town for weeks at a time which obviously conflicts with her training. If she's just working late and I'm done training I'll coach her through her workout, but if she's out of town we just try to pick up where she left off the next time she's able to train. I honestly thought I'd have to be more delicate (?) while training her, but she's pretty tough and determined so I can actually push her pretty hard. I've learned to definitely highlight the good reps and sort of ignore the bad ones. Pointing out what she's done right on a rep works much better than pointing out what she's done wrong. She's also getting to the point where she can feel the difference between a good and bad rep so that helps too.

I really enjoy having the company while I train, it makes the longer sessions fly by. I just wish she'd push me a bit, but that may come. I'm trying to convince her to attend the seminar with me, but I've been unsuccessful thus far.

edit:

She's already lifting more on most lifts than she did when she played basketball in high school. I've found that making a big deal out of PR has helped even if she's hitting a PR every session.

[jsteffen80]

She's a professional forester

That's pretty badass right there...

I get to start training my wife today... we're setting up a weight room at home in the next few months, but we're going to get her a head-start since she can go to my gym for free during the summer (university gym). I'm going to start with the Squat/Press/Deadlift workout, and kind of see where she's at. Our son was born just 10 weeks ago, so she's ready to get back to some gym time. I just don't want her to destroy herself with endless hours of cardio like she used to do. She is very open to the idea, and I don't feel like I'm forcing it on her.

The only thing I'm concerned about is her diet. It's going to take a lot of doing to convince her to eat more. We both have some weight to lose, but she seems to be going about it in an unhealthy manner... We'll figure it out.

[Mr_Rogers]

That's pretty badass right there...

I should add a disclaimer to that. She's involved in the forest regeneration/sustainability and planning side. She's not out there in a skidder and chainsaw chopping stuff down lol

edit:

jsetten80: you may want to look at KSC's programming forum. He's got some ideas on training a girlfriend/wife. I eased my wife into doing only the bar for the first two workouts (knowing she'd be sore) and the next workouts we worked on finding her starting weights.

edit: link is here.

If she's wanting to do some light cardio TBone suggested walks in a thread I made and Jamie recommended kettlebell swings (Google Dan John for form).

[jsteffen80]

Thanks a bunch!

I don't really plan to try for working weights today, but concentrate on making sure the movements are good. Other than squats (which if she can't do the bar quite yet, she can at lest do body weight) my gym has a bunch of static-weight bars that go all the way down to 10 or 15 pounds, so we should be able to find a weight she can press and deadlift without much problem. She can carry our 65 pound son up stairs, so she's not super wimpy or anything, but I expect there to be some deficiencies in parts of the motions.

We walk 1-3 miles several times a week (really helps my legs with recovery since I sit all day) and she does a lot of walking on her own during the work day, so I think she's covered on that.

She's open to my type of training, but I'm going to have a hard time convincing her to not starve herself. She is the kind that will live and die by the number on the scale, and I was too until I found Jim Wendler's site and started digging into Starting Strength, but I'm slowly trying to get her out of that mindset.

While it might not be HER goal, my goal in working with her is to bring up her self-confidence... Once that happens, I feel everything else will fall into place.

[mann_ey]

I'll chime in with the perspective of a woman training with her male partner. We started SS six weeks ago (so no long time advice here, sorry!) together. I was the one who wanted to weightlift to get stronger, and he came on board for injury prevention (desk job, very tall, bad posture, and a family history of back pain).

I'm the "manual reader" in the family and so read Rippetoe's books and became the "coach."

I'd absolutely advise your wife to read the book as well if she has not done so. I am sure you give her the best advice possible, but there is so much information in there! My partner and I took away different things from it, and discussing it really helped both of us a lot. I do not think my partner would feel as committed to the program if he hadn't learned about it and decided for himself to implement it. That being said, you are three months into the program, so whatever you are doing must be working :-)

Anyone else out there training with their wife (husband)? How do you deal with disparity in progress? (My wife is a bit unhappy that I can progress faster.)

My partner progresses a lot faster than I do - in absolute numbers, that is. He is also twice my size! Okay, slightly exaggerating here, but my point is, why would I compare myself to him in absolute numbers?

Maybe it would help your wife to look at her lifts in relationship to her bodyweight and general strength standards. I know, those standards are established for young people, but they could give her some perspective on the differences than can be expected between women and men, and what weights she can start working towards. Having goals of your own is very motivating.

How big is the difference in progress when you both look at your bodyweight? Still enough to bother her?

What do you do when you get out of sync because one or the other missed a workout? In our case one of us just repeats the prior workout exercises.

We just continue with whatever was scheduled next for each of us. Is there a specific reason you cannot bench on a day that she presses, or vice versa?

I like it. Its a good "couples" thing to do.

I completely agree. It creates a bond, and I think having a training buddy who happens to also be your partner rocks. Quality time, and all that.

[mann_ey]

She's open to my type of training, but I'm going to have a hard time convincing her to not starve herself. She is the kind that will live and die by the number on the scale, and I was too until I found Jim Wendler's site and started digging into Starting Strength, but I'm slowly trying to get her out of that mindset.

Hoo boy. The scale. I used to want the numbers to go down. Nowadays, in order to make sure they don't, I concentrate on eating as much as I can. I have seen nice body composition changes while maintaining my body mass. It's actually quite fun to tell people who comment on my apparent "weight loss" that no, I haven't lost any weight at all.

But I expect your wife won't just take my word for it, so send her this link to a great article by Jason Seib. It has before/after pictures of a woman who maintained her weight, but changed her body composition a lot. While I have no idea what look your wife is aiming for, this should illustrate the futility of using the scale to measure fat loss.

[DV]

I think mann_ey's posts were very interesting. If you can get her to read up on some of the books, as she suggests, great. I can't with my wife.

The little trick I stumbled into, was making it her responsibility and thus her achievement as well. I.e. I will show her what to do and how, but if she goes and does it is on her. I go to the gym religiously, but if she decides to skip a session or three, that's her own deal and I won't pester her about it. It also means that I do my routine as scheduled, as does she - sometimes we do the same, sometimes not.

The second trick was using what motivates her. For my wife it is purely aesthetics, more particularly getting hypertrophy in desired areas, especially glutes and legs. Just after a few weeks of SS she could tell the difference in her clothes, and to this day she swears by squats and deads, when she trains. If your wife is motivated by numbers on the bar, then make sure to track progress closely. And for gods sakes microload as soon as you can.

Finally I also always ask her about my form on the excercises, often having her film sets, and then critiquing them. That way it isn't as one-directional - we are both giving input to how the other is lifting.

Regarding diet our meals together are good (lots of meat and rice, usually), which then gives her some leeway when she eats alone. I just impress the importance of always having some form of meat (which it seems women aren't pre-programmed to eat a lot of) in her meals.

Those are some of the things that I've found worked. The most important thing, though, is to avoid becoming her "coach" so much, that you start pushing her, delivering one-way critique etc.

I think it's great that you've taken this up together. I'm sure you'll find it rewarding.