Considerations for trainees with bad recovery

[ambivalens]

Hello coaches, and thanks for the time you put into this forum!

33 year old male, 260 lbs, current 1RMs: Squat: 310 DL: 360 Bench: 245 Press: 175

I'm running standard Texas Method because session to session weight increases are too taxing for me. I'm a very bad sleeper, and get on average 3-4 hours every night. I have a physically demanding job (carpenting + brick laying etc.), 2 kids and all the other stuff people have in their lives. I would say that weight lifting has made my sleep even worse than it was - I can feel quite "electric" at night after heavy lifting. I've been able to manage this decently by lifting quite early in the day though.

I've been increasing my upper body lifts 5 lbs each week, and lower body 10 lbs. So far, so good. The biggest challenges with weight lifting so far for me have been psychological. Motivating myself to go to the gym and go all out after a particularly bad night is demanding, but once I'm actually in the gym I feel quite good and I don't really think my strength is significantly affected. Atleast not at the numbers I'm working with, perhaps it will be worse as I move up.

The "too long, didn't read" of it all: Are there any considerations you would advice for trainees who have less than stellar recovery, like me?

Thanks for your consideration, and feedback would be highly valued!

[Mac Ward]

If you are adding 10lbs a week, you don't have recovery problems.

As for the motivation...if I could add 10lbs a week, I would have all the motivation I need.

Seriously, try running the program as written, and see if that helps.

[Rich Rowe]

I'm not a coach but I have lifelong sleep problems. I'm just not good at it.

From your results you seem to be recovering ok so far, but you identify a psychological angle in your post.

I looked into sleep hygiene quite thoroughly a while back (it helped a lot). Something that I found helpful that may benefit you was the idea of not getting stressed if the night is going badly. Ancient man rarely got through the night without some kind of disturbance (says the theory) but still coped pretty ok the following day. This knowledge helped me relax which in turn helped me get back to sleep.

Conversely, laying in bed at 3am worrying that it's Volume Day or you have to fill in your TPS Report or do some other important life task will likely do you more harm than simply being awake.

The ideal is to sleep enough, but failing that, practise some meditation or other relaxing pastime. Keeping your stress levels down is (mostly) under your control and will aid recovery.

Good luck!

[crookedfinger]

I am going to chime in here. Probably not worth much, but...

Your recovery is not the issue. Your lifestyle is.

Sleep needs to become a priority. Given your schedule and demands outside of the gym, I think you need to rethink TM as the program of choice. It is very time consuming, very mentally and physically demanding, and, quite frankly, I think sleep is more of a priority. You need to look at a program that will get you in and out and of the gym in under an hour.

The lack of sleep will impact your ability to lose weight, it will sap your performance in the gym.

Hop over to Andy's forum and website and take a look at alternatives. KISS has some draw.

In regards to motivation, I, too, have no motivation. I just get up and make myself go train 3 days a week. I usually don't want to. I usually want to be lazy and go to bed. But I don't. Motivation is overrated. Self-discipline is under-rated and this is what it takes. The only motivation I have is that I would rather be strong than weak and to be strong I have to get my ass up and go train.