Old Lady's Log

[Longanlon]

I waited to see if my mother will stick with training long enough to warrant a training log. So far so good, so I believe some of my observations while training her might be useful.

Subject: My mother, 67 yo woman, about 200 lbs, 5'5. Breast cancer surgery a year ago, half of her left peck muscle was removed. No other serious health issues. Some minor mobility issues which despite her over-dramatizing are due to her being somewhat fat and out of shape.

Training background: none to speak of. Desk job, retired for five years, working in the garden.

Started training on October 01, 2016.

[Longanlon]

Initial conversation and persuasion techniques

Any of you who have any experience weight training old people will agree one of the most difficult things about that is actually convincing them they need weight training. I have prodded her before about training with weights and she just laughed it off. After her surgery I prepared her a simple "exercise" routine to follow (basically my joints warm up routine: rolling of ankles, knees, hips, waist, shoulders etc. you know the drill) at home. She says she follows it almost every day, but I doubt it. So I put some thought on my approach and decided to play the "concerned" card which turned out to be successful. So here it is:

I invited her out for a cup of coffee and told her there is something important I want to talk to her about. I started the conversation slowly, talking about different old, sick people in our town we both know, about each one's conditions and mostly about how difficult it is for them to perform basic tasks (walking around, getting out of bed, etc.). I explained that despite her being in way better shape then they are, she is not getting any younger and I would not like to see her in such a miserable condition. I was careful to speak slowly, and calmly, to sound concerned.

We talked about osteoporosis, and about why old people get frail and weak. Actually, I had it quite easy because in our language the most common words you can use to describe an old person's condition: like weak, frail, etc. are the opposite of different synonyms of the word "strong" - so it was pretty easy to point out how if she doesn't want to be weak, she should just get stronger. I explained I care for her health and well being and would like to help her avoid slowly turning into "one of those old people we talked about".

I said I would like to show her a program specifically designed for older people, which starts them very light and progresses very slow, just 2 lbs each time, with a few simple movements, which will do wonders. She agreed to try it out (I suspect mostly because she wanted to spend more time with me )

So to summarize:
- act concerned
- talk about frail, weak, and sick old people you both know
- emphasize that nobody should spend their golden years like this
- being strong is the opposite of being weak
- it's just 2 lbs each time, let's try it and see it's not hard

[Longanlon]

October 1, 2016 - First training session

Following my "slow and careful" approach and trying not to spook my mother, I decided to introduce the Starting Strength lifts one by one. The first session I spent the first 15 minutes just talking with her (not to her) about the program, but I focused on general principles. I was purposely vague and didn't mention any specifics (like movements, reps, etc.).

The Squat

I explained the squat is the most fundamental and important movement of them all and that is why we will just squat today. Using the info in that video: The Squat - Training the Elderly - YouTube I showed the foot and knee positions and made her stand from seating position. We did that several times, with me correcting.

Than we worked on breathing, me showing the Valsalva maneuver (I didn't call it that just said "holding your breath") and emphasizing we will breathe like this for every other movement we do during training.

It was time for air squats and she did 2 of those, I had to help her up with the third. She did another 2 sets of 2 air squats and I called it a day. She was pleasantly surprised how short and easy the workout was.

[chromoly]

Really excited to follow this log and glean tips. I'm trying to convince my parents (in their mid-60s) to start training.

[carson]

My wife and I were in our mid 60s when we started. My wife had osteoporosis when she began. A recent check shows that all evidence of the disease is gone. She nearly died before she entered and it wasn't difficult to convince her to give it a try.

It's exciting to see your progress with your mom. I wonder how a child will progress with the training. You may wish to have her check with a certified SS coach from time to time to reassure her that she is on the right track and to correct any mistakes she might pick up that she doesn't wish you to correct or you don't notice.

I'll keep watching.

[anniemichael]

Following. Great that you are taking a steady and patient approach!

[Longanlon]

Pic of the Old Lady holding Rip

[Longanlon]

First month's results

We started training 2 times per week. We did not set specific days, but rather agreed on training days ad hoc each time. It seems to be working. After she was able to air squat for 3 sets of 5, I started keeping track of the weights and introduced the other movements one by one. First month's weights are as follows:

Week 1: introduced The Press
Squat 10kg (small bar)x5x3

Squat 12kg
Press 4kg (dumbbell handles)x5x3

Week 2: Introduced Bench Press
Squat 15kg
Bench press 10 kg

Squat 20 kg
Press 10 kg

Week 3: introduced Deadlift
Squat 15 kg (she didnt feel well but insisted on training anyway, I deloaded 5 kg)
Bench press 12 kg
Deadlift 20 kg

Squat 20 kg
Press 12 kg

Week 4:
Squat 25 kg
Bench press 15 kg
Deadlift 25 kg

Squat 28 kg
Press 15 kg


Some observations:

First of all - rest days. Because we did not set specific days of the week for training, sometimes she has 2 rest days, sometimes 3, and sometimes 4. Once - 6 rest days (yes, the "weeks" above are there just for convenience, it took about 5 weeks to do the above mentioned sessions). What noticed is that rest days definitely have an effect on recovery in the sense that more is better. My mother never missed a rep so far, and I have been somewhat conservative with adding weight, but I try to notice the speed she does the movements with as well as the general effort it takes her to move the weight. After the 6-day-rest the session was easy as pie, and generally after 2 days of rest she struggles a little bit more with the new weight. If I can go as far as to generalize, 2 sessions per week is definitely too much for her 67 yo self, although 1 session per week is maybe too little. 3 to 4 days between training sessions seem optimal for recovery.

Rest between sets. Again, more is better. I hadn't tested rests bigger than 10 minutes, but 3 minutes is definitely too short. I generally stick to 5 minutes.

Being sick. One time she had a cold and felt somewhat lousy but insisted on training. Following my conservative approach I took the liberty of deloading the squat with 12 lbs (5 kg) although such a thing is not covered in The Good Book. Turned out well.

Breast cancer surgery and Bench Press. We were both concerned about bench-pressing, since half of her left peck muscle was removed a year ago. Turns out, it is not a significant problem. The bar path is steady, the bar does not lean left (as to indicate strenght imbalance or mobility issue). The only thing bothering her is the scar which, she says, stretches and "the feeling is not good".


Breast cancer surgery and The Squat. There are mobility issues with the left shoulder regarding the Squat, so she squats high-bar, which coach Campitelly says is ok in her case.

[Bliss]

This will be very insightful, thank you for your time devoted both to training your mum,and to writing about it!!

Curious about the language specific you mentioned, with the synonyms/antonyms, can you explain a few examples?

Oh, and one thing i didn't grasp from your log, are your sessions still structured as the usual 3 lifts per day? And weight increase is each week?

(tapatalk)

[Longanlon]

Yeah, I missed that in the introduction: 3 lifts per day, but because of her age I don't ask her to do power cleans. Instead she does something like an incline pull-up with the feet on the floor. I don't measure those since the difficulty depends on foot placement and I have not included it in the numbers above. So the program looks like this:

Workout A
Squat 3x5
Bench 3x5
DL 1x5

Workout B
Squat 3x5
Press 3x5
Incline pull-up 3x5-10

Language is Bulgarian. One of the words is "немощен" which literally means "not-powerful", weak-strong is pretty much the same. An expression people use to describe a very weak old person is "he/she has no strength to stand up".