I want to reflect for a bit. I had an article queued up about differences in training between my 20s and my 30s, but then I got hurt. I got hurt doing something I would have specifically called out as fucking stupid in the article I didn't finish writing. I'm really trying to figure out what I'm frustrated about with this entire debacle, because getting hurt is unfortunately part of the game. It doesn't matter if you exert yourself physically or otherwise. Injury can find you.
For a quick preamble before the bulleted list, I fucked up my neck and my right knee. My left arm has been completely numb for days (although that is almost completely turned around) and I feel a sharp pull in my right knee when it bends under weight.
My thoughts from this last shitty week:
- My immediate thought was I'm fucked and it's not going to get better. This is a loser mentality. A 'war story bro' mentality. So what if my most of my body is out of commission, my left leg is fine. What's to stop me from racking up obscene amounts of volume with my left leg while the rest of me heals? Absolutely nothing. I'm not an invalid. I'm just acting like one.
- I've been seeing a neck injury coming for weeks. Instead of, I don't know, actively working on making it stronger for once, I kept hammering in on compound moves that I know are tough on my neck and traps.
- Once the initial neck injury happened, I doubled down and did farmers walks to stretch out the area. This no doubt both made the initial problem worse as well as incited the knee fun I'm experiencing.
- For the longest time, I have no programming. I'm lost at sea.
So where do we go from here? I'm in a weird spot where it's not a great age to take large risks or to ignore nagging pains. I had the right idea with one of my workout ideas (which I promptly abandoned after a week) where I could alternate heavy and light blocks of movements.
Light (4 week blocks)
- Calisthenics.
- High volume.
- High frequency (2x / day).
Heavy (4 week blocks)
- Weighted calisthenics, barbell squats, and barbell deads.
- Medium volume.
- Medium frequency.
The keys I'm missing are consistency and training for longevity. If I want a chance in hell in being in good shape when I'm a father, I need to abandon my chaotic approach to programming. There's a time and a place for chaos, and that's for conditioning. I can engage with the plan above and not exclude sandbags, farmers, kegs, whatever. I just need to be smarter with them. When I'm introducing chaos to my routine every week, I'm not correspondingly listening to what my body is saying. And bubbee, it was screaming before I got hurt.
