Gosh, I hate when I increase the weight. My arms hurt from shoulders to fingertips, shoulders hurt in the front and I think my back is sore too, but it's all a blur honestly. blech I just want to climb under my electric blanket like I did last nite and kill the ache. I probably need to hit the motrin yet again.

Is it supposed to do this? I mean, I've been lifting now for a whole six weeks! This should be over!

HRbabe, i don't know what kind of pain you have. Are you sure this is the normal muscle soreness after training?? In my experience you are sore for a couple of days, but not for 6 weeks! Are you sure you did not cause an injuriy because your ligaments etc all need to strengten too?

I found when i started training that my muscles grew faster than my ligaments could handle, and kind off took it easy for the whole system to adjust. I would maybe stay with the same weights, or even lift a little lower for like a week and see what happens pain wise.

Again, I am no expert, but I did not have severe pain for that long, so I would take it easy for a week.

You are doing HIIT BFL I remember, and I believe I have heard that HIIT has an increased risk of injuries, so be carefull out there!

Take care,
rabbit

I've been weight lifting on and off since 1993 and in my opinion this has got to be the best way to get in shape. However, you will feel sore sometimes and that is ok. Usually the soreness kicks in on day 2 or 3 following a work out. After you've been lifting for 12 weeks and you're sure you've got the proper form down, try lifting as heavy as possible for 2 sets only per exercise. You will notice yourself burning a lot of calories and you can practically feel your metabolism pushing itself harder than usual. Once you have increased strength in your whole body, you will find yourself able to lift boxes and things with such ease. So I say stick with it. But make sure your form is proper. And best of luck .

Hey Rabbit, thanks for your concern. Just want to add it is not constant. It permanently goes away with some motrin and doesn't come back. It's usually about 6-8 hours after a workout and stays until my next workout. The next workout feels good while I'm doing it and after, but then I start aching that nite again. YOu may be right, I may be increasing and that hurts a bit. But it has not been constant for 6 weeks. I just thought after my body being used to lifting for 6 weeks now, that I wouldn't get sore after a workout anymore. But I have seen some people complain that if they don't hurt, they know it's time to up their weight. THis just doesn't seem like a fun way to go thru life, imo, popping ibu's, or dealing with muscle ache.

I also think things are worse bc of our cold weather snap. My core temp is not cold per se, I'm usually pretty warm blooded, but the cold is tough on the muscle pain if that makes sense. Crazy, I know.

Fran- try taking the supplement l-glutamine. It does only good things! Aids in muscle repair, decreases soreness, and has been shown to increase bronchial immunity. I add 1 scoop (about 4000mgs) to my morning protein shake daily.

I've been lifting seriously for about 6 years and can still cripple myself by changing my leg exercises, doing an extra set of pullups, changing the angle from which I hit a particular muscle.

I no longer increase the weight I use on my arms because the last time I did I pulled a bicep tendon which was excruciatingly painful- arms are kind of in maintenance mode.

Mel

THanks Mel. THat helps alot and is good to know that extra info about your arms even. I think I will focus on increasing the weight on my squats and plies and leave my poor ub alone for now! It's easy to increase my lb resistance because I started a zero figuring my bodyweight provided alot of weight - and my legs were tired the next day.

I think that discomfort/soreness is supposed to happen, or we wouldn't be doing ourselves any good. By definition, you HAVE to injure the muscle-the muscle grows when it repairs itself. The thing is, severe pain is not normal, even if it goes away with meds. I tried for several weeks to do what I thought was a reasonable weight for the lat pulldowns, and was killing myself. Lowering your weight on a specific exercise that's bothering you the most won't be that bad-just get a feel for what's right for you.
I really don't feel like you have to lift such heavy weight and "max out" to get the metabolism going. I am only lifting about 60% of my max and doing 3 sets of 10, and it has DEFINITELY increased my weight loss since before I started lifting.
Don't get me wrong....I've only been lifting for about 10 weeks now myself, and I know that eventually I will have to severely increase my weight to get results, or else I will just basically be doing cardio-but as a "beginner" I only go up in 2 pound increments at a time. You never said how much you were increasing, but I think those of us less experienced in this risk injury by going up too much too fast. I started this never having lifted weights before in my life, so I'm more concerned about not hurting myself than maxing out-but that's not everyone's goal with this, and I don't know if this goes against the BFL guidelines-just tossing in my 2

Thanks for those thoughts, RB. I'm only going up by 3-4 pounds usually, depending on whatever my next increment is on my dumbbells. Right now I'm doing 8-10-15 on my chest presses and butterflies on my bench, lying flat.

Working out last nite, I think I may have discovered something I am doing to irritate myself, and that is picking up the 15 and 20 lb weights with my one hand from the floor while sitting on the bench. I think I'm leaning over and not doing it right and possibly overextending my arm. SO I am going to stop doing that and being so lazy and just get off the bench to get my weights picked up for the next routine.

Although I don't post often I luv to read this forum! I agree with rebeleage and wonder if you are lifting too much weight. I have been using free weights at my health club 3 days a week and along with cardio 5-6 days have seen good results. I didn't lose any weight for about the last 7 weeks but have seen the results in my arms and strength. I only use 8 to 10 lbs free weights and 20 lb barbell. I use one machine whose name escapes me at 35 lbs that I pull out with both arms. I was taught to lift weights every other day to let muscle to recover. This week I lost 4 lbs finally! I know I am a newbie at this! I hurt my knee this summer from overexercising ( who'd of thought I ever be typing the word overexercising) and the doctor didn't want me to stop working out, but told me to to take 2-3 days off of cardio and then take at least one day a week off to rest. I was taking 800mg of ibuforen 3 times a day and it took almost 8 weeks to repair that. I never want to go thru that again! Then, my foot was killing me! It gets harder as you age! So please rest if you really hurt! I switch things up a lot. I just started doing spin a few weeks ago, use the eliptical and lifecycle and go to an upper cuts aerobic class and an intense pilates class all in a week. I started last year, doing 5 days a week in the pool and do the pool now as a reward! That way I don't hurt anything 2 days in a row! I am also 52.

Mel, I didn't know that glutamine came in a powder! To get 1000mg I was choking on these horse pills and then just stopped, and I am not pill impaired! You all inspire me!