FITNESS MYTHS and EXCUSES YOU CAN'T STAND!!!

JustJennie1

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The only time I can think of to "suck it up and deal with the pain" is when I did a really hard workout and my muscles are sore. If I feel as though ANY of my joints are going to blow apart when doing an activity I typically err on the side of caution and stop.
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When my muscles are sore from a hard workout .. I poke at them all day. I dunno. I like that pain.

You have to analyze your pain. Feel it, experience it .. I ask my boys (14 & 16 yrs aol, hockey and lacrosse players) "Are you hurt or are you injured?" If you're not injured, then suck it up and get out there for your next shift.

That's my point.

To say that anyone with an injury or who has excruciating pain when they do certain exercises should just "suck it up and work through it" is rather ridiculous IMO. That's just asking someone to hurt themselves further. My husband has what he calls a glass shoulder. It bothers him a LOT when he does certain shoulder exercises so he doesn't do those exercises that cause him to have sharp, shooting pains in his shoulder which brings him to his knees.

fitandgeeky

"I have to do cardio to lose the fat first. If I start lifting now I'll just be building muscle beneath the fat."

sullus

It's too expensive to eat healthy.

My math says it's less expensive.

fbmandy55

Friend's facebook status today, " One of my all natural diet pill customers lost 6lbs her first week! This is what 6 pounds of fat looks like! (attaches photo)".

I wanted to post so badly that unless her friend burned 21000 calories that week, it was just water weight.


Diet pill friends are getting on my nerves!!!

sullus

I can't stand "muscle weighs more than fat" Drives me nuts. 1 pound = 1 pound regardless of what it is made of. Muscle is denser than fat so 1 pound of muscle takes up less space than 1 pound of fat!

Biggest pet peeve in excuses? "I'm scared" WTF is there to be scared of? Being fit, being thin, living longer?

But muscle does weigh more than fat. If you took the same volume of each, muscle would weigh more.

Not in space. If we're going to be pedantic about it ...

ndj1979

if I do not eat six small meals a day I will go into starvation mode...

I am converting fat into muscle....

I want to scream when I hear those two....

Rosytakesoff

"Oh, I could never give up X food or eat like you do. I like/love to eat." Well, I like to eat also, but I also like not being fat, so if that means I need to cut back on the crap, then that's what I'm going to do.

SoDamnHungry

"I'm meant to be a bigger girl." Aka "I'm 5'0'', 170 pounds and I don't want to try to cut back or work out more so I'll just stay like this."

tlkrallman

"I'm not going to exercise, I'll just lose weight when I stop eating."

Said by my 16 year old step daughter all the time, as I'm busting my a** doing 'Insanity' and she's eating cookies.

Phrakman

That I.F is some sort of magical fat loss/muscle building entity.

rduhlir

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The only time I can think of to "suck it up and deal with the pain" is when I did a really hard workout and my muscles are sore. If I feel as though ANY of my joints are going to blow apart when doing an activity I typically err on the side of caution and stop.
...

When my muscles are sore from a hard workout .. I poke at them all day. I dunno. I like that pain.

You have to analyze your pain. Feel it, experience it .. I ask my boys (14 & 16 yrs aol, hockey and lacrosse players) "Are you hurt or are you injured?" If you're not injured, then suck it up and get out there for your next shift.

Theres sore

and then theres sore

GurleyGirl524

I signed up for MFP but I'm not losing any weight.

Well, are you logging daily? Are you working out? A website will not make you lose weight.

irjeffb

"Yeah, but it's easier for you because you're a guy"

BS. I'm successful because I work hard at it. Gender has nothing to do with it.

jessmart83

My best friend is always saying "I don't have time to work out or eat properly!" What?!!! you are a stay at home mom, your daughter is in 1st grade and goes to school all day, you have time you are just lazy! I work full time, have a 5 year old and I go to schoo full timel, I make 90% of my meals and usually workout an hr a day, dont give me that bull.

RGv2

You need to drink 8 glasses of water.....no matter your activity level, size, or weight. Everyone only gets 64 oz.

Lisah8969

MYTH - pretty much anything and everything that Dr. Oz says and tries to sell!

EXCUSE - "I'm scared to fail." Ugh. I have heard my wonderful friend say this so many times. I try to explain that not even trying gives her the exact same results as failure, but if she does try, she at least has the possibility of success. It just goes in one ear and out the other.

SarahBeth0625

When people say, "celebrities look good because they have personal trainers and chefs", as if the average Joe can't possibly attain a healthy figure. It's such an excuse! I hear it all the time when women post-partum say that they'll never lose all the weight. It is totally possible through diet and exercise. And of course, discipline.

RGv2

I can't stand "muscle weighs more than fat" Drives me nuts. 1 pound = 1 pound regardless of what it is made of. Muscle is denser than fat so 1 pound of muscle takes up less space than 1 pound of fat!

Biggest pet peeve in excuses? "I'm scared" WTF is there to be scared of? Being fit, being thin, living longer?

But muscle does weigh more than fat. If you took the same volume of each, muscle would weigh more.

waldo56

While I agree there are a lot of excuses out there, I have to add my 2 cents about squats.

Some people, myself included, have joint problems. I can't squat without having popping, grinding, and pinch-like pains in my knees, so, I don't squat because I don't want to injure myself. I'm not exceptionally heavy, just 15 pounds overweight, but the joint problems are something I've had my whole life, even as a teenager. Not everyone is made the same, and for whatever reason, some people's joints just can't handle strain like that.

Heck, lately at the gym I've been doing the over-head shoulder press weight machine, I do it on 20 pounds (which is next to nothing) but that's all I can do without causing myself pain. I get popping and grinding in my shoulders with 20 pounds, but if I bump up to 30 I get popping, grinding, and stabbing pains. My hope is that if I keep at it at 20 pounds whatever is messed up in there will set itself right and I can bump it up some more.

Also, just to further prove a point about how everyone's body is different - I fell down the stairs a few years ago and got a very serious foot injury. It didn't break, but the bone on the front of my foot on par where my ankle is (cuboid I think) popped out and back in causing some tearing. My doctor gave me bad advice and said it would heal on it's own with no physical therapy. Years later I still have problems with it and they makes no sense. For instance: The elliptical's motion will eventually cause a pinching and "out of place" pain in my ankle that will last for days... the arc trainer doesn't. Why? I have no idea, they're similar, I even get more resistance with the arc, but the very slight difference in motion is what makes it so that I can do 30 minutes on the arc on hill intervals whereas after 10 minutes on the elliptical's lowest manual setting I have issues. I can walk down the street just fine, and usually I can jog a little, but if I walk on a treadmill it hurts and takes days to heal. Why? It doesn't make much sense, but the very minor changes in impact and range of motion have major influences on how my foot handles certain exercises.

So, it's sort of a peeve of mine when people act like they understand everyone's anatomy perfectly. If everyone was a perfect model human that would be one thing, but each of us has life experience and often injuries that impact how our bodies handle various activities, even when outwardly we all look the same.

Chronic movement chain problems often resulting from overcompensation or poor posture are almost always at the root of chronic pain.

Cracking and popping are a sign of swelling, something isn't moving right.

Ankle inflxibility, calf tightness, poor hip mobility, joint knocking, weak feet, and poor glute activation (many people have flat out forgotten how to use their butts due to a lifetime of sitting) are the root cause of chronic knee pain for many, even if those root causes were prompted by injury.

With the shoulders, take this simple test. Stand up and hold a pencil/pen in each hand lightly, arms naturally by your sides. If those pencils were lasers, do the beams cross, and where? If they cross it is a sign of hunched shoulders whose root causes include poor t-spine mobility from hunched sitting all ay, overdevelopment of pressing strength relative to pulling strength, and/or poor scapular control. If these lasers would cross only a few feet in front of your body, the angle of your upper arm bone in the shoulder socket almost guarantees that any overhead work will eventually cause the snap crackle pops and pain.

All issues that arise from posture, mobility, strength imbalances can be fixed.

For squatting, face it, before the invention of the outhouse, full depth a2g squatting was the only way to go to the bathroom. All of our close relatives in the wild (and/or zoos) and our young children squat full depth all the time.

_cdngirl71_

I hate the excuse "I don't have the time". If you have time to watch TV for 3 hrs, you have plenty of time to get off your @ss and workout. My brother and my friend use this excuse all the time, drives me nuts.