Deloading for recovery?

xidia

Can I have some advice please?

Background:
I'm tired. All the time. I'm 3 months away from our wedding, we're buying a house and I'm in the middle of picking up a new role in my current company. None of these stressors can be changed, only managed. I'm making sure I get 7-8 hours sleep a night (historically, this is enough), I'm drinking my water, I'm mostly balancing my macros and I've started on a multi-vitamin that gives me 100% of pretty much every trace element, mineral and vitamin I could need. I'm upping my calories back to maintenance and ditching cardio until I feel more like Tigger and less like Eyore. I will go to the Dr if I don't seen any improvement in energy in a week or so.

Question:
I want to get back to lifting, partly to keep the routine and the "me time" to de-stress mentally, and partly so I don't lose the physical gains I've made. But I can't do 5x5 and progress according to the programme. I do not have the energy.

So what can I do instead?

3x5 and keep the weights? (reducing volume)
5x5 and deload 20%? (reduce weight)
2-3x8 and deload 50%? (reduce weight & volume)
Something else entirely?

jstout365

First off, congrats on all the exciting stuff going on!! I know it probably seems more stressful than anything, but they are at least good reasons for stress.

If I was in your place, I think I would deload by 20%, do a 3x5, and add the weight slowly for the lifting side. I would also turn my attention to my diet. Vitamins are fine, but fruit and veggies can go a long way in helping increase energy while lifting. I know for me, the more fresh foods I incorporate in, the better I feel. I'm not perfect and I don't aim to be, but the better I do at it, the better I feel.

Being tired for me usually comes down to food more than activity. I don't want to give up the exercise so I eat to fuel the work I put into it. I've had good results at even TDEE - 5-10% and then I don't feel utterly drained all the time.

I think you are on a good path to get it worked out. Hopefully you get your Tigger bounce back soon!

auddii

First off, congrats on all the exciting stuff going on!! I know it probably seems more stressful than anything, but they are at least good reasons for stress.

If I was in your place, I think I would deload by 20%, do a 3x5, and add the weight slowly for the lifting side. I would also turn my attention to my diet. Vitamins are fine, but fruit and veggies can go a long way in helping increase energy while lifting. I know for me, the more fresh foods I incorporate in, the better I feel. I'm not perfect and I don't aim to be, but the better I do at it, the better I feel.

Being tired for me usually comes down to food more than activity. I don't want to give up the exercise so I eat to fuel the work I put into it. I've had good results at even TDEE - 5-10% and then I don't feel utterly drained all the time.

I think you are on a good path to get it worked out. Hopefully you get your Tigger bounce back soon!

This sounds like great advice to me! I don't have any experience with deloads, so I don't have any useful advice, but I'm interested in what other girls have to say.

Will_Thrust_For_Candy

Yes, I would agree with jstouts advice as well.

I decided when I started my second cycle of SL (3x5) to also increase my deficit because I was not seeing the results I wanted. One thing I know for sure is that is can't progress at SL speed at a deficit so I have started to stay at a weight for a little bit before moving up in weight. With that being said, I do try to increase reps, rather than weight. So for squats for example, I will do 3x5 for maybe 2 or 3 workouts, then bump up to 3x6 for a couple, etc.....this way I still feel like I'm progressing but not nearly as quick. For me personally it's working quite well. It's also definitely still a sense of accomplishment. You would be surprised how tough it is to eek out just that 1 extra rep!

Oh, and I forgot that I did do a deload week between cycles.....20% on lower body but not quite as much on upper because those lifts were not so heavy to begin with :laugh:

xidia

Thanks ladies.

My diet hasn't really changed, so I'm treating the multivitamin more as belt-and-braces than the primary source of anything. I take the point, though, that fresh is better. One of the (minor, in the grand scheme of things!) problems is that our life doesn't really lend itself to regular fresh veg & fruit - we eat a lot of frozen veg, some salad, fresh stir fries, and I get a fair amount of dried fruit each day. I'd love to get back to having a regular box of organic veg delivered, but we just end up throwing most of it away if we do that at the moment. I could do a bit more when it's my week to cook in terms of fresh, but Himself is unlikely to

3x5 is fine, and allows me to eke out some extra minutes in bed before I have to get up for the gym!

Deload-wise:
Squats were 77lbs, so go back to 60lb

Bench was 50lb, but deloading to 40lbs means changing bars, so I'm tempted to leave that at 45lb. It's been 50lbs for around 4 weeks anyway because I've been so inconsistent in lifts, so it's not exactly hard, and I'm dropping the volume.

Row was 60lb so drops to 48lb, or basically the bar on its own

OHP, my nemesis, was 35lbs. There's the 15kg/33lb woman's Oly bar, or I could go down further with a fixed one - a 20% deload would be 13kg, or 28lbs. That's probably the right thing to do, or maybe even dumbbells.

Deadlift was 133lbs, so back to 105lbs

That sounds doable, at least for a couple of weeks. And at that point, the house stuff should, hopefully, be a bit less stressful and a bit more settled as to whether/when we're buying it.

DaniH826

I think it's wise to listen to your body and adjust accordingly.

If you can't do 5x5, then do 3x5. If you can't push for progression right now, then deload and take a break.

I'm taking today off from lifting because when I woke up my body said "not today". Bummer, cause I wanted to, but you can only do what you can do. The weights will still be there Saturday.

I think moving AND planning a wedding AND a job switch is like the Trifecta of stress you have on your plate right now, so don't feel bad for feeling run down and having to adjust. Either of those ALONE would be enough. No wonder you're exhausted. Try to take it easy, eh? :flowerforyou: