When you have a history of pain, injury, or hypermobility, it can be scary to introduce strength training into your routine. But strength training can help you improve your mobility, build strength, and move beyond a past injury. If you have fears about starting a strength training practice because of pain or hypermobility, this episode is here to tell you that you have nothing to fear.

Key Takeaways

If You Want To Use Strength Training to Improve Your Pain or Hypermobility, You Should:

1. Start changing your mindset to believe your body is capable of doing more than you give it credit for
2. Find a basic strength training program with low-to-medium reps to feel more in control
3. Introduce strength training in a way that makes sense for your unique body and needs

The Benefits of Strength Training

Nikki Naab-Levy is a strength and nutrition coach who knows firsthand what it is like to live with chronic pain. Having been involved in multiple arenas in the fitness industry for the past 17 years, Nikki and her clients have used strength training to alleviate their pain and gain confidence, strength, and a sustainable mindset.

How Strength Training Can Help Your Symptoms

Even if you have a history of pain, injury, or hypermobility, it is completely possible and beneficial to use strength training as a way to create a sense of safety in your body through your nervous system. 

If you think an activity will hurt, the likelihood of it hurting is far more significant; it is just how our brains are wired. But, when you equip yourself with the knowledge that Nikki shares to know how pain works and why it happens, you can design your strength training workouts in a way that benefits your body and mind.

Getting Rid of the Fear Around Strength Training

There is a lot of misinformation out there when it comes to strength training, especially for women. We are told not to lift anything heavy because we might hurt ourselves and are instead conditioned to believe that workouts 'made for women' are the only way to find the results we are looking for.

This couldn't be farther from the truth. Strength training, when done properly for your unique body's needs, can not only help you manage your pain, injury, or hypermobility, but it can lead to a whole new way of understanding just how much your body can really do.

Are you ready to harness the power of strength training so that you can relieve your pain, past injuries, or hypermobility? Share how this episode changes your perspective with me in the comments on the episode page.

In This Episode

• The biggest benefits of strength training if you have a history of pain or injury (10:31)
• Clues that you are potentially hypermobile and how to gain clarity around your assessment (14:37)
• How to get started on your unique strength training journey if you have a history of injury (19:55)
• Dismissing the myths that women should not lift heavy things because they will get hurt (27:20)
• How to get clear on the goal of your exercise and see the results you want (32:44)

Quotes

"We tend to have a really narrow view of how to address things. And that narrow view tends to be what keeps us stuck in not feeling or getting better or being able to start or pursue something." (8:51)

"I think the first thing we need to start to understand and educate ourselves to reduce some of the fear is this understanding that pain is sort of an experience that is created by the nervous system as a way to get us to pay attention to something." (12:32)

"You do need a certain underlying level of being able to sense and feel your joints and control your ranges of motion or your stability." (20:35)

"What people need to realize is, it is actually that basic, and whatever weight you start with does not matter. It just needs to be heavy enough that it feels challenging, but not so heavy that you feel out of control with the weight. And typically, as women, we are much more capable and stronger than we realize we are." (22:34)

"You are not going to get that from starving the shit out of yourself and doing these workouts that make you tired. But they don't make you stronger, they don't give you more muscle, and they don't make you better." (33:34)

Featured on the Show

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Check out the full show notes here!

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