Progressing with brain injury

Hey guys, 

 

So long story short, I'm recovering from a brain injury and one of my biggest challenges is exercise intolerance. Exercising past my limit has consequences and starts to bring back symptoms. 

 

About 6-8 weeks ago I started foundation from scratch. At first 3x6 Pushups was too much for me. I would complete the sets but be overall exhausted after (with no muscle fatigue etc). The brain/neural muscular system would literally fatigue before the muscles. 

 

Now fast forward I'm stuck at 4x9 for most of PE1's.  I can get through them fine with plenty of rest between the sets (30-60s between Strength work AND iM and vice versa).  And i'm starting to be able to work the muscles almost to fatigue with no symptoms as long as the body has enough recovery between working sets. 

 

Staying true to the principles of Foundation I have tried to close that rest gap but currently I cannot handle the sustained output (or capacity as you might call it) without negative consequences.

 

I wanted to throw the idea out there whether I should push ahead through the cycle resting as much as needed in order to achieve the desired reps/sets. And then after a month or two, drop back down and pick up where I am now and try to close that gap. (Part of my rehabilitation has been to accumulate repetitions over time in difficult exercises to increase neural efficiency - Basically retraining my muscle memory to only expend as much energy as needed). 

 

What are your thoughts?

 

Try building your work capacity slowly. For what I've read in the forums and understood you should try to achieve mastery which is doing the week eleven PE/ PE iM back to back without resting with perfect form. Personally i don't see any problem in advancing to the next cycle if you maintain perfect form and try within your limits to close the resting gap. Good luck and keep working hard on your rehab.

I'd say stay with current cycle and repeat closing the gap little by little. As the movements become more intense the push to the CNS will as well; might as well push it for time and stick to the program while giving yourself time to adapt.

Also, recovery is huge here. Sleep and such. I really like binaural beats for a sort of extra recovery push. I use one called Holosync and absolutely love it. I'm not aware of any specific applications to brain injury specifically but I definitely feel like it has a positive effect on my recovery.

Best of luck and keep at it!

You need to be as conservative with this as possible, nervous system disorders can be very tricky.

 

Please consult with your physician, neurologist first and see if pushing your system this close to the limit is safe. If not, you're just going to need to scale back and respect the current limitations of your condition.

 

Any program including Foundations is built on the premise that students are healthy and uninjured. 

Congratulations once again on your progress to date Jules!

 

At this point in time I would not be overly concerned with following the programming exactly.  Rather use Foundation as a tool to gently explore and increase your tolerance for exercise once again.  

 

When in doubt, rest more or decrease intensity or both.  There is no hurry, my friend.  Brain injuries take substantially longer to heal than any other type of injury.  

 

Perhaps decreasing intensity still further (I find a total gym invaluable for this) will help to manage the exhaustion which is symptomatic of too much intensity.  Remember do not yet look at this a physical conditioning, but rather as the therapy which it truly is.

 

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer

Thanks for your input everyone!

 

Coach, looks like we are on the same page. I'm thinking long term, and am looking at foundation as a tool in the short term to get back the ability of prolonged periods without rest - the same ability is needed to get me back into the show. I love the total gym!  Great idea!

 

I might play with the idea of dropping the reps down and increasing the sets. Instead of progression from 4x9r--> 5x9r--> 4x12r etc, I might try taking a step back with 4x5r-->5x5r-->6x5r etc.  The lowered intensity should help to bridge that rest gap

 

Cole:  I appreciate your concern. I am working with a team of a Neurosurgeon ( He's the chief physician of all the Cirque shows in Vegas ), my Head Coach and also the Performance Medicine Physiotherapists. Everyone agrees that there is no road map, and the best way to move forward is find the fine line between therapeutic exercise and overexertion.  

 

Again, thanks guys.  Sometimes it's hard moving forward when you keep tripping over your ego

I would consider taking it a step further and using the total gym to lower the intensity, increase reps and increase sets; perhaps something along the lines of 5x15-30r.

 

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer