I have rotten luck...

[Belinda Barfield]

Good to hear from you Leigh. Take up table top gardening. Hoping things improve.

[Greg Peterson]

Leigh - I was going to suggest strength training and a massage therapist. I would not recommend olympic lifts just yet, but free weights (dumbbells and barbells) produce the best results and have the lowest investment in time and money.

Machines (plate loaded machines and Nautilus) by design work an isolated set of muscles. This gives the user a sense of accomplishment because they are really focusing on a specific muscle of limited group of muscles. Then they go to the next machine and work on the next set of muscles. And so on. Most of these machines involve one joint.

Olympic lifts like the dead lift, squat, press (not to be confused with the 'bench' press) and power clean involve the entire body. You can only correctly execute any of these lifts by what the weakest muscles allow. These are multi joint exercises and every muscle gets strengthened in accordance to the degree to which it is required.

Essentially, barbell lifts allow you to build strength in a balanced, useful approach. Machines, because of their isolation nature, create imbalances in the musculature.

You need not lift heavy weights to build strength, especially at first. But, you do need to keep the reps low, the weight high and make sure each work out session you add a little more weight. Always add more weight.

Three sets of five of each lift will build strength. Three sets of ten will build less strength but make the muscles look bigger. Strength = high weight/low reps. Body building = High reps/low weight.

Most people I see at the gym think they are building strength when in fact their routines are more in line with body builders. Make no mistake, they are building strength, but they are not building as much functional strength as they are. Especially the ones using the machines.

Good luck.

[Leigh Costello]

Oh lordy! lordy! That would be one way to go!

[Leigh Costello]

Funny you should suggest table top gardening - that's what I did last summer. I tell ya, having the vine ripened veggies growing very close to the grill sure made some fine bbq's better! I am doing better, Belinda. Busy with everything so that leaves very little time for ppp's. (PersonalPityParties)

[Leigh Costello]

Thanks for the advice, Greg. I have recently acquired a Bowflex from my sister and we have a knock-off total gym type machine and a gazelle (you can do it) and a classic nordic track. I use small free weights from time to time but only 5 lbs. down to 1lb. My nephew the physical therapist and my cousin, the other physical therapist and my niece the hernia research doctor all try to encourage me. I like hearing the advice they share is similar to what other folks are saying as well. When my dr. recommended more drastic meds I drew the line and went back to pt. So far, it hurts sometimes but at least my life won't be ruled by daily dosages. I pray for this phase to last a long, long while.

[Phil Thien]

I'm glad you're feeling better.

I'm just going to remind everyone to investigate vitamin D:

http://www.nhs.uk/news/2012/01Januar...pplements.aspx

Go to http://news.google.com and type in "vitamin D" to research the topic.

Or "vitamin D pain" or "vitamin D arthritis" or "vitamin D heart." Just spend 10-15 minutes reading-up.

[Greg Peterson]

Leigh,

The principles of weight training are the same for the beginner as they are for the elite trainee. Sometimes advancing the resistance falls into smaller increment than the equipment allows.

When executing a new exercise lift, you will normally experience the ability to quickly advance in large weight increments. Eventually these gains get smaller as you advance towards your genetic potential.

As an example, when starting squats, many people can increase the resistance in ten pound increments for quite a while. Eventually, there comes a time when ten pounds is too large of an increment, so they jump down to five pound increments. And so on, all the way down to the smallest increment possible. After that, the training routine for that particular exercise will need to change, but that is an entirely different matter.

Point being, sometimes you may require smaller weight increments than a pound. You can use micro loading to advance. Just keep advancing.