Gain Muscle, Lose Fat, Feel Better With Just Two Days a Week? 98

Hi everyone, welcome to the Heal, Nourish, Grow podcast. Today I want to share with you some things I have learned when going back to gym over the last 16 months. Um, I guess what I really wanted to share is that I know a lot of people are going to start thinking about New Year's resolutions here soon. And you know that I usually do some content towards the end of the year and the beginning of the new year around diet, around exercise, about tips and tricks and things that you can do to make these things easier if you are adding these into your life. And so this has been a lot on my mind lately because I just made a change at the gym and I'll kind of, um, go a little backwards and share with you just some of the things that I've been learning, what has helped me stay consistent. And if you're going to start doing this in the new year, some things that you can do to hopefully make it easier for yourself and not make some of the same mistakes that I did going back. Um, so just to give a little bit of background for those of you that maybe be new here, I've, I've talked about this and shared this a bit in the past. I've been super active my whole life. I was a runner for 17 years, had to quit that because of my knees. And I love hiking and anything outdoors. I am very excited to do and love doing, uh, walk almost every day outside. Um, but what I haven't done consistently over the years is lift weights. And there's just been more and more content and research coming out lately around the benefits of lifting and strength training as far as longevity and just better better daily life and the ability to live a better life into your old age. And I know if you're out there and you're younger and you're listening to this, you might not think that you need to start thinking about this now, but the sooner that you can implement this in your life and get it started, the better. There's actually research showing that children in particular and young adults, like, building as much muscle as you can when you're younger can actually help you when you get older. Because if you even take time off, from those things, from strength training and stuff at some point in your life and you come back to it, if you had built a lot of muscle at a much younger age, then it's so much easier to get it back. So there's that. So even if you're younger, and then also there's just, you know, being, uh, the ability to be fit and do more things when you're young before you have all these aches and pains and, uh, issues that you tend to have when you get older. So caring for your body when you're young as much as possible is a really good practice to do no matter what your goals are. And then if you You are already older though, it is never too late to make some changes to help your joints, to help you feel better, to help you feel stronger, and ultimately help you have a better quality of life. So the history with the lifting is I actually first started lifting when I was playing basketball in the 8th grade. So this is going way back here into the '80s, and we had a weight bench in our garage. My dad had always lifted weights, so it wasn't foreign to me, even though this was not a thing at a time. It wasn't like the women's sports teams were like they are now, where I think just about every sports team, men or women in high school, do some sort of strength training in the gym. And I think that is so amazing and something that I wish had been, uh, more prevalent when I was younger. If I had my teammates to do it and stuff, maybe I would've stuck with it longer. Um, but so I did that sporadically. And then as, um, an adult, when I was married the first time around, we also had a weight bench in our basement. And I would go through phases where I would do that fairly consistently for a few weeks. Usually what would happen is I'd get injured because I probably wasn't doing it right, or I was doing it too much, or I was running in addition to that at the time and playing a ton of golf. So I would, you know, quit for extended periods of time. So it's not like I'm totally foreign to lifting, but I've never done it consistently through my whole life. And then over the last several years, as I've become more focused on Heal, Nourish, Grow, and, you know, producing this content all around health and wellness and writing articles and doing research more and more research about, you know, how to live better, how to feel better, all those sorts of things. What has been coming more to the forefront and what is particularly in the forefront in social media these days is strength training, and particularly in women of— in perimenopause or menopausal age, um, because they're just finding that bone density in that age group is really poor. Um, and the problem is once you get to be that age, it's not impossible to reverse it, but we'd be so much better off if we were paying attention into this earlier in the process so that people never got osteopenia or osteoporosis. And if you've never heard of— most people have heard of osteoporosis at this point, which is basically weak, brittle bones, but osteopenia is what happens as a precursor to that. So it's like you're on your way to osteoporosis, and they're just finding that this is super prevalent in the population. And one of the best ways to prevent it is actually strength training. I am— I actually recently became aware of a study that they did over in Australia with, uh, people that were postmenopausal that had osteoporosis, and they had them start strength training, and they were able to get some of their bone mass back, which is something that they had never— nobody ever really thought that you could do that beyond taking some drugs that they have to prevent it from getting worse. But the idea that you can get more bone mass even in your older age just by strength training is pretty amazing. Uh, and then outside of that, it's just about living better and longer, right? So even if you live a long life and you can't get out of your chair when you get to that long life, then that's not gonna feel very good in your body. You're going to be dependent on other people. So the longer that you can maintain the ability to, you know, pick up and bring in your groceries, get yourself in and out of a chair easily, safely, get yourself in and out of a tub, um, it just will make you more independent and have a better quality of life as you get older. So all that being said, I finally was able to flip the switch in my head that I really needed to start strength training. And when I first started thinking of this, I think I've talked about getting my DEXA scan in the past, and thankfully for me, a history of being active my whole life, I have really good bone density, um, like very high, like 75th percentile or maybe 90th percentile for somebody my age. Um, so I don't have to worry about those things, but it's because I've been active so much up to this point. Um, but really what I was struggling with is, you know, because of all the years of running, my knees are bone-on-bone osteoarthritis. So I have some pain there, and I have a tendency, um, every once in a while for my knees to just kind of give out. I don't know if you're familiar with this term or why, and, and nobody really knows exactly why. Thankfully, I don't have any meniscus tears. Um, sometimes when this has cropped up, I've had to get an MRI in the past, and basically it just involves a period, you know, months and months and months of rehab before I can get better again. So when I originally had this idea to do this, I had planned on starting it well before my 50th birthday. Got injured pretty bad with my knee and so I had to take some time to rehab, so I wasn't lifting. But at this point, and this is, we are in November of 2024, so whenever you're listening to this, that you can do the math. But to this point, I've now lifted consistently for 16 months, which is by far the longest that I've ever done this for an extended period of time in my life. And so that being the case, I wanted to share with you, you know, some of that background that I just described, because really learning all about that and hearing it more and more and more over the years, that helped solidify in my head that it's something I need to do, even though I really don't enjoy it. Although I do have to say, You know, just lately I'm starting to finally enjoy it more. So there is this kind of idea of, you know, fake it until you make it, or, you know, just do something because you know it's good for you and you know you should. Um, as much as I hate to say that, sometimes that is part of the thing. So it's not about, you know, willpower or passion to do it. It's more just about the commitment to do it. And so that's something that I've been about a lot of things in my life is just, um, And, you know, doing that process until it becomes a habit and then it just becomes something that I do. And if that's something that you're interested in learning more about, if you go back in my channel, um, there's a video on my YouTube, 5 Things You Need to Create Better Habits, and that kind of walks through some of that stuff, my thought process and how to do that. And then other content as well as I've had in the past, just talking about, um, maintaining habits. And I am certainly not the best or the most authority on the subject. There are plenty of books about it. The one super, um. Popular book about habits. Uh, the name's escaping me at the moment. Uh, but anyway, if you just go to Amazon, type in habits, you'll find James Cleary, I think is the author. And I still am having the name escape me, but I'll put the link in the show notes for you. So anyway, I thought I would share like what, what is the way to get started again, especially if you have joint problems, if you are an older person, if you're a woman that's afraid of the gym, first of all, The thing to say is you don't have to go to the gym. You can do so many things at home for such a long extended period of time without a lot of equipment and a lot of things with zero equipment at all. So the first thing is just bodyweight exercises. So things like squats, push-ups, sit-ups, all those kinds of things you can do at home without any equipment whatsoever. And then if you have just some light weights at home, that will get you pretty far for a while, especially if it's been a long time since you worked out because You'll be kind of not very strong. You'll be a little weak. And so those smaller weights can work very well for a long time. And if you go on Facebook Marketplace, you don't, you don't have to buy them new. There's plenty of people just looking to get rid of dumbbells and stuff because they've been sitting in their basement for a long time and they haven't been using them and they're finally ready to make peace with that and just get rid of them. Their loss is your gain because you can pick these up for very cheap. Same with certain types of exercise equipment, whether it's an old bike or a treadmill or things like that. And in fact, treadmills. Have gotten, and we're talking mostly about strength training here today, but you know, if you live in an area further north like I do and where there's occasionally snow and weather in the winter, you might find it useful to have a walking pad or a treadmill in your house just to get your steps in. And those have become exceedingly inexpensive over the years. I think I picked one up, maybe it was about, it was before the pandemic because I was using it when I was writing the book. I was doing a standing desk and walking on that little treadmill. And I think I picked it up on Black Friday, which is coming up here if you're listening to this in real time. For, I don't know, no more than $150 on Amazon. It might have even been $100. Um, and before I go on with this, I will mention one other thing. Since Black Friday is coming up, every year I put out a gift guide of like health and wellness, um, products that I've been using over the last year and testing out. And I always, if I like something and use it, I go out of the way to get a discount code for you guys. And then I put all of those in a guide. So this year it'll be healnourishgrow.com/guide. Blackfriday2024. That will be the URL and look for that coming up here soon. But if you go to the URL, it'll have all the best health and wellness deals, things that I've been using, things that I love. And, um, usually if you put in code HEALNURSERO or HNG10 or some variation of that, um, but the best thing is to just go to the website, click the link, and that'll take you there and automatically apply discounts for the most part. Um, so if you're looking to get back into working out, that might be a good resource for you coming up here with a lot of sales going into the holidays. Um, and I'll say one other thought on that for the end. But so starting with virtually no equipment, you can get a lot accomplished and start to get stronger just doing bodyweight exercises. However, at some point you might find that either going to the gym or having a gym membership might help you in your process of getting stronger, and it certainly makes it easier when you have access to a lot of equipment. Where I got started again is I just signed up for Planet Fitness. I had actually— speaking of the pandemic, I had been going to Planet Fitness during the pandemic. That was another one of my little stints where I started lifting and quit again. But, you know, that's a good basic gym. They have everything you need. They really promote this idea of no judgment. And whenever I go into the Planet Fitness gyms, there's people of all sizes there. Everybody is for the most part doing their own thing. Nobody's really paying attention to anything anybody else is doing. And that's one thing I can say is having been a yoga instructor for years and years and years, and, you know, people would be nervous when they would come to yoga class, like that people were looking at them or judging them and those kinds of things. But quite honestly, when you're working out, whether it's with weights or you're in your yoga class or whatever, everybody is so wrapped up in what they're doing and concentrating on what they're doing that for the most part, they are not like concerned or looking at you in any kind of way. So as hard as that is, try not to let that be a barrier for you going back to the gym or to get a membership somewhere. And you know, there are good gyms everywhere. It doesn't have to be Planet Fitness. I just— that happens to be the one that was close to my house and it was easy and it's inexpensive. So that's what I did. And my biggest first tip for going back, especially if it's been a while since you've been lifting and like I was rehabbing a knee injury, so I really had to pay attention to this first principle very much, and I already have joint issues, so I need to be aware of that. Um, so when I went back, I was very careful to start with light weights and just get my body used to doing the movements again and just staying in a rep range that is like in the 8 to 12 range, which I will tell you some things I've learned scientifically about that since then. Um, but just to get yourself used to it, that's a good thing to have in your head. It's a good amount of time. It's not overly taxing if you're not using a heavy amount of weight. And you know, most machines are self-explanatory. Um, also at Planet Fitness, they have some barcodes on the machines where if you scan it, it'll show you a video on how to use it. So it's pretty simple. Also, you can ask any of the people there to help you use a particular machine. It usually has the body part on it. So whatever body part you're, you know, wanting to work on first, that's a good place to start. Find that machine and then just try it out and do the things. Um, you know, maybe only do one set just when you're getting used to it. Do one set on one machine, go to another one. They also have a circuit, uh, area there at Planet Fitness that you can do, which is basically the purpose of that is a half an hour workout. So you just do each machine in order, and that's a good way to get started again. But so what I learned about that is it just like, again, it got me used to moving my joints again. And as time went on, what you really need to do though to get stronger is the idea of progressive overload. So progressive overload is one of two things. Progressive overload means either more weight, more resistance. So you're adding weight as you get stronger, or it can be more reps. So you're using the same weight, but you're doing more reps each time. Either one of those is progressive overload. And here's where I go into the geeky thing, because I, I don't know why it took me so long this time, because I think in my head I just somehow didn't believe I was finally going to stick to it this time. But So I waited until this point to start kind of digging deep into the research and into the science and like kind of how to get bigger and stronger and hypertrophy and, you know, anabolism, catabolism, all these things in your body that these processes that bodybuilders go through to make themselves stronger. And the one thing I learned about the progressive overload thing is there is a pretty wide range of reps that can actually grow your muscles. So if you're looking to grow your muscles and get stronger, the rep range that can produce that is anywhere between 6 and 30. So if you're scared of lifting really heavy or you have bad joints, it might be a good idea to test out these two things because the one thing with higher reps, obviously you're bending that joint more, which could be irritating. But generally heavier weight on the joint is going to be more stressful. So if you want to do higher reps and then you, um, use a lower weight, anything that's up to 30 reps will get you stronger. Beyond that, you're really not giving your muscle enough stimulus to make it grow. So stay somewhere between 6 reps and 30 reps. And it could just be, you know, um, a time constraint thing because part of the thing of doing that 8 to 12 rep range is number one, it, it puts you on the machine for a reasonable amount of time. It makes the whole workout a reasonable amount of time. If you had to do every exercise for like 30 reps, you'd be on the machine for a long time, number one, which might annoy others there in the gym trying to use it. And number two, it would just take a lot longer. So something in the lower rep range might be good just for time constraints. But anything in that range will get you stronger. The other thing that I learned about frequency is people always wanna know, well, how many times a week do I need to go to the gym to really see some gains? And when I started going back, I decided on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, give myself 2 days on the weekend off so I could have some good recovery. And it was just an amount that I felt comfortable with and I could commit to. Um, I think actually at the very beginning, I might've only gone twice a week when I was just getting used to it again. Um, but in any case, what the science says about that is that even 1 time a week going to lift weights, you can get about 60% of the muscle growth that you would get Anyway, which is pretty amazing. So if you're already having trouble convincing yourself to go to the gym, which was a struggle that I always had, just once a week. I mean, that is not asking a lot of time to do that. And that could be a great way to start. Um, you're gonna give yourself plenty of recovery time. So if you get a little sore, especially when you're first going back, you'll have 6 days in between before you have to go again. Um, but to really get that good balance between muscle growth and keeping the muscle stimulated, really 2 to 3 times a week is best. So at 2 times a week, you get something like 80% of the muscle growth that you would get in an entire week. And then as you go up to 3, you're getting closer to that 100% of muscle potential that you're gaining by doing those many workouts. But so 2 times a week is a pretty amazing thing. 2 times a week, you're gonna get 80% of the muscle that you would grow anyway. That's pretty good. So if you can only convince yourself to go twice a week, that's still going to give you benefits, still going to make you stronger, still going to make your muscles grow. So that extra, the third day or the fourth day in the week might just be because it's in your routine. It could make the workout shorter amount of time if you go a few more times a week. And also the more times a week you go, the more you're stimulating that muscle. So that's where you get those little more incremental gains that you might get up to 100%. But I thought learning that science really just made me feel like it could be accessible to so many more people because you don't need to be in the gym at night. And that this is what has always kept me away from the— I don't like being in the gym. I don't wanna be in the gym. I wanna be outside. If I'm doing something, I wanna just go for a walk or go for a bike ride or go for a hike. Um, so being in the gym has just never been my thing. Um, but had I known like years ago, really solidified it in my mind that if I went 2 days a week, that that was gonna gimme some great benefits, I think I might've gotten around to this a lot more quickly. Um, so that's just what I wanted to share about getting you back in there to encourage you. I can't believe I almost forgot this part. So I'm slicing this in. So if it's a little disjointed, you'll understand why. But maybe I was reflecting on this after recording the information earlier. And I, when I originally had the idea to record this and to give kind of my thoughts on it, there was one thing that I really meant to address that I completely forgot when I first recorded it. And that is that there is such a thing in the first year as newbie gains. It's a proven thing. And so while I'm saying to, you know, give yourself an adjustment phase where you get your joints used to lifting and all of that, there may be a reason to consider in the first year to eat in a slight surplus. Or if you've got a lot of body fat to lose, maybe just eat at maintenance and don't cut back too much so that you can really take advantage of your body's desire to put on muscle during that first year. And so if you're not trying to lose weight, you're just trying to get healthier and gain muscle, maybe eat at a slight surplus. And then also maybe consider just for that first year to go ahead and go to the gym 3 times, 4 times a week if you can tolerate it. Now I think obviously kind of what I did, whatever I needed to do to get myself in there on a consistent basis, and that was to not load it up. Because even if I really would have fully known that newbie gains was a real, a real thing and that it was my best way to maintain muscle. I don't think if I would have started out saying I'm gonna go 5 days a week, given that, I, I just don't believe that I would have stayed as consistent. So finding some kind of balance there between, you know, getting started again, getting consistent, but then maybe some time during that first year of lifting to actually ramp it up so that you can take advantage of that. So I'll, See if I can find the video again, but I thought— I think it was Minnow who did a good explanation of that phenomena and why— how you can take advantage of it. Or it could have been Dr. Mike, I'm not sure. It'll take me a while to dig back through that and find that video. Um, but you know, maybe consider taking advantage of that while you have a chance. And the same applies for people who maybe lifted in the past but have taken an extended period of time off. It seems that those people can also take advantage of a period where they have increased muscle growth when they first get started again. So anyway, now back onto the rest of it. The other thing is when you're first getting started again with any habit is people, especially with New Year's resolutions, you tend to go overboard. Like, I'm gonna eat so clean and I'm gonna go to the gym every day and I'm gonna do walk every day. It's too much. And if you go back to some of my other content, um, that you'll hear around this time of year, or some are like, look at episodes that came out between November and the end of January. And some of them are even talking about like New Year's resolutions or whatever. And the thing is, don't take on too much at once. Make your goal reasonable and achievable. You'll be so much more likely to stick with it and so much easier to make it a habit if you start slow and then build up. Um, and so speaking of buildup, this is where I've gotten to this point. So up to this point, I had chosen those 3 days a week. Do full body every time I'm at the gym. Takes a little longer, but then I only have to go 3 times a week for the reasons I just described. I don't like going to the gym that much. Um, but what I was finding as I started lifting heavier, as I started getting stronger, I became familiar with this term of systemic fatigue from Dr. Mike Isertel because I was adding more lifts, more sets, more weight, and my body was just starting to— like, I would still recover every time in time to go to the gym the next day, but I by far always felt best on Mondays after I'd had 2 full days to recover. I always felt like super fresh and I could just hit it so hard on Monday. And then by the time I, you know, get to Wednesday, I still had just like, even if my muscles weren't sore anymore, I still just had this like a little bit of lingering fatigue. But I would, I would do my Wednesday workout and I'd do my Friday workout and then I'd recover over the weekend and start over again. Um, and so as I've been learning about this over time, as I've been looking at more and more YouTube videos with these scientists, I'm gonna list all of them below and I might as well just say them all right here right now in case you're wondering who I've been listening to, because this is the other thing. Don't just go on YouTube and listening to any random people about lifting, about working out. If you want to be serious about making the most of your time in the gym, and this is one thing I wish I would have done sooner now that I've been so consistent because I was probably, you know, working all this time to a point where it was not super effective because I was just kind of left to my own devices and not paying attention to the science yet, which is very unusual for me. But again, this whole process in my brain, like I said, took a while because I was never a person who who really enjoyed lifting. So to me, it was like just a miracle that I was getting myself there every week and I was letting that be, you know, they say, don't, you know, don't let perfect be the enemy of good. That's, I really had that in my head. I'm like, hey, I'm going, I'm doing it. That's going to be good enough for now. I'll worry about the rest of it later. I'll figure it out. And now over time has gone on, I've gotten more interested in it and I've gotten, like I said, I've solidified it where I've convinced myself I'm, you know, I'm solid in this. I'm going now. And I felt like I could dive in a little more and try to I get more out of my workouts now that I'm more consistent. So that's why I started diving into the science. And the people that I've been enjoying listening to the most, Dr. Mike Isratel, he has tons of videos on YouTube. He really, he has two different kinds of videos for the most part. Ones where he works out with people in the gym and really pushes them to their point. And if you watch those, you might think, oh, I have no interest in doing this at all, right? Those kind of videos, people are just in pain and they're really, they're, you know, they're bodybuilders. They're, they're looking to get the most growth out of every single session, and they're just really going after it hard. I've, I've found those entertaining now. I think if I would have been watching those ones at the beginning, I might have been like discouraging myself a little bit, quite honestly. Um, but then the other videos that he does that are really amazing, he really goes into the science of what makes your muscles grow the most, what makes you the strongest, what's the minimum stimulus, different body parts that he talks about. If you have a specific body part that you would like to grow more, And then he, he just breaks it down and makes it very simple, even though it's very science-based. Particularly when he talks about fat loss, he does an amazing job of talking about fat loss and that process. And, and like I've said in the past, as I've, you know, been focused on health and wellness, and a lot of people that come to a low-carb space are very focused on weight loss. And so I've over the years read tons of things about that. I've always said that I just think the whole foods are the way to go. Personally, I do low carb because that works for me. I am— have been experimenting with adding some more carbs since I've been lifting consistently because there is some evidence that adding carbs, um, around your workouts is anti-catabolic, which is what you wanna avoid. So catabolic is muscle breakdown. Um, anabolic stimulus is muscle growth. That's mostly for the protein's job. Um, but that's adding some carbs definitely helps with this process of not breaking down. So I thought that was pretty interesting and that's made me start experiment a little bit. I'm still like, you know, lower carb obviously than the standard American diet. But it's just been something interesting to learn about. And I also think when you work out on a regular basis, you've gotten yourself to a point where you're metabolically healthy. There's no reason that healthy carbs can't be on the menu if they work for your body and it's not causing you to, you know, your blood sugar averages to skyrocket and cause you to go towards diabetes. Then maybe your metabolism is not ready for that yet. But if you're really, really healthy, carbs aren't a problem for everybody. So it's like, I don't, I feel like I've never demonized carbs in my content. But definitely like for a lot of people, low carb can be very, very healing. And it's not necessarily something you have to do forever. Once your metabolism's healed, if you're working out more, there's so many factors, right? If you wanna go back to a good episode where I think we talked about that a little bit more, Alan Aragon's also a great person in the health and wellness space that's very science-based. I'll put that link in the show notes. I can't remember the episode of that. Um, but anyway, so Dr. Mike Isretel channel on YouTube, the link will be below. Um, Menno, Dr. Menno Henselmans, um, Dr. Milo Wolff. Those three have been the ones that I've primarily gotten onto lately. There's just one other guy that I'm, um, his name is escaping me, also a doctor. Um, but those, does that that information is just gonna ensure that they, they know how to do things properly. They're giving you science-based information. They'll make your workouts more effective because like I just said about the knowing that 2 times a week can get you 80% of the way to get your getting stronger and getting more jacked goal or whatever your goal is or losing some more fat. That's all, that's all really important stuff, right? So listening to people that really know, I mean, there's plenty of workout people on YouTube that are more for entertainment purposes. And I've been enjoying some of those channels too. One I came across is Will Tennyson, and the other one is— ah, his name's escaping me at the moment too. But a guy that— he's actually a player of lacrosse, which is kind of funny to me since our kids both play lacrosse. But in any case, those— and they do, they actually do a great job. And I think at this point, both of them have been lifting long enough and doing it long enough that they are reliable sources of information as well. And there are plenty of people that are reliable, but I'm just saying, for my brain and the way I like to approach things and the effectiveness that I want to get out of my workout now, that's why I really rely on the science-based, um, people to a certain degree. So all that being said, here's the other part of this. You might be thinking, well, I don't really want to get jacked. I just, you know, I could stand to lose 10 pounds or 20 pounds. And, you know, yeah, getting stronger That'd be great. So I should probably just use my exercise time doing cardio, right? No, that's not right. That's unfortunately what we've all thought for way too long, for so many years. You do absolutely still need to move your body, do cardio for heart health, for mental health, all of those things. I've talked about that in the past. But really, for fat loss, for— is strength training is going to be one of your most effective tools. It won't make you as hungry when you're working out as much. It won't increase the appetite as much. So that's a good thing if you're really You know, focused on fat loss, and it'll actually make you look better once you do start losing fat because you'll be able to see the muscle underneath. And they've just shown time and time again with controlled groups, people doing cardio only versus lifting only, that resistance training beats it for fat loss. So that is no longer— I think it's still in the general population, the idea that you need to be, you know, running or doing a bunch of cardio or these kind of of things to lose weight. Definitely still true in the general population, but in these science-based communities and people that have done the research, it is just really unbeatable as far as something to add to your fat loss program is getting stronger. So, um, yeah, so that's kind of what that has been all about. Then I have another— I'll have another video coming out, and I think I'm going to go ahead and put it out on the podcast as kind of like a special episode, but I've been testing a new product, which is the, um, Hume Health scale. It's a body fat scale, and I've used a bioelectrical impedance home scale for probably over 10 years now. And I think I've talked about them in the past. They're fine. They're a good tool. They can show trends, but they're not really all that accurate for body fat levels. However, this one that I started testing back in, uh, or September actually, so it's gonna come be coming up on 3 or 4 months that I've been using it now. And it is, um, it's well, to go back to the, this is what I was going to come back to with the Black Friday thing. They've got a huge Black Friday sale and my code stacks on top. So you get an extra 15% off of the big Black Friday sale. And that link is healnourishgrow.com/hume, H-U-M-E. So if you go to that and you use my code at checkout, it should auto-apply, but put in Heal Nourish Grow and it gives you the, like, the discount on top of the Black Friday deal. So that's pretty cool. Um, but the full review is coming up. But the short version is, is I think it is very, very good. It's the best one I've ever used. It's so good that they say it correlates 98% with DEXA, which talked about DEXA in the past here. Um, it's pretty much the gold standard for body fat at this point, even though it's not perfect. It is one that people use the most, um, when you're there doing studies and that sort of thing. But I had gotten a DEXA right when I got the body fat scale just to see did they match up, was it close. Within a percent of body fat it was the same, and I'm going to go over all this more in the review. And then as I've used it over these last several months, um, what I've noticed is the trend over time is exactly matches my training and what I've been doing with my diet, that I've lost about an additional 2 pounds of fat and gained some more muscle, which I will be testing that again in December when I go back for DEXA to give really this full, um, full 3 months of testing the scale versus the DEXA and see what those are and see how accurate it is. But I've been really pleased with it. Like I said, by far the best I've ever used. It seems to be tracking really well with— like I said, the first number when I first did it was absolutely spot on. And where it is now based on what I've been doing with my training and my body fat, I think it's— I think it's very accurate. So, um, and they have like a 60-day money-back guarantee. So if that's something you ever thought about using, especially if you're going to start, um, if you're thinking about going on this strength training trip, it's really nice because the number on the scale for me since I started this process has actually gone up, um, because I've put on like— at this point I'm probably up to like maybe 9 pounds of muscle that I put on over this last 16 months of this process. And so my number on the scale is actually higher, but my body fat is lower. I have much more muscle, so I look smaller, but that number on the scale is bigger. And that freaks people out. It freaks me out. This freaks me out. Like, the last 3 months, I'm like, oh my gosh, I've been working so hard, training hard, you know, doing really well with my diet, just a slight deficit, and the number is staying the same. But if I didn't have that body fat component and the muscle component that I have on the scale, it's showing me that I am making progress. You know, it's easy to throw in the towel. So anyway, if you've been thinking about looking for a tool like that, I think this is super useful and it's a great time to get it. So I did just wanna mention that even though, like I said, it'll be on the, um, Black Friday list of tools that I love and, and make great gifts for health and wellness people in your life. So I think that kind of covered everything that I wanted to share with you today and talk about. I hope that if you are not strength training now that you'll consider doing that going forward, knowing how good it is for you and convincing yourself like, hey, Cheryl said I only have to do it twice a week or even once a week. And that is a great place to start. Like just once a week if you're not doing it now. Like I said, start out light, start out easy, start out with body weight stuff at home. Do it once a week, get used to that, add on another day. And if you get to a point like me now where I was getting that systemic fatigue. I think I forgot to finish that thought earlier about where I was going with the systemic fatigue. So I was doing my 3-day weight program. I just this week decided, okay, I'm gonna go to the gym 4 days a week. Even though I, like I said, I'm not happy about that. It's not a place that I like to be, but I am starting to like it more and more like having these goals in mind, having these strength goals, having also in my head some other goals that I'm not gonna share yet. Cause I don't know if I'll actually do it, but something I've been toying with the idea of doing in relation. To strength training just to give me a goal. But, um, you know, like something out in the future to work towards. But, uh, so the 4 days a week now. So now I will not be doing full body every time I go to the gym. I'm doing upper lower. So I started out on Monday with a hard lower body day. Today I went and I did upper body only, and I think I'm gonna really like it even though it requires another day in the gym. Just the mental break of not having to do do everything while I'm there every time. Like, I went in, I did legs, and I was like, I went really hard on legs. And then I, and I like felt like it was really weird. I left and I was like, God, I felt like I didn't do much because I've been used to doing full body. And then same today when I did upper body, like my lower body was really sore, but upper body I hadn't touched it. So I did all the upper body things. And now tomorrow I get a full day off and then I do that again Thursday and Friday and then 2 days off again. So Um, so you can just see how over time, you know, it's all a progression. It's all in good fun. It's all meant to, um, you know, challenge you, get you healthier, help you reach your goals. The other reason I'm doing it is because, and here's where you do need to be careful, is I've gotten, um, some pretty flared up elbow tendonitis happening on my right arm. And so I also thought that switching to that split would give, um, my upper body an extra day off during the week so that hopefully this can calm down a little bit because it's been going on for months and I just haven't wanted to stop training. And it's not bad enough that it made me stop or anything like that, but I've been using my, um, you know, the other, the other tool that I love to use so much. I've been using my Kineon red light on it every single night. Um, and they also have great Black Friday deals, so definitely check that out. healnourishgrow.com/kineon. That's— I made all the links like that now, so it should be super easy. Um, Um, you know, whenever you're looking for those and also just any time of the year, go to my shop page. I put all of those on my shop page. It has a little blurb that talks about like why I like it and has the discount code. So you can always find that stuff there or you can always email me and ask me. Um, but yeah, so that's the other reason I did it cuz I, I need to give my upper body a break so I can hopefully heal that a little bit more. And I'm also looking to push through the next next, um, I think it's an 8 or 12-week cycle. Cuz number one, that's really a good way to do your training. Just go in cycles where you kind of have these certain exercises you're working on, uh, keep building your strength over time over those 12 weeks. And then maybe take a little, what they call a deload week or a break. Um, and what my goal is, is to make it to mid-January when I will be going snowboarding and, you know, getting really strong for snowboarding season, which I'm super excited about. This will be by far the strongest my legs have ever been on the mountain. So I'm really excited to like test that out and see how it affects my snowboarding. Um, so to push through to then, and then we're actually going on a trip. And so what I will do then, since I haven't really done this at this point, is one of Dr. Mike's tips was to take like a week or two off on vacation. Don't train, just let your body like heal, relax, recover. You know, doing that every once in a while is actually really good for your body, probably mentally too, just a good break from it. Um, and I did a little break from that when we went on the trip in September. I only trained one day that we were there cause I was also sick the entire trip. So I really, really couldn't do too much outside of just dealing with being away on vacation and, and getting around and, and having the energy to do that. Um, so I've really only taken one break like that during the time that I've been training so far, but I also had not been training probably as hard. Hard as I am now. And so I think that my body is going to need that more going forward. So in any case, hopefully that was helpful in some way. Now I really will wrap it up now that I've explained all the things, how I got to this point. So I didn't start out with going 4 days a week, obviously. Like I said, I started out slow, um, lighter weights, build myself up, got used to it, tried not to hurt my joints, still did it. So you just got to be careful, especially the older you are. And this is, this is One final, okay, then I'll say one final thing and then I really will wrap this up. The one thing I would recommend doing sooner in the process than I did is the reason I started, so I just started going to a new gym as well that has different equipment, but it's because that I found a trainer that I'm going to go to once a week for a few weeks so that I can learn some more things, learn some better techniques, learn some workarounds for this elbow. Um, and just, you know, progress, get, you know, the, you know, once you get to a certain point on your own, I feel like I've kind of you know, learn the things I can learn on my own. And now that I'm diving into these videos, I'm certainly learning much more that it's going to propel me after I have these few more sessions with the trainer. Um, but it's also just good to like learn new technique, be pushed a little bit more in a different way. Um, and if had I done this sooner, maybe I would have mentioned to whoever I was working with that, oh, whenever I do this exercise, I'm getting this pain and It kind of just came on really slowly. So I'm usually pretty good about at this point paying attention to my body, backing off, because several points throughout this, um, I've had like little things with my knee kick up and I've kind of had to back off lower body a little bit or change the exercises that I'm doing to better accommodate how my knee was feeling. So I'm overall pretty good at that after all these years of having those issues. But for some reason, this one just got me. And I feel like if I would have maybe started working with someone sooner or talked to somebody about it, somebody who trains regularly and that knows what they're doing, um, that I might have been able to avoid making this as bad as it is now. Um, so obviously that does cost money. It's not, um, cheap, but I actually found somebody that's very reasonable and I think it's worth it for investment because once I learn how to do this properly and learn more things that I can do as workarounds and different ways of doing things, then I can carry that with me into the future and hopefully hopefully avoid having this problem ever again. Oh, probably not. Cause I always seem to have some kind of joint issue, but I'll do my best. So anyway, if you have any questions, definitely get in touch. If you happen to be in Cincinnati, the gym I'm going to, I really like the trainer, Steve Ross. He's, uh, close to my age, which I like cuz he's been training for a really long time. He knows what he's doing. He knows how to work with older people with achy joints cuz he's done it all himself too. Um, but it's Finish Strong and if you happen to be in Cincinnati and, um, yeah, so that is it for this week and, uh, look for the Black Friday deals update. Like I said, it'll be at the link healnourishgrow.com/blackfriday2024. And yeah, if you have any other questions, let me know, get in touch. Um, the other thing I will, I don't know if I'll have it in time for the Black Friday thing, but I also cleaned out the basement cuz I'm looking into getting a home gym after, like I said, being committed to this for so long, I finally feel like, okay, I that I can get a home gym and that'll actually use it. And so I'm in the process of researching those now and looking into, you know, ones that have affiliate programs so that whichever one I choose based on like doing all this research, that hopefully that you'll have a way that you could, if you're interested, get the same thing, get a little discount, that sort of thing. So anyway, I haven't picked it yet. Still working on that research. You know how I love to do a deep dive on these things, so it's taken me a little bit. So I hope you're having a great week wherever you are, and I will obviously be putting— I, you know, it's supposed to be weekly. I've missed one here and there occasionally, but I have no plans on stopping, so just bear with me when I might miss a week. But hopefully— I've had a couple of interviews lately, I have those in the queue to edit and get them up for you. And we're coming up on almost 100 episodes, which I can't believe. So crazy. Week. I was trying to think if I should do some kind of event or giveaway, or— I haven't come up with anything yet, but I'll definitely, um, if I do something like that, you'll be the first to know. So anyway, I will talk to you again soon.