I admire his attitude toward pain and wish I could have that same attitude as well. Like the author, I have a herniated disc (more specifically a disc protrusion) caused by a sudden weight lifting injury 4 years ago when I was 23 that damaged L5-S1. There's not really any hope of it healing on its own, and surgery is far too risky. It's just constant pain pretty much all day every day. Some days aren't too bad—other days are really bad. But the pain is always there, and I think that just knowing it's going to be there tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, and every day after that for the next 50-60 years of my life is really the worst part of the injury.
I closely follow the latest studies on disc regeneration, but unfortunately medical research is still in the dark ages in that field, and no significant breakthrough is likely to make it past clinical trials anytime in the next decade.
So... sorry for the rant, but if there's some deep wisdom to be gained from suffering, I still haven't figured out what it is.
My experience is the same, L5-S1 and unfortunately I had surgery (bad decision, but had started developing nerve damage), which just replaced the herniated bulge with a permanent internal scar, having more or less the same effects. ;)
You learn to live with pain, and adapt to it. You learn that some activities are off limits, and will probably always be so. The trick is not to start feeling diminished, not fall into depression by comparing yourself to a mythical healed self, and learn to appreciate the life we have, which even with a bad back is still incomparably better than what the rest of humanity experienced for most of its existence on Earth.
There are ways to get better though, if you don't despair: after 10 years of trying countless practices and remedies, a combination of McKenzie exercises and acupuncture is finally working, allowing me to lead a mostly normal life (eg lots and lots of exercise and just refrain from cycling, contact sports, or bumpy activities like offroading).
My suggestion is to try that with absolute dedication (eg 100 repetitions spread over each day, weekly acupuncture sessions), and if you have no improvements in a couple of months, try something else. Improvement is possible, it just takes a lot of effort and time.
You may be able to fix that disc. I crushed a disc from a wrestling injury, then again recently lifting a washing machine. Iyengar Yoga saved me. There's only about 250 instructors on Earth - it's known for being useful for healing injuries. I combined that with breathing meditations and acupuncture, but really it's the Iyengar that's fixed my back.
Yeah, it's an awkward situation, I understand, but the user is scaring the crap out of people, then retracting part of the essential information. I'm still hoping they will post the information somewhere in an anonymized form, so the bodybuilding community can learn from this accident.
Sorry, didn’t mean to scare anyone. I mainly removed it because it was kind of embarrassing. The injury was caused by trying to set a barbell down on the ground myself rather than calling for help when doing bench press. Not something that would happen to most weightlifters.
Just wanted to say there's nothing wrong or embarrassing about sharing our mistakes. Take heart in the likelihood that, by sharing this, you've probably saved a reader from a similar injury.
Depending in the lift this may or may not be possible.
I don't know which lift the author was performing (and would ask you not to repeat it if you do know), but of the popular lifts which could cause a problem if you fail:
1) Bench press. Have a spotter or don't use clips (the things that hold the weights on the bar). Some benches will have safety bars which can help as well. If you don't have clips you can tip to one side and dump the weight off the end of one bar, then the bar should roll of you (albeit painfully/noisily). People have died benching alone in a gym, don't get caught out.
2) Squat. Have spotters and/or squat in a cage/safety rack (with parallel bars either side of you). It can be dangerous if you fail, have no spotters and aren't in a safety rack. i.e. you can dump it, but this can be dangerous to you and those around you.
I went to a personal trainer once, the program was effectively 30 minutes of personal training on one day, 30-60 mins of 'on my own' the other, and the trainer gave me an exact schedule to follow. On the days with the trainer, we could rack up the weights and he'd be there all the time. On my own days, I had to go for much safer exercises - dumbbell bench presses instead of the bar - and at a lower weight.
If you want to just train, go for the safe options and a bit more reps. If you want to really break your limits, never not have a spotter. They will allow you to be a bit less safe on the one hand (e.g. bars with max weights) and provide you with motivation on the other. I never pushed past my limits before I had a spotter.
Good advices. And we should repeat this: there's no need for putting extreme weight on bars. Repetitions, series and rest time are golden here. You can do wonders with 50-80kg deadlifts (not when starting weight lifting), no need to go after 150/200kg. Same goes, for example, for bench press: failing alone (which should not happen) under 30/50kg is very manageable, but the same under 150kg can cost your life.
I would agree with you, up to a point. I agree that one doesn't need to put oneself under undue strain every time in the gym, and you can get a good workout from doing lots of reps for light weights.
But naturally by virtue of not increasing the weight on the bar one will reach a point where one ceases to get stronger (measured by the amount of force you can produce). There are limits to what more reps will do for you.
So don't deadlift your 1RM every time you go to the gym, just slowly increase how much you lift in a safe and structured manner.
This so much. I switched away cca year ago from trying to lift as much as possible during every session simply because it's stupid. I was walking on the edge of serious injury for no good enough reason. Anyway most people I know don't go to gym for bodybuilding, but rather getting/keeping in shape and looking good.
So unless you are a professional (then you already know about this more than I do), lower the weight and stick rather with 15-20 reps. If you feel that given excercise is too easy during set, just another 5 reps and try to do perfect movements. YOu can get the same famous 'burn' in the muscles. This also builds stamina, which is much more beneficial in real life compared to pure power for few seconds.
Needless to say, since I switched, i didn't have a single injury, not even minor stretches. Even if I am totally exhausted, I can handle the loads I use to put them down/to the rack safely.
I closely follow the latest studies on disc regeneration, but unfortunately medical research is still in the dark ages in that field, and no significant breakthrough is likely to make it past clinical trials anytime in the next decade.
So... sorry for the rant, but if there's some deep wisdom to be gained from suffering, I still haven't figured out what it is.