Strategic Deconditioning

This isn’t anything new, only an attempt to stir up some more discussion on the topic of taking strategic breaks from PE.

Breaks and progress?
Putting Punctuated PE to the test.

and probably several others

What can be done after you have reached a plateau and gotten stuck there? I mean truly stuck, not the newbie idea of no-gains-in-one-month stuck. Increase time/intensity? Yes, that’s one way. But what do you do when your dick is accustomed to everything you have the time and effort to throw at it?

If your prior progress is well-cemented, why not take a month or two off to allow the tissues to decondition?

I’m thinking 4 weeks is probably about the minimum for a well-trained penis to decondition enough to become more amenable to reasonable stimulation from training. I have nothing to back this up except my progress before and after taking a 4 week break last year. 6 weeks, 8 weeks or maybe even much longer could be better.

What are your thoughts and/or experiences with results after long breaks?

hobby,

>This isn’t anything new, only an attempt to stir up some more discussion on the topic of taking strategic breaks from PE. <

There hasn’t been a good old involved discussion in a while has there? I’ll discuss. Or should we poll first?

>But what do you do when your dick is accustomed to everything you have the time and effort to throw at it? <

Most people post a depression thread.

>I’m thinking 4 weeks is probably about the minimum for a well-trained penis to decondition enough to become more amenable to reasonable stimulation from training. I have nothing to back this up except my progress before and after taking a 4 week break last year. 6 weeks, 8 weeks or maybe even much longer could be better.

What are your thoughts and/or experiences with results after long breaks?<

The most important thing as you mention is cementing your progress before the break. If what you are doing is not having any effect, and you cannot increase the time/intensity due to privacy or safety issues, is this ‘work’ sufficient to cement a gain? If you are not actually causing any further enlargement, all you are effectively doing is holding the tissues in the extended state, right? Is that enough for a hardgainer to cement gains? It is (IMO).
Say the work you are doing is enough to keep your FSL at 8” (which it would be if it was enough to GET to 8”), and you would need to do an extra hour per day to eventually break that. Other limiting factors will also be taking the stress (I ranted on this in my PR thread somewhere) as they reach their elastic potential. So there are more fibers taking the load, as well as the original ones thickening and strengthening. But as there are ‘fresh’ fibers coming into play, this allows the stretched (torn) ones to stay extended and heal in that state.

So when you are ready to take the break you have a bunch of stronger, thicker (and longer or course :) ) fibers and a fresh bunch working in equilibrium with them. When you break they will start to get thinner, as there is no need for them to be stronger any more (don’t use it you lose it).

This pretty much summarises my experiences. I had gained .5” through BTC hanging (but I think that maybe .25” of that was from tunica stretching), then took a 10 week break. I regained .25” very quickly with SO hanging, using HALF my max weight for BTC. Another .25” soon came, along with a rise in LOT (which is why I assume some of the original gains were tunica).

The length of the break is a tough one. I assume that the longer the time off, the weaker the tissues become, up to a point where they no longer become any weaker, and they are ‘normal’. 4 weeks sounds good for about 6 months of intense PE. I hope other guys will chime in too with their experiences.

Please excuse this rant. I just wrote whatever entered my head to hopefully stew up some food for thought.

SS4

SS4, Hobby,
I wouldn’t mind a little more of this rant.

>So when you are ready to take the break you have a bunch of stronger, thicker (and longer or course ) fibers and a fresh bunch working in equilibrium with them. When you break they will start to get thinner, as there is no need for them to be stronger any more (don’t use it you lose it).<

I get it. I like it. but then…

>I assume that the longer the time off, the weaker the tissues become, up to a point where they no longer become any weaker, and they are ‘normal’. <

I get lost. I don’t like.
Are you saying that the tissues weaken, but then at some point reverse course and toughen or “normalize”. And therefor an extended break can create an even tougher plateau to surmount?

Rant on, you two. It’s good. I like.

—Cap

Cap,

>Are you saying that the tissues weaken, but then at some point reverse course and toughen or “normalize”. And therefor an extended break can create an even tougher plateau to surmount? <

No, that was just badly worded by me. I don’t mean that they will begin to toughen. By normal, I mean pre-PE. After you stop they will eventually reduce in size and toughness until they reach their former state, because there is no need to have this strength anymore. Your body adapts to everything, and it will also adapt to nothing. How long it takes to get to this normal state is debatable, and will vary based on genetics (like how fast your body adapts and heals), and the amount and nature of work done.

It would be fair to say that the longest this period could be is 10 weeks, as I am both king of hardgainers (not bragging), and put more work in than most do (not looking for sympathy).

I wonder if the speed you can gain at is related to the speed which you ‘normalise’ at. ie easy gainers would need shorter strategic breaks than hard gainers. I got deja vu writing that, might have ranted about it before.

Good Luck
SS4

Aha:

The quote below is by me from this related thread.

SS4

I took a month off and have now gained 3/8 in 2 months. Hope that helps but there are other things to consider besides my time off.

cya@9

Cya,

How long had you not gained for before the break?
Towards the end of the month had you noticed any changes in flaccid hang, or the elasticity of it?
After the break, how much weight were you using (if you hang) or how much force (if a stretcher), and also how much hang/stretch time compared to before the break?

SS4

Roughly, it was 4 months worth of plateau because I was at 7.875 very early in August. I didnt gain again until 12-3. During my month off, I lost 1/8 but got that back after a week with the PM. My flaccid seen to hold steady during my break but I didnt break out the ruler.

After the break, I started using the PM everyday, at high tension, for at least 3 hours a day. It took a month before I started seeing results but have came with consistency since.

Edit: After my break, my gains are very much like when i first started PEing. Slowly at first and then a huge jump almost overnight.

>Edit: After my break, my gains are very much like when i first started PEing. Slowly at first and then a huge jump almost overnight.

Interesting. The same happened to me when I took a month off last year. I had gained 1/16” each of the two months before the rest, then 1/8” the month after. The gain happened almost overnight during the 5th week back.

SS4 wrote:
>The length of the break is a tough one. I assume that the longer the time off, the weaker the tissues become, up to a point where they no longer become any weaker, and they are ‘normal’. 4 weeks sounds good for about 6 months of intense PE. I hope other guys will chime in too with their experiences.<

I suspect 4 weeks is the minimum. I say that because I haven’t noticed better progress after breaks lasting one to two weeks, but I did after 4. Is more better? Maybe 4 weeks is only long enough to lightly decondition, and results would be improved with a couple months off. 6 months?

We need to find a good balance between the level of deconditioning and the down time. The psychological aspect of taking a long break is also a consideration.

How much “on” time is optimum between breaks? Cya and I didn’t get results until the 4th-5th week back into training. Seems that long plus some extra time (another month?) for cementing would be the minimum amount of training time needed. Longer is probably better.

There’s also the issue of how long it takes for a newbie to build up enough connective tissue strength for a long break to be beneficial. Which is the better gauge, the time he has spent PEing or his rate of progress?

>It would be fair to say that the longest this period could be is 10 weeks, as I am both king of hardgainers (not bragging), and put more work in than most do (not looking for sympathy).

Have you taken a break shorter than 10 weeks? Was it beneficial too?

Hobby:
>The psychological aspect of taking a long break is also a consideration. <

A great point. What one considers “long” is an individual matter, too. I recently came off of a two week break - I can’t say as a result of a plateau because I simply haven’t been at this long enough to recognize any pattern(s). But the psychological power of the absence of PE was pretty powerful at about the two week point. I literally began to crave the smell of a rice-sock cooking in a microwave.
The break made me hit the ground running, hungrier than ever for gains. And my interest in this subject/thread comes out of this little break as well:
Have I done more harm (physiologically) than good? Or the other way around?
I will say that I noticed no loss of weight tolerance whatsoever. I was immediately able to get back to my max. And in truth, I expected (and kind of hoped) to find the opposite was true; That although I perfectly held onto my gains, the necessary weight/time formula to reach fatigue would have returned to it’s original place.
It hadn’t - but what the break did to expedite gains is yet to be seen. I’m only now in week two of my return and don’t want to play the measuring game.
*Interesting note: Extra skin on the shaft and a visible increase in girth at about 50-70% erect has appeared - very reminiscent of what preceded my original rather quick hanging gains.

—Cap

Cya,

>Edit: After my break, my gains are very much like when i first started PEing. Slowly at first and then a huge jump almost overnight. <

So it seems that the break was long enough to get your tissues to their pre-PE state, or close to it. That is interesting.

I also lost gains on a break and got them back quickly.

hobby,

>I suspect 4 weeks is the minimum. I say that because I haven’t noticed better progress after breaks lasting one to two weeks, but I did after 4. Is more better? Maybe 4 weeks is only long enough to lightly decondition, and results would be improved with a couple months off. 6 months? <

I agree, 4 weeks minimum. Shorter breaks would be good for motivation, but probably not enough for strategic deconditioning.

>How much “on” time is optimum between breaks? Cya and I didn’t get results until the 4th-5th week back into training. Seems that long plus some extra time (another month?) for cementing would be the minimum amount of training time needed. Longer is probably better.<

There’s also the issue of how long it takes for a newbie to build up enough connective tissue strength for a long break to be beneficial. Which is the better gauge, the time he has spent PEing or his rate of progress?<

By ”on” time do you mean plateau time? I don’t think these extended breaks should be planned, but rather used as an extreme plateau busting technique. The magic bullet types will be taking months off after a few months plateau, when maybe all it would take is another few weeks of solid work to gain. It’s hard to give general advice, especially since are people who bust plateaus through perseverence. What is your opinion?

>There’s also the issue of how long it takes for a newbie to build up enough connective tissue strength for a long break to be beneficial. Which is the better gauge, the time he has spent PEing or his rate of progress?<

I suppose time and progress are both relevant. If a guy is gaining at a steady rate he has no business taking a month off, better to keep at it until the goals or a plateau is reached.

>Have you taken a break shorter than 10 weeks? Was it beneficial too?<

I’m on one now, 2 weeks 2 days in, and I am not fully healed. I know because I can sometimes feel the ‘tunica ache’ in the areas I was isolating. This break is forced (injury), I wonder if it will have any effect as I hope to be back in the new year at the latest, which would be 4 weeks.

Cap,

>I will say that I noticed no loss of weight tolerance whatsoever. I was immediately able to get back to my max. And in truth, I expected (and kind of hoped) to find the opposite was true; That although I perfectly held onto my gains, the necessary weight/time formula to reach fatigue would have returned to it’s original place.
It hadn’t - but what the break did to expedite gains is yet to be seen. I’m only now in week two of my return and don’t want to play the measuring game.
*Interesting note: Extra skin on the shaft and a visible increase in girth at about 50-70% erect has appeared - very reminiscent of what preceded my original rather quick hanging gains. <

It is hard to say if 2 weeks caused the benefit, but think of it this way - if you were stuck before the break, that means you would have needed more weight to gain. Now you are seeing the signs of gains with lower weight than you would have needed before the break. Or it could be coincidence, or your increased motivation giving you better workouts. Who knows.

SS4

Wouldn’t the break be trying to get you deconditioned back to the state where you received your best gains? For an easy gainer this seems to be all the way back to when you started and for a hard gainer this seems to be back to a couple months after they started. I’d think that may wind up making the deconditioning time around the same for hard and easy gainers alike. Otherwise, wouldn’t a hard gainer be putting themselves back into the position they were in during week one of PE?

lad,

Good questions.

>Wouldn’t the break be trying to get you deconditioned back to the state where you received your best gains?<

Well, there’s a lot more variables to the time you got your best gains than just the strength of the tissues. The aim of the break is to weaken the tissues which have adapted (strengthened and thickened) to the work. The state where you received your best gains is gone forever. That’s not to say you can’t make faster gains in the future, with different routines.

>For an easy gainer this seems to be all the way back to when you started<

Ideally.

>and for a hard gainer this seems to be back to a couple months after they started.<

That would depend on what they did in those few months wouldn’t it? If what you mean is a few months of optimal PE leading up to the first gains, I understand what you suggest but it’s not really possible. Tissues heal on a break, but they tear during PE. And as some fibers are stretched others come into play. You can’t turn back the clock, just take away some (or preferably all) of the conditioning.

SS4

I understand better now that you put it that way.