Have you tried intermittent fasting yet? It’s rather easy now that you are keto. Just decrease your eating window by an hour a day until you hit 8 hours or less. Maybe even one meal a day would work for you.
I’m going to try skipping breakfast first. I think I mostly eat it out of habit; I’m not usually all that hungry in the morning.
Slow progress is a good thing with weights. It can be really helpful to buy tiny weights if you don’t have them so that you can go up or down by very small amounts. I don’t know how much you’ve learned yet but generally speaking you should start with a low weight set before slowly increasing the load to what you can handle for 5 reps (as you’re aiming for strength not bulk), then do 3 sets of 5 reps with a long break in between (3 minutes or more).
Almost all of my exercise so far has been joint rehab more than anything else. Low weight, with 20 to 60 reps. I have half a dozen 2.5 pound and a couple of 5 pound weights for the barbell; they’ll do me for a while. It has only been in the last couple of weeks that I’ve been able to lift the bar without my lower back going nuclear.
I’m more interested in general fitness and some shaping than strength training. Not Mr. Olympia stuff; just looking more like a reasonably fit man instead of Jabba the Hutt’s little brother. I won’t be able to use a whole lot of weight until I get the hernias fixed, and for that, I still have to lose more weight. Two inguineal and one umbilical hernia limit anything that involves the core abdominal muscles. I’ve been able to tighten the abs a lot despite that; I used to get shooting pains with more than a few pounds; now it’s not a big problem as long as I use the ab brace. Lifting lore says not to lift with an umbilical hernia, but I’m at weight far below what they’d consider a ‘lift’.
It’s also relatively normal to be able to lift more one day than another and maybe that indicates that you are progressing the weight too quickly. It’s also a good idea to not use all your energy on your build up sets.
When I started, it was joint pain that limited what I could do. Then my back, and then the hernias. I’ve managed to improve all three, but I’m probably at the limit of what can be done for the hernias without surgery.
That’s probably going to be an issue. Back in ancient times the surgeon would cut and sew the muscles tight across the failed area. Nowadays they all want to put nylon mesh in with a laparoscopic procedure. My Dad got the mesh, and so did Mrs. Andy. I was underwhelmed by the outcome on both cases; they can feel the mesh when they probe at it, and it looks unnatual when they bend and move. Plus both still had a bulge because their hernias had never been repaired, just covered over by the mesh. Which is, basically, just an internal version of the gut band I’ve been wearing for years.
There are plenty of people here with good info about lifting.
I’ll be picking their brains when it’s time to move past the kiddie weights I’m lifting now.
