No pain, no gain?
It depends on what kind of pain you're talking about.
If you're training at all with pain and injury, this is one video you don't want to miss.
What's up, guys?
Jeff Cavaliere, ATHLEANX.COM
Today we're going to talk about the number 1 question we get here on this channel.
We see it over and over again.
And that's, 'Jeff, what do I do if I'm in pain when I'm training?
I've got this hurting me or that's bothering me.
Should I continue to train or should I step away from the gym?'
It's a question that's right up my alley because as a Physical Therapist and a professional
Strength Coach, I actually get to address this and see this from both sides of the spectrum.
I get to see it in the acute stage when somebody's actually rehabbing, and then see them as they
attack their workouts once again.
And try to make sure that these pains and issues don't recur and come back.
So, I feel like I'm uniquely qualified here to help you with this.
And it starts right here, guys with what I call the cycle of pain.
If you're trying to figure out whether or not you should go back into the gym or continue
working out around an injury, it's really going to come down to this cycle of pain.
And that means, when you get pain or discomfort in a lift and it could be your knees on a
squat, or it could be your shoulder on a bench press.
Or it could be even your shoulder on a Side Lateral Raise.
When you feel that pain, the first thing that's going to happen is you're going to get altered
joint mechanic pattern.
So, if it's that squat and I feel pain in my knees, the first thing I'm going to do
is what?
Instinctively try to find a way to avoid the pain.
So, the same thing on a Shoulder Side Lateral Raise.
I feel pain when I'm in this range from here to here.
So, I instinctively try to find a way that I don't have to have the motion occur in my
shoulder so I kind of lift, lean maybe, you know, pull up a little bit with my trap.
What's worse is, a lot of times these altered joint mechanics are not even perceptible in
the mirror because they're happening internally.
So, you can't even all the time see them but you know that they're happening.
With these altered joint mechanics, the next thing we'll see is weakness.
So, let's go back to the squat example.
If I feel too much pain when I squat with my knees and I try to lean a little bit more
to take the descent out of the knees and put it more into the hips, guess what happens?
The quads don't get much work.
So, if we're taking our altered joint mechanics, the quads are now doing half of the work they're
supposed to be responsible for.
That leads to quad weakness.
So, you'll see a decrease in muscle size or an inability to reach the muscle size
that you should when you start to avoid your pain, alter your point mechanics and then
cause weakness and/or a decrease of muscle size.
What goes along with the altered mechanics is also a compensation.
You know, the body is smart.
It's going to get to what it has to do.
It's going to get to point B from point A.
The problem is, it shifts the load often times to joints that are ill-equipped to handle
those loads.
Again, with the example of the squat.
As I try to lean more forward to take the knees out of the equation, I put more of it
onto the hips, but more so, I put more of it onto my low back.
So, the low back is ill-equipped to handle the loads of a back squat as you lean forward.
It's a bad position.
So, now you wind up with pain again.
And now, unfortunately, it's not even in the area that initially bothered you in your knees.
Now it's in your back.
So, now you got 2 problems to deal with.
As you can see here, guys, this is a deadly cycle here.
It's an ugly cycle to say the least.
I get brought in a lot, and now obviously CrossFit is a popular way to train.
Now, I have my differences on how they train.
But it doesn't mean that they don't need help, right.
I get brought in a lot of times to do seminars with CrossFit Athletes about what can they
do to break the cycle of pain.
And it doesn't matter whether you're training that way or whether you're training with your
own program.
If you're in pain when you're training, you have to start asking yourself whether or not
it's a good idea for you to be training.
If you have the opportunity to work with someone like myself who could fine-tune and look it
over, see your program as you're doing it
and make those corrections as needed to allow you to continue to train through and not allow
an acute injury to become a chronic injury, that's a good thing.
That's what I did for a living with the New York Mets.
My job was to help these guys.
Those guys were constantly training with issues.
But we had to be able to get them to continue to get out on the field and play and get around
those issues.
But not everybody has access to somebody like that that can actually oversee every aspect
of their training.
I've been trying to put a lot more of our corrective and mobility stuff on our channel
as well because you guys have been asking for it.
And we'll continue to do that.
And you can try to start incorporating some of that stuff into your training as well.
And if that doesn't make a dent in your pain, then there's other methods as well.
Guys, one of the big things that I just invested a large amount of my time in was a development
of our ATHLEAN MECHAN-X joint supplement.
Guys, joint recovery is just as important as muscle recovery in the recovery picture.
You guys know how big I feel recovery is when it comes to seeing gains in the gym.
As a natural, drug-free trainer, guys, you have to make sure that recovery is on top
of your priority list.
And if you're not addressing your joint recovery, then you're going to get yourself into big
problems eventually.
Again, young guys may sit there and laugh at the whole topic thinking that I'm an old
guy talking about this.
Not at all guys.
I had early, early knee issues that if I was doing something to address them back in my
early 20s, I probably would feel a lot better these days than I did if I hadn't just abused
them the way I did.
So, it's not something to take lightly if you're training with injuries, training with
pain, guys, if you need to take it to that next level, NSAIDs are not the answer.
Long, long, recurrent use of NSAIDs has it's own host of issues, as you can look up online
if you need to see them.
So, you've kind of got to look more a natural way.
Again, if you haven't checked it out, guys, I would definitely encourage you.
Check out ATHLEAN MECHAN-X.
We've worked a lot, a lot, to come with a natural way to help to break this cycle of
pain because if we can interrupt this pain, then we can normalize your mechanics.
We're not going to alter them.
We normalize joint mechanics.
Now, in that same squat, we get down, we do the squat effectively in the way it's supposed
to be done.
Now we're putting the focus back on the quads.
Now your quads start to grow a lot more.
They start to get a lot stronger.
So, we're not looking at weakness.
We're looking at strength.
There is no compensation.
Compensation was actually directed to the joints that were supposed to do the job in
the first place.
There's no need to throw the forces other places that can't handle it.
So, you start right here, you can start to get rid of the pain in a natural way.
And we can actually start to execute the exercises the way they're supposed to be done.
Whew.
That's a lot to say, but hopefully you guys get the point.
There are things you can try to do.
If you're finding that those things are not working for you, then it's time to start investigating
other ways.
If you're going to look the supplemental way, I would totally guys, point you in the direction
if ATHLEAN MECHAN-X.
I really think this is going to be a game-changer for a lot of people who find themselves in
discomfort at all when they train.
And whether that be through CrossFit, whether that be whatever training method you're using
now, it's the way to go to try to break this cycle up.
If you guys found this video helpful, make sure you leave a thumb's up below.
Tell me what other issue's you're dealing with painwise, I'll be glad to make a video
on it.
We've covered things about the elbow.
We've covered issues in the knees.
We've covered issues in the back.
Let me know what it is that's bothering you.
You can be sure that I will try to address it here in a future video very soon.
Alright guys, I'll talk to you soon.