Starting from scratch; Lifting with bad heart valve

[kx250rider]

For those who aren't up on my story, I have been lifting for 30 years, and just got diagnosed with a heart condition; bicuspid aortic valve anomaly, and severely calcified aortic valve, accompanied by enlarged aorta and enlarged heart. I was first misdiagnosed as having HCM, but that was disproven in a more comprehensive physical at the Cooper Clinic in Dallas earlier this week.

SO, the bottom line is that I need the aortic valve replaced, and the aortic root replanted (REALLY UNPLEASANT operation; sawing my sternum in half, etc. I will need it done between 10 and 20 years from now (mid-50s to mid-60s). I hope maybe there will be advancements by then, making it less gruesome of a surgery . But knowing the facts, I will be able to continue lifting, but nothing heavy. I've been on 3-5 sets/10 reps at 325 on the bench, and that's no longer allowed. The rule is that I can only do enough weight whereby I can lift (x lbs) for 10 reps and 3 complete sets, without failure, and without "bearing down" or straining. I'm looking at about 175 on that, I hope. Luckily, my routine for pretty much every other lift, was already within the rules on the limits. The lat pulldown and seated row will need adjustment, but not as much as the bench.

Common sense says that if I do a whole bunch of sets of a lot of reps at a lower weight on the bench, I'll lose mass. Any thoughts on this? At my age, if I lose it, it's not coming back. I don't want to lose all I've worked on since I was 14, but I also don't want St. Peter sending me any messages if I over-do it!

My goal is to try to keep what I have, and I'm trying to figure out what routine will do the best on that.

Charles

 

[stevesmi]

as long as you rip up the muscle fibers and you said you were on HRT. so your body will be anabolic 24/7.. I dont see you losing mass.

strength yes, but mass should be okay. its gonna get harder to put on more mass cause you won't be pushing your body to its limits anymore, but you should be fine with mantaining what you got with that strategy IMO.

i agree with not doing the surgery, not worth the aftermath .. i would rather just die than half my sternum sawed in half and have to deal with post surgery trauma.

 

[Backtobasicks]

For those who aren't up on my story, I have been lifting for 30 years, and just got diagnosed with a heart condition; bicuspid aortic valve anomaly, and severely calcified aortic valve, accompanied by enlarged aorta and enlarged heart. I was first misdiagnosed as having HCM, but that was disproven in a more comprehensive physical at the Cooper Clinic in Dallas earlier this week.

SO, the bottom line is that I need the aortic valve replaced, and the aortic root replanted (REALLY UNPLEASANT operation; sawing my sternum in half, etc. I will need it done between 10 and 20 years from now (mid-50s to mid-60s). I hope maybe there will be advancements by then, making it less gruesome of a surgery . But knowing the facts, I will be able to continue lifting, but nothing heavy. I've been on 3-5 sets/10 reps at 325 on the bench, and that's no longer allowed. The rule is that I can only do enough weight whereby I can lift (x lbs) for 10 reps and 3 complete sets, without failure, and without "bearing down" or straining. I'm looking at about 175 on that, I hope. Luckily, my routine for pretty much every other lift, was already within the rules on the limits. The lat pulldown and seated row will need adjustment, but not as much as the bench.

Common sense says that if I do a whole bunch of sets of a lot of reps at a lower weight on the bench, I'll lose mass. Any thoughts on this? At my age, if I lose it, it's not coming back. I don't want to lose all I've worked on since I was 14, but I also don't want St. Peter sending me any messages if I over-do it!

My goal is to try to keep what I have, and I'm trying to figure out what routine will do the best on that.

Charles

As steve said, dropping the weight won't directly decrease mass.. But strength will obviously drop.. You should be able to maintain what you've worked to achieve if you keep a similar work ethic.
Goodluck though and hope you don't need surgery until your late 60s! Atleast

 

[kx250rider]

Thanks bros! It really does mean a lot that anyone has confidence that I'll be able to hold onto some of this, because my natural body type is very skinny arms & legs with big bones. Not what I want, and not what my wife is used to on me.

Yesterday I fooled around with the amount of weight on the bench, and it looks like I'm following the rules if I do 5 or 6 sets of 170 x 10 reps. I felt the burn, so I hope it's working. Before, I was trying to bulk the pecs up a bit, and I was doing 325 x 10, 7, 6, and fail on 4 or 5 of the last set. That's a clear no-no at this point :-( .

The other thing I'm worried about is the prescribed 30 minute aerobic routine 3-4 days/week. I've never done true aerobic, and in fact I was 100% ignorant on what that even is. I used to make fun of the skinny people jogging in place at "don't walk" signs, thinking they were suffering from OCD. But I learned that they're actually doing that because the slightest pause in motion will wreck the whole 20 to 30-minutes of workout. My worry is, that the body begins to consume itself after the pulse reaches the aerobic state (130 appx for my age). So if I have 4.7% body fat, what the F is my body going to consume after I'm in the
burning state"??!!! I don't want to start eating up my own lean muscle tissue. Anyway, that's this weeks research project.

I know that when I was in high school in West Los Angeles, and would cut class, I used to walk all the way up to the Stone Canyon Dam. That was a fast-paced walk up hill for 7 miles from our house; from near sea level to 2000 feet. I couldn't have put on an ounce of muscle if my life depended on it when I was doing that.

Charles

 

[zedhed]

Dam bro where did the calcification come from? (aortic valve)
Anyway hope the best for you bro and gr8 tude too man!

 

[Backtobasicks]

Thanks bros! It really does mean a lot that anyone has confidence that I'll be able to hold onto some of this, because my natural body type is very skinny arms & legs with big bones. Not what I want, and not what my wife is used to on me.

Yesterday I fooled around with the amount of weight on the bench, and it looks like I'm following the rules if I do 5 or 6 sets of 170 x 10 reps. I felt the burn, so I hope it's working. Before, I was trying to bulk the pecs up a bit, and I was doing 325 x 10, 7, 6, and fail on 4 or 5 of the last set. That's a clear no-no at this point :-( .

The other thing I'm worried about is the prescribed 30 minute aerobic routine 3-4 days/week. I've never done true aerobic, and in fact I was 100% ignorant on what that even is. I used to make fun of the skinny people jogging in place at "don't walk" signs, thinking they were suffering from OCD. But I learned that they're actually doing that because the slightest pause in motion will wreck the whole 20 to 30-minutes of workout. My worry is, that the body begins to consume itself after the pulse reaches the aerobic state (130 appx for my age). So if I have 4.7% body fat, what the F is my body going to consume after I'm in the
burning state"??!!! I don't want to start eating up my own lean muscle tissue. Anyway, that's this weeks research project.

I know that when I was in high school in West Los Angeles, and would cut class, I used to walk all the way up to the Stone Canyon Dam. That was a fast-paced walk up hill for 7 miles from our house; from near sea level to 2000 feet. I couldn't have put on an ounce of muscle if my life depended on it when I was doing that.

Charles

With the trying to bulk up pecs, I dont know if Itd work for you, but I gave German volume training a shot for 6 weeks, with eating at a deficit. Which I've learnt not to do when trying to gain muscle obviously..
But I got quite good gains from it.. Without training legs even.
Simply 10 sets 10 reps for the compound movement and 3 x 10 for an isolation for each muscle. In a bi tri. Back chest split. Little rest in between and supposed to be 1 second lift, 4 seconds going down.
(little rest and delayed going down along with number of sets can be tailored to your needs, so you don't throw your heart into stress too bad.)
You could probably try out something similar as I didn't need to lift heavy by any standards and I still grew which I was suprised at.
Just my opinion
Goodluck with whatever you end up trying man

 

[stevesmi]

yes if you do more than 10-15 minutes of moderate cardio you will start burning away muscle. all part of the game. thats why swimmers and runners are so skinny (i know cause i used to be a triathlete) was 6% bf and 133 pounds at one point when i was running 45 miles per week lol. now 184 at 13% throwing weights around 5-6X per week.

 

[kx250rider]

Thanks again for the input! I'm going to be doing a high-rep shoulders/delts/upper back workout today, and I'll keep in mind the timed motion. I'm guilty of doing it too fast sometimes; just trying to get to the end of the set...

yes if you do more than 10-15 minutes of moderate cardio you will start burning away muscle. all part of the game. thats why swimmers and runners are so skinny (i know cause i used to be a triathlete) was 6% bf and 133 pounds at one point when i was running 45 miles per week lol. now 184 at 13% throwing weights around 5-6X per week.

I hope I can avoid that! I'm fairly well in touch with my calories and protein, so I'm going to try to load just enough before the cardio, not to dip into reserves. At this point, I'd be more inclined to sacrifice a little on the ultra-low bf % in favor of keeping bulk. I know what I look and feel like at 6 feet and 129 lbs :-( . At this point, I've lost a pound or 2 since the diagnosis, but still 182-ish with <5% bf.

Charles