Episode #32: Inspirational Interview | Overcoming Chronic Pain & Identity Loss Through Barbell Training
CHRONIC PAIN, INJURY, AND ILLNESS OFTEN HOLDS PEOPLE BACK FROM BEING PHYSICALLY ACTIVE AND PARTICIPATING IN COMPETITIVE OR RECREATIONAL SPORTS. THIS MAY LEAD TO IDENTITY LOSS, DEPRESSION, AND POOR HEALTH. MEDICAL DOCTORS FREQUENTLY WARN PEOPLE AGAINST BARBELL TRAINING WITH SUCH CONSIDERATIONS, BUT IN FACT, BARBELL TRAINING IS ONE OF THE FEW THINGS THAT CAN POSITIVELY IMPACT CHANGE LONG TERM.
Our goal with bringing on some of our clients is to share their unique stories, experiences with barbell training, and how their training has impacted their lives positively despite the negative medical narratives and belief systems surrounding barbell strength training in hopes that it inspires even just one person out there.
In this series of interviews each episode consists of a PRS client sharing their journey of overcoming injuries and illnesses, recovering from surgeries, and navigating changes in their lives and the role that barbell training has played throughout this process for each of them. These are just a handful of our clients that are truly inspiring and motivating and we hope that sharing their stories will inspire you, your patients or clients, or your family to incorporate barbell training into your life or continue barbell training during challenging times.
In this interview, we sat down and spoke with PRS client Keri who has been active since she was a swimmer in high school. After becoming a mother of two, Keri picked up ultra running and triathlons which she enjoyed very much but over time, the long hours, hard sessions, and poor recovery and nutrition took a toll on her overall enjoyment of the sport and physical health. Unrelated to endurance training, Keri has a history of chronic joint pain with genetic rheumatic conditions that affect her knees, back, and eyes and most recently experienced a major knee injury. After receiving conflicting information about her diagnosis from multiple doctors she felt lost and depressed.
“AS SOON AS I STARTED LIFTING, MY BODY JUST WENT, "OH, THANK YOU." THIS IS WHAT IT WANTED TO DO. IT WANTED TO DO RESISTANCE TRAINING, PROGRESSIVE OVERLOAD. IT WANTED TO GET STRONGER AND NOT JUST GRIND AWAY DOING CARDIO FOR TWO HOURS A DAY.
DR. RORI ALTER: HOW DO YOU FEEL PHYSICALLY IN YOUR JOINTS AND YOUR BACK AND YOUR OVERALL HEALTH AND YOUR KNEE NOW, WITH BARBELL TRAINING RELATIVE TO WHEN YOU WERE DOING ALL THOSE ENDURANCE SPORTS?
Keri: Oh, it's so much different. I think the most immediate thing that I noticed is I would do a workout and I wouldn't be exhausted. I don't spend the rest of the day recovering. The next day, I'm not still tired. The recovery is a lot better. And at first I thought, I'm not doing it right. I should be doing it to the point of exhaustion. Shouldn't I be doing more to the point of failure? So that for me was like, "Wow, I did something, there was a level of effort and completion there and overload, but it didn't wipe me out." So I'm able to recover faster and I am able to give more to the next workout.
I FEEL A LOT BETTER. I FEEL LIKE I'M STRONGER FOR SURE, BUT I FEEL LIKE MY SKELETON, MY FRAMEWORK IS JUST STRONGER. I FEEL MUCH BETTER.
We’re sharing Keri’s story to highlight how our athletic endeavors, motivations, and enjoyment ebb, flow and change across the lifespan and how barbell strength training has reinvigorated her, improved her mental and physical health, and sets an example for her young daughters, despite the various medical conditions she’s been diagnosed with.
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Dr. Rori Alter, PT, PRSCC, SSC: [00:00:28] And Dr. Rori Alter. Join us on our journey of barbell strength training and rehabilitation. Welcome back to the Progressive Rehab & Strength podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Rori Alter, head clinical coach here at Progressive Rehab & Strength. And I'm here with my lovely co-host, Dr. Alyssa Haveson, also a clinical coach at Progressive Rehab & Strength. And we're back with another episode in our series of inspirational client interviews. Our goal with bringing on some of our clients is to share their unique stories, experiences with barbell training, and how their training has impacted their lives positively despite the negative medical narratives and belief systems surrounding barbell training in hopes that it inspires even just one person out there. In this series of interviews, each episode consists of a PRS client sharing their story of overcoming injuries and illnesses, recovering from surgeries, and navigating changes in their life. The role that barbell training has played throughout this process for each of them. These are just a handful of our truly inspiring and motivating clients. We hope that sharing their stories will inspire you, your patients, clients, or your family to incorporate barbell training into your life or continue it during challenging times.
Dr. Rori Alter, PT, PRSCC, SSC: [00:01:38] In this interview, we sat down and spoke with PRS client Keri, who has been active since she was a swimmer in high school. After becoming a mother of two, Keri picked up ultrarunning and triathlons, which she enjoyed very much. But over time, the long hours, hard sessions, and poor recovery and nutrition took a toll on her overall enjoyment of the sport and physical health. Unrelated to endurance training, Keri has a history of chronic joint pain with genetic rheumatic conditions affecting her knees, back, and eyes. Most recently, she experienced a major knee injury. After receiving conflicting information about her diagnosis from multiple doctors, she felt lost and depressed. We're sharing Kerri's story to highlight how our athletic endeavors, motivations, and enjoyment ebb and flow and change across the lifespan and how barbell strength training has reinvigorated her, improved her mental and physical health, and set an example for her young daughters despite the various medical conditions she's been diagnosed with. Let's dive in.
Dr. Alyssa Haveson, PT, PRSCC, CSCS: [00:02:40] Well, Keri, thank you for joining us. For one of our handful of client interviews here at PRS. So we just want to ask you to tell us about your specific situation and your concerns when you first reached out to us.
Keri, PRS Client: [00:02:58] Sure. Thanks for having me. So I had always wanted to be stronger as an athlete. I was a high school swim person. I was on the swim team in high school, and friends always encouraged me to work out in the weight room and lift. And I was really afraid of it because I thought I'd get big. I would lose my feminine shape, and I would get I'd get too big. And I never tried it. But I wanted to get stronger. I wanted to be a better athlete. So I took up running and endurance sports after I had children and started doing some triathlons. And I wasn't working on getting stronger. I was working on getting faster. And the way to do that with a coach was to try harder, do it more, do it harder, and get faster. If you're doing it at an RPE of nine, you should be doing it at an RPE of 9.5. And that served me well up and to a certain point. And then I just mentally burnt out. I am physically burnt out. My body just started to say it couldn't do this anymore. And I was on a run with a friend who pulled me towards the back of the pack, and she said, you know, I've been doing some strength training. And there's this blue book called Starting Strength that you should read. I think that you'd like it. And that was about that's about a year ago. And as soon as I started lifting, my body just went, "Oh, thank you."
Keri, PRS Client: [00:04:31] Like this. This is what it wanted to do. I wanted to do resistance training and progressive overload. I wanted to get stronger and not just grind away doing cardio for 2 hours a day. And I found myself in a place where, after trying to do the novice linear program for a few months, I just got stuck. I couldn't figure out where to go next and how to do it sustainably, but I was still getting stronger, reducing my risk of injury and enjoying it. And at about the same time, I just so happened to get injured, not by exercise. It was just a fluke where I hurt my knee, and I had to take time off from working out and exercising. And my husband, who is also an athlete and an endurance athlete, said, you know, you like, your mental health is starting to struggle here. You're lost. You need to get back to doing something fun and feel good. And that's when I realized, like, I needed a professional. I needed somebody to help me design a program that would work with my lifestyle, my body, and my limitations. So searching around the starting strength website, I came across PRS, and I realized this was exactly the place that could help me, that could be smart about programming but also take into account any injuries that I have, my background, where I was coming from, and my goals.
Dr. Rori Alter, PT, PRSCC, SSC: [00:06:13] Can you tell us a little about the knee injury? So what was the official diagnosis, and what were you experiencing?
Keri, PRS Client: [00:06:21] So I'd had my left knee for several years. I'd said maybe ten years. Seven years has just always been a little. I don't know. I would have always described it as a little wonky if you will. It felt like in certain yoga poses, maybe it just felt like it could have given out at any moment, but it never bothered me as far as running. And literally, I was vacuuming, I was vacuuming my house, and I turned, and my knee went pop, pop, and I fell to the floor. And after I got an MRI, they diagnosed me with no cartilage in my knee, a baker's cyst, and most importantly, an osteochondral defect in my femur, weight bearing on the weight-bearing part of my femur. That was, they said it was significant in size, and they called it an abnormality. And the language that they used in the report was pretty scary. And I met with three different osteo-surgeons. And the first one said, "you need to get this taken care of right away, or else you'll never walk again."
Keri, PRS Client: [00:07:27] "You're never going to run again. You need surgery like next week." The interesting thing is, when I asked him, "have you done this surgery before?" He's like, "Oh, no, this is very rare. And I've only done it twice before." So I called another doctor, and he said, "You're fine. You're going to be. You'll never need this. Your knee is totally fine. Don't worry about it." And then the third physician I went to was, "well, you know, you're going to have to figure out what works for you. And you know, you're the only person who can answer whether you can live with this or not." So, I have not had surgery. I'm trying to get stronger so that I can avoid having surgery. It bothers me when I do certain things and make bad choices. It does tend to bother me a little bit, but I'm finding a way to still be active and live my life without needing to get that done.
Dr. Rori Alter, PT, PRSCC, SSC: [00:08:25] So first of all, you are not alone in being scared by the language in MRIs. And I think that for anyone listening who has been haunted by the language in their MRIs or language the doctors, other physical therapists, or chiropractors are using. The medical fields, really the rehabilitation fields, are trying to move in the direction of changing the way that we talk about changes in the body as not abnormalities and not defects and not degeneration, but talking about it differently so that there isn't so much fear associated with what we see on imaging and for because this kind of stuff. Listen, I think what you have in your near knee is rare and can be associated with a significant amount of pain. Still, it does not have to be associated with long-term chronic pain, and it does not have to be associated with long-term disability. When we look at the three doctors you spoke to, you got three different answers. And I think that can be confusing and disheartening for many people because they still feel lost. And I'm proud of you for getting a second and a third opinion after that first one who's like, You're screwed for the rest of your life. You know, that's the kind of language that we're trying to move away from.
Dr. Rori Alter, PT, PRSCC, SSC: [00:09:58] And like, look at you now. You're lifting so much weight. You're not in constant pain in your knee. And we can talk a little bit about running and how that impacts your running. But you're not the only one. And I think that for anyone who's concerned about what the imaging says and the language that doctors use, I can't remember which part of our pain and injury series, but I think it's we have a pain and injury series on this podcast. We'll link it in the show notes or the description. I think it's the second one where we dive into that specific scenario that you're talking about and that so many people experience. And we just want one thing that we want people to take away from this talk is that, like, look at you now, and we'll talk about kind of your numbers, how we started, and where you are now. But these things are not death sentences in terms of enjoying the rest of your life and getting stronger, and being pain-free. The other thing I wanted to ask you about is your age, medical history, and kind of role in your family.
Keri, PRS Client: [00:11:11] Sure. So I'm 46. I had to think about that. I'm 46.