After about 3.5 years of dealing with health issues I've decided to get stronger and in better shape. I have some kind of connective tissue problem they aren't able to name without biopsy which I didn't do b/c treatment doesn't change if they do find out. Jist of it is that I'm hypermobile in shoulders, hips, knees, ankles, wrists, and fingers. Ex, I can lay my thumb back on my forearm and my knees lock in a backwards like bow. My shoulders move in such a way that two rheumatologists have asked about dislocations. It's similar to fibromyalgia in terms of description, symptoms and treatment.

Inflammation and pain got so bad that I was unable to use my right hand for tasks as simple as turning over my ignition and I lost a good bit of muscle on the top of the wrist which came back. Entire body was then affected. Like it spread or something. I was able to control the inflammation and pain by stopping pc use, walking 10-30 minutes a day and taking osteo biflex along with a prescription NSAID. Doing this allowed me to become essentially normal again although it took over a year. Since this summer though I got lazy and didn't think I needed to exercise and went back to using pc like a normal person. Now I'm about a third of the way back to where I started from in terms of pain an inflammation.

Goal is to get off the NSAID and add some muscle so I can avoid this nasty inflammation. My joints need stabilization and activity. Doctors say no free weights but I'm fine to use resistance bands, machines, and other stuff like bike, walk, row machine, and swim. Basically anything that does not push my joints beyond normal range as my body can't hold them there (at least not until I do some kind of strengthening to fix that). As of right now I can't even do one pushup off the floor without it destroying my right wrist b/c my wrist can't support my weight. The left doesn't fair much better but it is a tad bit better since I didn't lose muscle there nor did I click a mouse 30,000 times a day for 3 years with the left hand. I've had all the nerve tests and muscle tests done and I'm fine. No issues at all. All my symptoms come from connective tissue and joint hypermobility.

With all this where should I start? It's really cold out so I've been jogging in place for 10 minutes a day and so far that is going well but I need to fix my joint stability or I will forever have issues if I try to do any task that requires some real physical effort. I guess you could say I know how to get normal but I want to go past that. Plus everything for people like me on the web says I need to be in much better shape than the average person or life will suck. I'd say that's accurate.

Things I know I can do:

1. Pushups with hands on wall not floor.
2. Walking
3. Swimming
4. Light jogging
5. Light resistance, 10lbs of weight or less

I'm thinking a yellow theraband and start with the wrists since that is my weakest link. Shoulders would be second weakest followed by ankles then knees.

Edit: I'm 5'10" and weight 165lbs. Would like to get back to my normal of 140-145 then add back with strength not junk food.

I mostly just want to say good luck, here are a few thoughts.

How proficient a swimmer are you? Seems like that would be great, especially starting out.

I also noticed that you mentioned biking in the body of your post, but not in the list at the end. A low resistance/high intensity ride would likely be a great option for you.

Are you able to join a gym so you can run on a treadmill rather than in place?

Here's a good site for resistance bands, hopefully you can work up to some of the heavier duty stuff- http://www.flexcart.com/members/elit...lt.asp?cid=138

Nothing earth shattering obviously, just wanted to get your thread off the ground. Good luck!

I left out biking and swimming mainly b/c don't have a gym membership. I have a treadmill, it looks similar to this http://www.onlinesports.com/pages/I,...-_-SOLO-MT2000 I don't use it that often b/c it's hard to get it adjusted right and it's outside in the cold. But it will work you good in just five minutes. Only reason I'm not using it now is b/c we're in a nasty cold snap. I could easily grab another one that is motorized from a family member as she doesn't use it.

Got me a real treadmill and some exercises to strengthen my wrists. Going to work on this and cleaning up my diet. Major soda and junk food in it. Ran into a friend from HS who took over his father's gym and once I get my wrists able to support my weight I plan on joining and doing starting strength. Hopefully I can see some gains within a year but it will be slower for me. Last time I tried this I didn't understand how much slower and got really discouraged and quit and just walked an hour or more a day.

It's only been 11 days on a clean diet (for me this is no junk or more than 12 oz of soda) and I've dropped five pounds even while eating ~2k calories. Might need more, especially if I start lifting but for now I am pretty sedentary throughout the day doing pc work. I must have been eating 3-4k calories a day with junk and soda. Amazing how quickly that racks up.

Sounds like some good changes. Could you use a more ergonomically correct mouse? Your initial post made it seem like you weren't a candidate for starting strength. Did something change?

Still not a candidate for starting strength but I'm going to try to get myself to the point that I will be. For example, my wrists are bad, right one especially since it lost all the muscle on top. I found some exercises for wrist and fingers that they give out for broken wrist and it helps. Cardio always helps me so it's a no brainer. Tried doing some pushups but instead of against wall with hands I used the bar in the shower so wrists stay straight. That and the exercises seem to be keeping the stiffness away. I'll know more about how good that works in 2-5 days. Takes me about 3 days to feel problems from something like that. I've been so lazy and sedentary for so many years it's going to take time.

I use this mouse for left hand since 2006. It's night and day difference vs a regular type mouse. Will never buy anything else mouse wise. http://ergo.contourdesign.com/produc...ail.aspx?id=36 I also use Ergo 4000 keyboard which is about the only one I can stand and it helps a ton.

In terms of starting strength the problems will be loading my wrists with too much weight. Shoulders can be fixed with bands like I was told to do years ago but didn't b/c I was stupid. Squats will be ok if I do it right and don't go too far down. Deadlifts will probably be ok. Power cleans and presses will be the tough part. Hopefully I can get to where I can put my body weight on my wrists with wrist exercises and modified pushups. If I can get myself ready to start starting strength in 6-12 months I will be happy.

Edit: found pics of hand then and will make one of it now so ppl can see what I talking about

Right hand in January of 2007. About 4 months after not being able to move it at all.




You can clearly see the knot. I thought it was a ganglion cyst but all the muscle came back on it's own. The right thumb was fractured in Oct 2003 which is why it sits out a tad.

Here is a pic of the same right hand taken a few minutes ago.



All that came back with me doing nothing but stopping mouse use in right hand, stopping all day pc use with poor posture and walking every day. Yet it's still very weak, much more so than the left.

Edit: IDK why I lost the muscle other than poor pc use. I've been through the nerve tests where they shock you then measure something as well as the needle you and make you flex back in spring 2008. Zero nerve issues with me. He said under 100 at wrists is bad and I'm over 1000.

i had one when i first started SS. same hand, same spot actually. i had it once in the past, too. it went away.

Still doing treadmill. Averaging about 15 min jog 5 out of 7 days or so. Those pushups on the bar tore my hands up nicely. I recovered but hard to use pc for a few days. Cut the lodine (NSAID) from 2.5 400mg pills a day to just 400mg. I added 2.4g fish oil. I'm thinking treamill + osteo bioflex + fish oil = no NSAID. Goal is to get off the NSAID then hit the gym.

So I found an old bench and weights at parents house that hold up to 110lbs while cleaning out some stuff under the house. Decided to put all 110lbs on it and see if I could deadlift it and I couldn't even get it off the ground. Put 40lbs on and tried to bench it and could but not many reps. Amazing what no activity besides walking a lot to class, hardcore partying for a decade, and eating like a bird can do to you.

I've been going back and forth on kettlebells or barbells since coming to this forum and reading how KBs help hypermobile people on another site. Watching the different movements with these on youtube and from KPCs log they might be better for me than barbells. The swing for example isn't much different than what I do when playing with the 2yo. I'm wondering what size should I go for if I can't deadlift 100lbs but swing a 25lb kid?