Fainted during Pause Deadlift

Good Morning Docs,

First off. Thank you so much for all of the great content you all continually put out. It’s greatly appreciated!

I’m a 42yo male. Doing The Bridge (week 7)

This morning I fainted during a Pause DL. I’ve gotten lightheaded before, usually when my head is at its lowest position before the pull. And its usually when I take just a tiny bit longer than normal getting set up.

Well, this morning I was setting up for a pull and everything felt fine (although I did take a couple seconds longer than normal during setup). When I reached the top of the lift in full extension I started to feel light headed…so I just started to descend and by the time the bar hit the floor, i was losing consciousness (which I never fully lost). I fell “gracefully” over the bar onto my hands, then back onto my butt. At this point I was what felt like 50% conscious, if that makes sense.

What scared me the most was that I seemed to be unable to speak during the event and my left arm was twitching and i could not control it.

This all lasted 20-30 seconds before I started to “come to” and feel normal-ish again. I got the whole thing on video, so i get to relive it over and over if I want :wink:

I guess I’m just looking to see if this is something that can happen from time to time if not careful with breathing and spending too much time during set up…or should I definitely see my doctor about this?

Thanks in advance!

This can definitely happen, and I’ve experienced it before myself on the press. Tons of videos of this sort of thing on YouTube as well. It’s usually a combination of factors, including things like food/fluid intake, bracing technique and length of time the valsalva is held, etc.

Of course, we cannot give you specific advice on whether or not to talk to your doctor about such things.

Thanks for the reply Austin!

RPE 11 much?