Hello Dr.Feigenbaum and Dr.Baraki,
First, thank you for giving us so much high quality information regrading to fitness and providing opportunities for us to get some professional feedback.
Here is my basic information:
Male
23 years old
Height: 5’7
Weight: Around 180lb
Body Condition: I have been suffering Vasomotor Rhinitis (allergy of the nose) and Nasal septum deviation for over 5 years.
As a result my right nasal is completely blocked. I am not able to breath from my nose instead I have to breath from my mouth.
In the past 4 years, sometimes i had to wake up in the middle of the night to get some water because my month was like a desert by the time i woke up and often i had to wake up the second time to pee.
It got worse in the summer and winter because in Hong Kong (I am an Asian by the way) the summer is extremely hot so the air conditioner is 100% necessary hence the air is so dry.
It is the same as winter. Basically there are only 5 months or so i can sleep through the night but sometimes i will still wake up in the middle of the night depending the humidity of that night.
Because of this, i feel tired all the time.
Moreover, i have slight hypertension due to family inheritance.
(I forgot the readings because i haven’t done the test for a long time)
No smoking and no drinking
Training history: I have been training for 4 years so far. What i did in the past was mostly hypertrophy and i rarely performed any barbell training.
I have started NLP since April 2018 (I spent over a month to learn the correct movement so basically i have started NLP approximately one month only
The current weight in the big 4 lifts: 200 lb x3x5 Squat
205 lb x3x5 Bench
115 lb x3x5 Press
215 lb x5 Deadlift
It is shameful that i can bench more than i squat because i didn’t train my leg very often in the past but now i am working really hard on my lower body now.
Here is the question, i have stuck in deadlift for almost 1 month. I think my form is pretty solid but the dizziness on my head just really bothering me to keep adding weight to the bar.
In today’s training session, after i performed 135 for 3 reps, by the time i stood up i already felt some light headed but the weight was not heavy at all.
I thought i just didn’t breath correctly so i added to 185, i felt the same but the feeling was getting stronger but still, the weight was not heavy at all.
Then i went up to 225 which was my working set but after my third rep i felt i was going to pass out. If i had done one more rep, i would have fallen down, but still. the weight was not that heavy and i know i could do more weight.
On the other hand, it doesn’t exit on my other lifts and i really enjoy the progression i have made so far but the deadlift just makes me feel really disappointed…
Recently i have visited a Chinese medicine clinic once to do “Cupping therapy” in order to release my tight lower back because my job involves a lot of bending over to pick up the stuff.
The doctor took my pulse and she said my heart is weak. She asked me if i have experienced any fatigue during the day time. I said yes because of my blockage of my nose that affects my sleep and she than asked me if i have experienced breathing hard when i walk up the stairs. I don’t have any problem of breathing on the daily basis but i do feel breathing pretty hard when i go hiking. I thought it is because i have to breath from my month so i am not able to inhale fully.
At first, i wouldn’t believe what she said but eventually it seemed like everything is reasonable.
In retrospect, i was not active after i was 15. I was an athlete before that but my mother had told me to quite all the sports in order to focus on my study. From that time on, i was sitting all day long and getting fatter.
When i was around 19, i started to lift weight but i always skipped leg day. During a period of time i could not be able to walk for 10 mins because my legs were so itchy to stop me from walking.
Moreover, i didn’t have any aerobic exercise whatsoever. Even though i wanted to play some sports but the scratchy on my legs were pretty intense to keep me away from doing any exercises.
One more thing, i did pass out once when i was around 16. After few hours of playing computer games, when i stood up i lost my conscious and 2 minutes later I was fine.
After that i went to the hospital to have a body check and everything was just fine.
What is really happening to my body?
Is it really the weakness of my heart?
Do i have to see a heart specialist?
If my heart is weak, does that mean my kidney is weak too?
If that is the case, should i still ingest 1g protein per pound of my body weight?
Thank you so much and sorry for my broken English.
Ken