About a year ago, I started running into some health problems. They seemed pretty serious at the time, and I’ve been in and out of hospitals and doctor’s offices many many times since. Around January or February last year, I suddenly gained a lot of weight and I got these massive swellings in my abdomen and legs. Fluctuations in weight always occur, but after a few days of gaining about 1.5 to 2 kg’s per day, I was starting to get worried, and I searched online for an answer. Whatever it was, the internet taught me it was potentially life-threatening, and I should immediately consult with my GP. My GP was so worried, he instantly sent me off to the hospital for blood work and heart monitoring.
At the hospital, they couldn’t find anything. Over the course of months, I was checked with every possible measurement or scan they could think of, but nothing was ever found. The oedema was idiopathic, and even now, nobody seems to know what caused it or why. I was running with a doctor for some months, that at some point she suggested it wouldn’t hurt if I were to gain some weight, particularly muscle. But, my doctor said, even a bit of fat mass would probably not hurt me. At this point in my life, I had been losing weight for three or four years. After my weight loss stalled in the summer of 2020, I decided to pursue it a bit more aggressively. I didn’t count calories very carefully, or macros at all. I just did a rough estimate every once in a while, and it got the needle moving again. It got me below 80 kg, and I couldn’t have been happier.
During the autumn and winter of 2020, I was quite happy with my weight loss. I weighed about 76 kg at some point, and my upper body was pretty much skin and bones, while my legs were pretty strong and developed. This was, however, what I was going for. I’m an amateur cyclist, and I started to look like the pros. At the same time, I was pushing 5 W/kg, which is an amazing achievement by any standards. However, in the winter my weight loss had stalled again, and I wanted to see how far I could go. I started tracking my calories using MyFitnessPal (I’m not sponsored by anyone, it’s just what I used). Ironically, the same week I started tracking my calories for real was the week I developed the oedema.
After all that, imagine my consternation when my doctor suggested gaining some weight. I didn’t like the idea at all; we actually bargained. She started with 10, I said how about 3 and finally we agreed I’d go for 5. But I didn’t want to gain any fat, so it’d have to be muscle. Me being a scientist, I didn’t just start eating at a surplus, I started by reading a few books. I figured if I was gonna do this, I wanted to do it right. So I got a few fitness books and I read through them in a matter of days. I learned about calories, macros, weight lifting, progressive overload, etc. At first, I thought I could swing it with just bodyweight exercises, but pretty soon I learned weights were the way to go. I was especially inspired by Mike Matthews’ Bigger Leaner Stronger. I liked the writing style and the simplicity of the approach. Then I set out and spent about 800 euros on a set of dumbbells. Again, I figured if I was gonna do this, I was gonna do it right.
In this series of articles, I’m gonna lay out pretty much everything I’ve learned, and I will also couple that knowledge with my own experience. One thing that every fitness guru says, however, is, ‘what works for me may not work for you.’ Personally, I think it’s a bit of a disclaimer to make sure you don’t blame them for underwhelming results, but whatever. With that caveat in mind, I will tell you how I did things, what I’ve learned, and what works for me.
Bart's Blog 