Family/Work/Training Balance

Thank you again. I know i read the layer article some time ago but i will definatly re read it again and the other one. But i understand/appreciate what you are saying for sure.

Like others have said a home gym was the answer for me. I remember lifting in the garage with the little fella in his bouncy chair thingy.
Now the kids are older I still love it, come home from work, disappear for just over an hour, then back out into the house

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Yeah im getting the idea that i may need to buy or build a couple things i am missing so that i dont need to go to the commercial gym for anything.

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I don’t have a home gym but I go to a gym close to me. I wake up at 400am to get there. Ive considered training during my lunchbreak but that takes away time from my kids and the early wake up doesn’t.

If I were to go in the evening, after theyve gone to sleep then that would take time away from my wife…

… damn! I’ve been doing this all wrong!

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echoing what others have said, training early in the am and efficient exercise selections are clutch. I’m at gym when it opens 5am, done by 6:30 before anyone is even up for the day and your workout is done.

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While getting up at 4 AM and putting in a solid session is an option that has worked for many here, let me suggest another method I often used when the kids were little and both time and sleep were precious.

Get a pull up bar (one that attaches to the door frame), a good ab roller, and good band. At work/before breakfast/while watching TV: Do sets up push ups. Do sets of pull ups. Do one leg squats (to a chair/bench). Do ab roll outs. Do lots of band pull aparts. Accumulate volume. Shoot for personal best numbers throughout the day.

To me, this was less stressful than trying to get to the gym early and putting in a full session. If I had 5 minutes, I could crank out 4x25 push ups. Or 3x10 pull ups, etc…

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My boys are adults now at 25 and 28 but I was training before they were born I never missed a workout after they were born. Now this took a tremendous amount of pre planning and always asking what if? I always had a plan B. I coached little league baseball and football and worked a retail management job at 45 hours a week plus. But since I am the boss I could work a lot of things around my schedule. I also belong to 3 major gyms so there was always one near where I was. It helps if the wife trains also so you can switch off with each for childcare while the other works out. The only thing I ever missed was sleep. It came at a premium. My motto is we always find the time to do whats most important to us.
What’s amazing now is that my boys are starting families now and they also work out and they are constantly asking us how did we do it all.

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Thanks for that suggestion man. Sounds like a good option as well

I have 9 year old twins and never stopped training, but I always made sure family came first. Like most people have suggested here, early workouts and training at home help out a ton. You can also look at how your training week is set up. 3-4 days/week can be plenty and some have even made progress on twice/week. They’re only small for a short period of time and before you know it, they’ll get older and you’ll find more time to train. I think the important thing is not to stop, thinking you’ll pick it back up when they’re older. Do that and the next thing you know, you’ll find yourself the average, out of shape, middle aged guy.

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Had my first 18 months ago and second on the way.
I pretty much did what Antiquity said. I also did a lot of calisthenic from the ground (planche push ups, l sits). Now that O have a bar and weights I will be running 5/3/1 Widowmaker. Hit your 5/3/1 weights, including PR set, then throw a Widowmaker on afterwards. I can knock that out in 15 minutes I think.
I also do not have a rack, so just focusing on heads and possibly front squats.
Congratulations!

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Definitely invest in a home gym. Our baby is 7 weeks old now and I purchase just a bar, squat rack/bench and some weights a few months before he got here for this exact reason. Sometimes I still find it hard to get a workout in, between helping with the baby, spending time with the wife and going to work. Just keep your diet on point and when you are able to lift, go balls to the walls and you will continue to make gains. It’s working for me so far!

This is what I’m dreading when my missus pops one out in January.

I don’t have room for a home gym so I think the only viable option is a combo of kettlebells, chin/dip station and solid running regime (5k, 10k, long ass runs).

For me it’s a case of just getting shit done.

The physique goals can take a back seat for definitely. What’s the point? It’s not like I’ll be trying to score some more pussy :joy::joy:

I bought a Bowflex after my first kiddo arrived. I’d take the baby monitor the garage and train.

I go to a family gym with a Kid Zone. For a little extra money I can drop my kids off for two hours a day as long as I stay in the building.

I also work a crap schedule. I’ve moved to day shift but I’m off Monday - Wednesday. My wife is a teacher and works “normal” hours. I plan my workouts so that I have my big days on my days off.

Check out @ActivitiesGuy 's log. He trains for like 15 minutes a day most days and he’s doing fine.

Two boys 3 and under here…

When/how often/if you can train will be based on a lot of things. Your home dynamic (For example, will you wife take care of the baby 95% of the time or will you be up rocking him/her to sleep at 3AM?) Energy. Time. Work schedule. Etc…

For me personally, the first couple of months was very difficult with our first boy. He was a difficult baby… We also moved when he was about two months so training took a big-time back seat until he was probably 6 months. My wife and I both work, she did most of the heavy lifting when it came to him (thank god), but I was still only getting maybe 5 solid hours of sleep.

When he turned 1, I start lifting at 5:30AM. This was good for a while, but I found I didn’t have the energy to play with him as much in the evenings and had almost no energy after he was in bed (7:30ish). It just didn’t work for me.

Then #2 came along and he was a way better baby in terms of sleeping through the night. I also took a month off to be with him, which made a huge difference, imo. I started lifting at night 4-5 days a week after the boys go to bed so around 8 or so. Tbh, it kinda sucks because that’s literally all I can do on those nights. I finish, eat, shower, and then usually read for a bit and then sleep. on the flip side. I’m not waking up until 6:30ish and energy has been better (losing weight has helped here as well).

Tl;dr:

Lift when you can. Kids change your life and you have to make adjustments that fit your lifestyle and home dynamic.

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Congratulations. I’m four months in and it has been a blast so far.

Step 1: have a home gym. Everyone’s schedules (both work and family) are different, but I would have to significantly alter my daily routine right now to work out without a home gym; however, with a good garage gym, it’s been a breeze (more details below).

Of course, you may have to adapt your training a little bit to what you have at home versus what’s available at your preferred gym, but that’s a workable solution. You could even train at home during the week and work something out with your wife for you to go to the gym on Sat or Sunday to hit anything you can’t do at home (but really: ask your wife very nicely, and make sure that you offer her the chance to do something in return, i.e. she watches kid alone while you get to go to the gym on Saturday, she gets to go to yoga/spinning/get her nails done/whatever on Sunday while it’s your turn to parent solo).

This is important. With my home setup, I find it fairly easy to work out for 20 minutes every day (in fact, when he was a newborn, I usually timed it so I worked out while she was feeding him).

I think it would be a harder sell to my wife to train for 60-90 minutes twice a week (just wouldn’t feel right being in the garage for that long while she had the kid alone). But some people may prefer that - just being “at home” and parenting for most of the week and cramming all of your training into 2 or 3 longer sessions.

Again: talk to your wife (when the time comes) and figure out which is best for you and your family.

Seems like CC has given you good advice here. That can/should all be doable with bands and a couple of dumbbells.

I expect that’s coming soon for me, once my little dude can actually hold his head up a little more.

I mean, we sound like a cult, but most of us that have gone home-gym will endlessly sing its praises. Assuming you have the space, and financial means, and no other limiting steps (i.e. if you move once a year, could be a pain) it is awesome.

Definitely a viable alternative if that works out better for you. Doesn’t Waterbury have some articles about just having a heavy kettlebell & just accumulating a bunch of swings and TGU’s scattered throughout the day?

Kettlebells can definitely be your friend in this situation. I love my heavy deadlifts now but the first few years logging on this site I was all kettlebells and pull-ups.

Finally, to what I do: if my wife & I are both home for the evening, I usually squeeze in my workout during the first feeding after I get home from work. If I get home at 5, kiss the wife real quick, she nurses him while I spend 20 minutes getting my workout in, hop in the shower & now it’s my turn to be dad for the night while mom looks after herself a bit.

If my wife is out for a rehearsal or something, I’ll feed the little man, play with him, get him down for an evening snooze, then take the monitor out to the garage and work out. It’s really not that bad. He sleeps pretty soundly by now.

As others have said, training economy becomes key. Anecdotal experience, of course, but I feel like focusing on heavy deadlifts has prepared my body really well for almost any other challenge that I would need to throw at it (not necessarily if I were comparing myself vs competitive high-level strongmen, but in general). Limit strength is somewhat of a master quality. I spent a lot of time working deadlifts and relatively little other stuff in the past couple years, and the strength gains from all that deadlifting carried over pretty well to “other stuff” when I’ve re-tested it and spent even a little time working on it. So, while you have to figure out your own way, if you are really pressed for time, I have found high-frequency, low-volume, heavy deadlifts a way to feel that I’ve stayed all-around strong and pretty well able to adapt to other challenges.

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One other note, which coincides with what others are saying about training economy. You’re gonna want to dial things back. I would concentrate of short intense sessions. I would not use a lot of volume. The last thing you want to deal with is DOMs in your lower back at 3AM while rocking a crying infant.

Trust me on that.

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Haha. So true, if it’s anything like when my son was born, wow, I went to work for a break. I remember coming home and the wife meeting me at the door with him for a break herself. He had some gut issues so cried wolf, man, I remember some weekend I was like a zombie!

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My work, gym, and home are all within 15 minutes from each other, and I sometimes work from home. My wife lives away from me till she graduates, then she’ll move in.

I live with my elderly parents and take care of my disabled mom. In the AM, my dad takes her to the bathroom when I leave for work, but I stop at home for lunch when I take my mom to the bathroom, and again after work before I leave for the gym. Put her in the shower every other day on non-training days. After I lift, I take her to the bathroom again and then we eat dinner. I send my parents to bed at 11 and then go to bed myself.

If I’m behind on work stuff, I’ll just do it from my room in the evenings or weekends, but I manage stuff well enough to not have to do this often. Thankfully, my dad handles the cooking (retired restaurant owner) and much of the cleaning, but I do as much as I can on the weekends.

Honestly, I don’t have much of a social life outside the gym or outside of weekends. Most of my social time lately has been volunteering to set up at meets because I realized volunteering at the meet was too time consuming for me.

There is no such thing as work, family, training balance. A better way to term this would be “work, family, training INTEGRATION”.

It all depends on your goals, but I find shorter workouts more frequently to be more beneficial like @ActivitiesGuy. Just easier to commit to 20-30 minutes daily, vs having a 60-90 min session ESPECIALLY if you have to go to a gym.

But since you have a barbell and dip/pullup station you are set.

I would do 30 minutes of training a day with some combos like this and just rotate through the days. You can get strong as fuck while keeping your sessions to under 30 minutes for sure!

Deadlift & Dips
Front Squat & Chin-Ups
OH Press & Rows

There some good ideas here too:

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Lol, I’d walk in the door and my wife would hand him off like I was coming out of the backfield… He’s the sweetest kid now, but damn did he cry.

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