I do not believe in the one size fits all approach. That is not a marketing line — it is the reason my clients keep showing up. A downloadable twelve-week plan does not know that your right knee still complains on stairs. It does not know you work twelve-hour shifts, or that you have not trained since before your surgery. It knows one thing: the average person it was written for. You are not that person.
The plan is not the problem — the assumptions are
Most generic programs assume four things about you. That you can already hinge, squat, press and pull with clean mechanics. That nothing hurts. That you have five days a week to give. And that motivation is your limiting factor. For the women I train, all four assumptions are usually wrong, and the fifth unspoken one — that you will simply push through discomfort — is the one that gets people hurt.
When those assumptions break, the plan does not gently adjust. It just stops working, and you are left believing you failed at it. You did not. You were handed a template and asked to be average.
What I do instead: meet you where you're at
I like to listen to my clients needs and meet them where they're at. Practically, that means the first session is mostly information gathering. What have you had done? What movements did the surgeon or physiotherapist clear? Where does the pain live, and what makes it louder? What does a normal Tuesday actually look like for you — not an ideal Tuesday, a real one?
From there I build the smallest version of a program that still moves you forward. Sometimes that is two sessions a week and a ten-minute walk on the other days. Sometimes it is a full-body circuit at a load that feels almost embarrassingly light for the first fortnight. Light is not the goal — light is the on-ramp. Loading a joint you have been guarding for a year has to be earned, and earned quickly turns into strong.
Adaptability is the actual skill
The best routine is not the one that looks best on paper. It is the one that survives contact with your life. A program that only works when everything goes right is a program that works about four weeks a year. So I build routines that travel well: a gym version, a home version, and a version for the week you are exhausted and can only give twenty minutes. Same principles, three formats. Nothing to renegotiate at seven in the morning.
That is also why I ask you to tell me when a week has gone sideways. That is not a confession, it is data. We rebuild the week around what is actually available and keep the thread unbroken. Unbroken beats perfect.
What progress looks like when it is yours
Working as a physiotherapist assistant taught me to measure the things that matter to the person in front of me. Not just the number on the bar. Getting off the floor without using your hands. Carrying groceries up a flight without bracing. Sleeping through the night after a leg day. Standing in front of a mirror and not immediately looking for something to criticise.
Those wins compound, and they compound faster when the plan was built around your body instead of a stranger's. If you have tried programs before and quietly decided the problem is you, I would like to show you that it was the program. Tell me where you are starting from, and we will build from there.