hi comrades kirby-wave

a while back I made a comment promising to share a customized workout routine catered towards forming a more traditionally feminine body shape - this is that, only a couple weeks late! I'm going to divide it up into two sections - the routine itself, and some notes I've made on transfemme fitness in general.

the routine

I have designed this as an upper/lower/upper/lower. Most fitness routines put more than 50% time into upper but we're not most fitness routines. The idea is M/Tu/Th/F, or whatever 4 days on 3 days off you have in a week. Only rule is no 2 same days in a row and no 3 any continuous days in a row. Skip upper days before you skip lower days. All exercises are 3 sets unless specified otherwise. I'm not going to go into things like form, choosing your weight, etc. here because these things are covered well by existing fitness guides and I'm not more qualified than they are. To warm up, before each exercise, do the exercise for one set at the specified number of reps with half to two thirds the weight you intend to lift for the main sets. Don't skip your warm-up. meow-knife-trans

The exercises:

Lower A

Lower A
Exercise Reps Notes
Back Squat1 10 activate your glutes on the way up and at the top
Romanian Deadlift 8 also activate your glutes at the top
Leg Extension (Single Leg) 10
Hip Abductor1 15 hold open for a second or two, return to closed slowly
Leg Curl (Single Leg) 10
Calf Raise 12 hold at the top for a second or two
Glute Machine1 12 each gym will have a different machine for this, change your reps based on what feels right. consider holding at the top/bottom and returning to neutral slowly.
Leg Lifts ??? this one tracks reps, not weight!

Upper A

Upper A
Exercise Reps Notes
Overhead Press3 10
Lat Pulldown3 10
Dumbbell Bench Press 10
Dumbbell Row 12
Tricep Cable Pushdown 12
Supinated Dumbbell Curl 10
Pectoral Fly1 12 do this one nice and slow for chest definition, this is your most femme-affirming exercise of the day 🍒
2

Lower B

Lower B
Exercise Reps Notes
Leg Press1 10 if you have crunchy knees like I do, do 10 to 20 seconds of standing quad stretches between each set. really do this twice a day every day if you have crunchy knees.
Hip Abductor1 10 hold open for a second or two
Hip Adductor 10
Leg Curl 10
Calf Raise 8 hold at the top for a second or two
Bulgarian Split Squat1 10 form >>>> weight for this exercise more than any other, smooth, stable, fluid movements and hold at the top
Barbell Hip Thrust1 10 my favorite exercise of all time <3 make sure you're holding at the top! this is where the 🍑 is made
Weighted Crunches 12

Upper B

Upper B
Exercise Reps Notes
Seated Cable Row3 12
Incline Dumbbell Bench Press1 8
Chin-ups3 10 use an assist machine if you can't make 10 very clean reps 3 times in a row
Dips 10 same as above
Hammer Curl 10
Dumbbell Shrug3 12
2

Routine Footnotes

Routine Footnotes

1: These are your priority exercises for these days - this means that if you have extra steam, throw on an extra set or two. Do not lift more than you are comfortable lifting. More sets is better than more reps. Inspired by this article from the original thread.

2: This is where I'd add an obliques exercise, except that oblique work widens your waist so I've omitted it. If you like a more robust waistline, I'd do dumbell side bends and weighted twisting crunches here. There's something to be said for targeting the transversus abdominus in slimming your waistline, but I don't know enough to do that sooo comment down below with ideas? maybe planks on these days?

3: this is shoulder work. I personally like my broad shoulders, but many transfems don't. That being said, back work leads to good posture and good posture is both sexy and healthy, fem or masc, so if you don't want bulky shoulders and upper back, I recommend still doing these and doubling the reps and halving whatever weight you were gonna do.

Additionally, I do have arm work in here, same goes for the notes on shoulder work except that arm work is less relevant for posture - if you don't want to add bulk on your arms, double your reps and halve your weight, and if you really don't wanna work arms, you can skip the isolation exercises (both curls and tricep pushdowns) and let the compound exercises take care of it.

Another note on practicality - the reason for choosing the order I did is to 1) put the more important/bigger lifts at the front while you're the freshest, and 2) to avoid hitting the same muscle group 2 times in a row. The order is also largely preserved from the 4-day split in Jeff Nippard's Fundamentals Hypertrophy program that was the basis for this program. You'll probably run into situations where you can't do these in the order specified - that's fine, just make sure you don't do the same movement twice in a row (rows into chin-ups, squats into leg extensions, etc.)

General Transfeminine Fitness Notes

General Transfeminine Fitness Notes

Gyms are not the friendliest environment to be trans. Shit sucks but it is what it is. You will see the most progress by a lot if you have a complete set of equipment, so it's imperative to find a gym you are comfortable and safe in. Notes:

  • Give every place a fair shake. I've been at affirming gyms in reactionary shitholes, and I've been at toxic gyms in progressive bastions. You should try your best to tour as many gyms as you can reasonably expect to go to, because finding one with a good vibe will drastically impact your willingness to get up and go.
  • When touring for the above, trust your gut. If it feels off, it's not the gym for you; the feeling probably won't go away.
  • If you have a friend you could make into a workout buddy, drag them along! It's a lot less intimidating to go with someone else, and especially if that other person has an intimidating demeanor, you can win yourself a nice personal space bubble with this.
  • Consistency is more important than anything else. If it's music, if it's a little treat afterwards, if it's some kind of little points based system you come up with, if it's alarms, come up with a way to get yourself in the gym. Us trans folks are very often neurodivergent and building habits can be hard so put as much thought into getting yourself to the gym as you do about what you'll do when you're there.
  • Consider adding a stretching routine to your time at the gym. Not only does this help you in your fitness goals, but being flexible is also fun. bottom-speak
  • You belong. You're here to work on your fitness just like everyone else. Don't feel guilty for taking up space. This especially goes for squats into RDLs in Lower A - squat racks are highly sought after equipment and you're using it for two exercises in a row. Don't rush it - you deserve it because you are precious and deserve the world. cat-trans
  • When you get home, you need to get some protein in you. Also depending on your body type (I'm skinnier than I wanna be and maybe you are too??) keep in mind that in addition to getting sufficient protein you're going to want to get a lot of good fats too - many bodybuilding recipes leave this out because that's not conducive to 3% body fat. Working out in a healthy fashion lowers cortisol and lower cortisol promotes a more feminine fat distribution. I'm going to leave this as an exercise for the reader (I have a few recipes I lean on heavily, future post??? thonk)

I want this to be a living document. I'm not the most experienced weightlifter and I'm also not a binary transfemme so this will likely not be the perfect post - please make suggestions and notes if you have any in the comments! I'll try to roll them in for the lifetime of the post.

love y'all, solidarity, and happy lifting 😘heart-sickle

  • aaro [they/them, she/her]
    ·
    1 year ago

    hi! I am both on E and have shit knees, so I am fairly qualified to answer this one!

    for the former - you can still gain strength on E. It is very much slower and the maximum you can achieve is lower, but you would be surprised at what your body is capable of. I've only been on E for a short time and I have already noticed changes, but even if your ability to gain strength and mass drops to cisfeminine levels, you can reasonably expect to put on at a minimum 10 pounds of muscle in a year of dedicated training and a good diet depending on your build (for people with T this is around 20 pounds), which is a lot of muscle, especially if it goes where we want it to. Muscle mass aside, if your concern is functional strength, anybody, cis or trans, fem or masc, can reasonably expect to double their day one lifts with enough time, which means stronger hand-to-hand combat and practical skills. In fact, targeted strength training is a great way to feminize if you don't have E as an option as well.

    as for the knees, I can only speak to one specific kind of shit knees - patellofemoral pain syndrome. In my case it's due to muscle tightness in my knees being asymmetrical and causing pressure to be applied in the wrong points. Stretching can fix it if this is the problem, and this is something that should be done fully before undertaking strength training in the legs - taking tightness and adding more strength plus a lot of weight is a recipe for disaster. When I hear family reasons though I kind of think maybe connective tissue problems? If that's the case then I believe strength training can actually help you, but 1) I'm not a doctor and 2) even so, I knida think the strength training needed for people with a connective tissue disorder is very different from a routine for someone without a connective tissue disorder.