hypotonia?

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All my life I was the scrawny kid. And as a result I became very uncomfortable with my body's appearance. Always wore long sleeve shirts and long pants, even in the heat. (And sometimes big coats that gave me the look of more "bulk.) I tried working out, that just made me tired and sore, but I never really did increase muscle mass much, never did get a "toned" look.

A few days ago I read about "hypotonia." And I'm wondering if that's what my deal is. And wondering if it's an aspie thing.

Im a scrawny aspie too but I dont think that aspergers has anything to do with it. Hypotonia causes weakness because of lack of muscle tone.

Well I've never been a strong individual. Never could build strength up. Cant even do chin-ups.

I'm the opposite. I exercise like crazy and barely eat anything and I'm overweight. I think it's because all of my medications have "weight gain" as a side effect.

You can still be fat and have hypotonia, as long as your muscle tone is too low.

You'd need a doctor or a PT or OT to diagnosis something like hypotonia. It doesn't have anything to do with building up strength, or how much muscle you have. It has to do with a problem with neurological background activity (the extrapyramidal system) that determines how much your muscles resist movement (at least that's what I understand). Kids with low tone that I've seen tend to be floppy, tend to have trouble keeping themselves upright and often lean.

Im scrawny as hell and also wear geans all year long, even in the hot summer, for me the reason im super skinny was because I did not eat well while little and growing up, had a food thing, so i never grew right, however im pretty healthy, never sick hardly, do work requiring lifting heavy objects and do lots of outdoors activities, what were u like when little, did u eat well, i forgot what its called, some people like us growing up wont or cant eat certain foods. very odd, like I was afriad to try something different, i always wanted to eat the same stuff over and over...

Well, I have studied exercise a lot and once even had some fair success. I watch things like unbreakable(There is a scene where the heros kid keeps loading a bar and stands back in astonishment as his father(the hero) keeps pushing the bar) Well, there have been times when I could bench close to 300lbs. I could do leg extensions with over 250lbs, and I won't even tell you how high on the calf raises.

Yet I spent most of my life, and now for the most part probably am, far weaker.

Basically, you have to make sure you always have enough available protien(You have to have the right amino acid makeup, so glutamine, among some others, is required), work past your ability, lift as heavy a wieght as you can, and rest each part at least 1 day between each set. You also, of course, need enough carbs that you can exercise and survive without burning up too much available protien. Of course, you also need vitamins and minerals. If you eat meat without having enough magnesium, for example, the meat won't help you build very much muscle.

hypertonia is more than just weakness. And MOST people with AS probably aren't all that strong. NOT because of the AS, but due to a lack of exercise caused by working on relatively non physical pursuits, and a lack of vanity and socializing. I can tell you that that was MY main problem. NOW it is more because of routine, and a lack of socializing.

As others said muscle tone isn't how big your muscles are.

Muscles are partially contracted in their natural 'relaxed' state. In that if you disconnected a triceps it would extend further than the forearm. To keep it in his contracted state there is an unconscious electrical impulse. It tends to be thin on one end and more bulbous on the other. The overall size of the muscle is irrelevant. There is optimum you want the muscles are not collapsing under its own weight and hanging but slightly firm that is essentially what happens with hypotonia as well the muscle itself completely lacking elasticity and rigidity. It you had this you would be very limited motor control.

Weak muscles can be from poor nutrition, electrolyte deficiency (potassium, sodium, etc), or just generally not being used. Then there is the size of the muscle itself. You need to do body build exercise and then eat enough protein to help you muscles repair and grown.

More common is hypertension (maybe hypertonia would be the clinically significant version), this also can cause you to feel weak. It is mostly caused my stress both physically and mentally. The tenser the muscles are the higher up the length the muscle rides the more tense it is. You would think that because this makes the muscle look superficially larger that therefore you would be stronger. That is wrong. It is causing more resistance and inflexibility you would get a build up of lactic acid faster.

The way you could treat hypertension is through reducing stress, anxiety, eating bananas (potassium), and some exercises that can release muscle from the tense state without adding it back on such as Progressive Muscular Technique

When a muscle is used rigorously the cells sense that and create more and stronger protein chains but don't replicate very much leading to small but strong muscles.

Body building on the other hand is actually designed to cause tiny tears in the muscle tissue which heal and scar causing the muscle to grow abnormally large at an abnormal speed but decreasing the overall tensile strength of the muscle tissue (increasing the chances of more severe tearing). Increased strength is a side effect of the body building training but not its primary goal.

Contrary to popular belief large muscles are not necessarily stronger and if anything are a sign of severe internal scarring.

That "burn" the exercise enthusiasts are always talking about is a positive thing to them because it means their muscles will grow in size.. but probably stay relatively the same in actual strength.. the sensation is a symptom of lesions and tearing of the muscle fibers.

Fraya,

You are right to a degree, but the smaller muscles are usually better for endurance, not strength and, trained properly, bigger muscles CAN be a lot stronger. As for the burn, etc... That can happen with EITHER type of exercise. Remember when I said a few heavy sets? You COULD do a lot of light sets, and gain endurance instead.

As a kid I was super skinny but I was so weak that I still couldn't do a single pullup. I filled out after my growth spurt was done around the age of 16-17. Now my muscles grow when I work out but they still shrink back to nothing if I stop. Around the age of 20 I did pullups every day for a year until I could do 10 in a row. I stopped doing them for about a year and found I was back to only being able to do 1 . I've been working out again and so far I'm back to doing 5.