Genetics: Dumbbells are Getting too Light! (Plus Bad News + More Good News) · 9:03pm Dec 2nd, 2021
Gotta love my titles, right 
1) First good news- Hips and back are closer than ever to being aligned! For the longest time, my hips and back would twist toward one side, causing a lot of pain when I'd walk, sit for long periods, and sleep. However, after consistent physical therapy and lifting, I'm super close to having an "even" spine again! My physical therapist said I should expect to be properly aligned by 6 months, which is nothing compared to the nearly 8 years I've been twisted.
And that means I can do heavy bilateral squats, legpresses, and similar movements again! Which is good because...
2) My dumbbells are getting too light for me! The most my handles can fit are 170lbs total, which is a month or two away from being too light to do lunges off my couch with.
And yes, that wasn't a typo. This is 170lbs total which I'm squatting with one leg. Reminder that because of my joints, it took me 2 years just to do one full lunge with my bodyweight 
3) Bad news- I tweaked my back a few days ago being an idiot with the lunges. I'll be fine within a few days. Basically, I brought out my longer handles, which allow me to load a total of 205lbs. However, they're so long that they hit the couch when I was in the bottom of the lunge, causing me to lose my balance and strain my back. Well, lesson learned. No more longer handles
Also, as side note, if I do join a gym next year (leaning towards making a home gym), I have to find a good one. Most gyms max out their dumbbells at 100lbs or so, and many even max them out lower than that! It's rare for a gym to have 150lbs dumbbells, let alone 200lbs ones. For guys who do dumbbell rows as a main lift, even 150lbs is too light after a while. And if you're dumbbell bench pressing, 100lbs is too light eventually too. Dumbbell shrugs... gonna need 200lbs dumbbells in the future at least for that. And so on.
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To make it clear, I'm squatting those, not curling them haha. Well, a split squat, but you get the point. Curls I stay between 35 - 45lbs dumbbells since I'd rather keep my elbows safe. So I have a good 8 years or so before I can curl those giant dumbbells lol.
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Two 15lbs dumbbells? Or 15lbs total?
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Do you do it off a couch? If not, Google "Bulgarian split Squat" and try them. The couch helps with balance so you can focus on the lift.
And I was doing reps with 30lbs last August (well, 25lbs...). Like I said, you have more potential than me since you don't have dumb joint issues to deal with.
I agree don’t go to a gym. Most of the exercises you can do at home and cheaper.
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Disagree on the cheap part. If you want a barbell, plates and a rack for it, that's gonna cost money. I can get it, but it's still pricey. And for legs, a legpress machine is too good to not have, unless you regularly want to do high reps squats and feel like death lol. And there's the leg curl machine, though I can just get a glute ham raise bench.
The best part of a home gym is convenience. I can train whenever I want and not have to wait for anything.
Checking out something like Bowflex or using resistance weights rather than physical weights might be an option to consider. It fits pretty nicely at home and can dial up through several hundred pounds of weight, and tossing pulleys on it lets it reconfigure for just about any exercise
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Has anyone ever gotten big on Bowflex? Legitimately asking haha. I've heard of older guys using it to maintain the size they built in their youth from big weights. However, I can't see a Bowflex replicating a 150lbs dumbbell row or 400lbs Squat. Even though the machine will say hundreds of pounds, it's not the same as hundreds of pounds of physical weight.
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I've admittedly not kept track of how well they work for gains, but it was useful for physiotherapy.
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Yeah, I can see it's uses for PT. After all, the PT work I do like band pull aparts is with bands. If they worked for building tons of muscle, though, then every bodybuilder, fitness model, strength athlete, and football/rugby/MMA player would be using a Bowflex. And yet, none of them do except on commercials lol.