Exercise does amazing things for your mind, body and soul but it’s important to know when to slow down. We all love high intensity workouts and breaking a sweat because it makes us feel good and it burns fat but there is a fine line between training like a beast and over-training.
Being sore after a workout is normal but when you are feeling constantly fatigued, extensive pain and soreness that never seems to go away, an irregular heartbeat or just general weakness and no progress, your body is telling you it’s time to take a step back and slow down.
Working out releases cortisol, the hormone released into your body when you are under stress. Cortisol is cortisol so the stress from a workout is the same stress from your job and life. If you don’t slow down, you will build up chronically high levels of cortisol and increase your risk for serious health issues. It’s extremely important to listen to your body when it’s telling you that it’s too exhausted from any stress-inducing activities such as work and exercise— if you ignore those signs and keep on going, you’re only asking for injuries and sickness.
I can’t even begin to describe the past month for me but unsurprisingly, I was still able to commit to my daily workouts and I kept them all INTENSE. That is until this week. It doesn’t help that I also got my wisdom teeth removed last Saturday but when I started working out again on Tuesday, my body totally failed me.. I was burnt out. Then on Wednesday, I attempted to go through my with planned leg day but it got dangerous when I got lightheaded… the next day I was sore all over and I barely did anything! My warm up weights were already killing me, my muscles were super tense, I had fatigue that never went away throughout the week, I could barely hold myself up while sitting at my desk because everything was so uncomfortable and then right when 6pm hit on Friday, my throat got dry and sore, my sinuses went all crazy and I knew I was getting sick. Ugh.
Next week, I’ll be listening to my body and slowing down my workouts. I won’t stop cold-turkey because there is no way I was going to sit at my desk for 14 hours and not do any physical activity. The gym is my escape!! I’ll just continue with easy spins on the bike, lifted light weights and LOT of stretching and recovery but probably nothing intense and no HIIT! Sigh.
