Getting a healthy balance of exercise and rest is important. Most people don’t exercise enough, but there are others who exercise too much. Excessive physical activity can be just as harmful as not getting enough exercise. It’s important to realise when exercise has become an addiction, or indeed if your lifestyle has become too physically active due to physical labour at work or too much walking/cycling. This post lists a few signs that you could be doing too much exercise.
You’re constantly tired and sore
Some achiness and tiredness is expected after an intense workout, but if you’re constantly tired and sore it could be a sign that you’re exercising too much. Being constantly exhausted and in pain could affect your motivation in other areas of life and your mood could even be negatively affected. Having a few complete rest days from exercises could give you a chance to refresh.
You’re experiencing overuse injuries
There are many injuries that can be caused by repetitive motions or repetitive impact on a certain area. This includes the likes of carpal tunnel syndrome, runner’s knee and tennis elbow. Rest could be necessary to recover from these injuries – failure to rest could result in these injuries potentially becoming permanent. A physiotherapist service can help you to recover from such injuries. By making sure that you’re having rest days from certain exercises, you can reduce the risk of developing overuse injuries (for example, if you’re training for a long run, make sure that you give yourself a day or two’s break from running).
You’re training through injuries
Training through injuries will just make them worse and could lead to other injuries. No matter what your exercise goal is, it’s important that you take the time to recover. Yes, you may not be able to enter a competition if you take time off to recover, but there could be the chance of a future competition. If you continue to train through your injury, you could make the injury worse and it could turn into a serious chronic injury, preventing you from ever competing again.
You’re performance is plummeting
In order for your performance to improve, you need to keep your energy levels up. If you’re exercising too hard and too often, you won’t have this energy to give and you could see your performance plummeting. Training with achy muscles and joints is also not going to give you the best performance. While it can be frustrating having to take rest days when you’re eager to step up your performance, it may be exactly what is needed to improve.
You can’t sleep
Overtraining can also lead to insomnia – especially if you’re training in the evening. Your body will still be buzzing with adrenaline and endorphins, which can prevent you from sleeping. Lack of sleep will in turn prevent you from making gains. To end this vicious cycle, make sure that you’re giving yourself time to relax between exercise and sleep. If you can’t avoid training late in the evening, try to plan a day of rest afterwards – once the buzz of the exercise has worn off, you can then catch up on sleep.