Working out is a great way to burn fat and gain muscle, but what about when it does not? Sometimes, when we kick-up our workout routine or begin training extra hard, our body responds in not expected ways. These responses are signs that your workout may be a bit more intense than your body can handle. If you are seeing any of these signs in your daily life, it may mean you are overworking your workout.
You Cannot Complete Your Usual Routine
One of the biggest ways to know if you are overworking your body is when your usual fitness routine is too much to handle. When we are no able to do a normal workout, it is a sign that our body is failing us. If you have recently changed your routine and increase your workout, it is common to feel discomfort or an inability to finish. What is not normal is not being able to finish a normally average workout at all.
This could be happening for a few different reasons. One of the main reasons that most trainers see is because of a massive increase in your workout load. Sure, our bodies can handle weights, cardio, and an extra metabolic workout all together for a certain amount of time, but not forever. If you are doing more than one form of exercise per day on high intensity, there is a pretty high chance your body is starting to get weaker from a lack of proper recovery.
You Stop Losing Fat
One of the most popular reasons people begin working out is to gain fat and loose muscle. If your workout results have changed from losing fat to losing muscle, you could be overworking your body. When we overwork our bodies, our hormones get turned upside down. This is due to a higher than usual output of the hormone cortisol. This hormone is a steroid that is released from the adrenal cortex in response to high stress. Our bodies use cortisol for insulin retention. When there is too much cortisol in our system, we have a much greater insulin resistant, meaning fats will burn away with much greater difficulty. Since our bodies have an abnormal hormone balance and a lack of fat being burnt off for energy, it is common to see mood swings and muscle loss as well.
If you have been experiencing unusual insomnia, issues with anger, aggression, depression, or loss of motivation, you may need to reduce your workout load.
Sluggish Movements
Having sluggish movements is one of the more complex signs of overworking your workout since it is common for people to feel tired after a workout. The big difference between healthy sluggish and unhealthy sluggish is the amount of downtime needed. It is common to feel tired directly after a workout for the next hour to three hours, depending on the intensity. If you are feeling tired or your limbs feel heavy for more than a few hours, you are most likely overworking your body.
Our bodies need time to recuperate after a grueling sweat session. That is normal. What is not normal is when we are tired for days on end. This means we are going through some massive recuperation that our muscles, ligaments, and joints are not able to handle.