Listen to your body

This week has been kind of long for me [and its only Wednesday!]  I haven’t been able to figure out why, and today has been the worst. I struggled to get out of bed, I’ve been in a down mood all day, everything is bothering me, and I’m dragging ass at work. … And no, I am nowhere near that time of the month, so I can’t even use that excuse! I figured that I was just tired from training hard all week, but I'm happy that tomorrow is my rest day. I don’t know if you guys know, but I started following this program called Outlaw. It looks like the “thing to do” now, but I don’t care what anyone says, I can see it working for a bunch of athletes and its geared toward many of my weakness, so I figured I would give it a shot, and drink from the Outlaw cool-aid. Anyway, tomorrow is a rest day and I’m dying for it, never actually been so excited for a rest day before. And let’s face it, I’ve been in such a bad mood that I can’t even stand to be around myself, so I know I need it. Thinking about this, I remembered something that I had read on the Outlaw website about over training and it make so much sense at the moment that I wanted to share it with you guys ….you may be feeling the same way. [I figure it’s much better to put a name on the kind of crazy you are feeling than to stay in the dark]

So you’re tired, feeling crappy, feeling sore, and you’re not sure if you should take tomorrow as a rest day or push for one more day. Well, on Outlaw’s FAQ page, it says that you should use the Mood – Fatigue – Soreness scale to judge your level of over training. On a scale from 1 -10, 1 being the best you’ve ever felt to 10 being on your death bed. They say… 1-1-1 would be ideal, 10-10-10 would be really bad, and 6-6-6 would be fuckin awesome. So I looked into this a little more because I started thinking my mood swings were from over training. I found out that there is an actual syndrome called over training syndrome [which we desperately want to avoid!] and it includes CHRONIC fatigue, appetite loss, altered mood, sore muscles, and sleep disturbance. Anyway, this shouldn’t scare you. I would take these symptoms as a warning sign that you need to “listen to your body” and think about taking a rest day. I also read that the way to avoid over training is to monitor mood, fatigue, and muscle soreness. Just like Outlaw prescribed. So today on my M-F-S scale I’m probably like a 9-8-7… no bueno. This tells me that I even if I wanted to WOD, I should probably rest to get myself back to that “fuckin awesome” 6-6-6. Luckily, tomorrow’s Outlaw is a programmed rest day, but our box and many boxes are open almost every day of the week, so it’s up to you to listen to your body, and be smart about your rest days. Hopefully this could help explain why you almost ripped your boyfriends head off, or couldn’t get out of bed after 4 days straight at the box. Try and use the M-F-S scale to guide you toward understanding what the coaches mean when they say “listen to your body." I’ll keep you guys posted on how my M-F-S scale is tomorrow after my much needed rest day! … So if you’re feeling 6-6-6, get your ass back in the box ;) 

 ... Don't over train to the point where you start looking and acting like this lol:  

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