Overtrained For Almost 10 Years Straight....

[LongBeach_Patriot]

Hey guys, this is my first post here:

I have over-trained for about 8-9 years consistently (no joke). I am now 30, and since I was about 21 I would train hard almost every day. For a couple years I was training hard 6x/week and one light day. Then I added in one rest day. I would take off 2 or 3 days here and there and a rest week maybe once per year. I did cardio almost every training day for about 45 minutes, which I now realize was way to much; and a lot of it was moderate to high intensity cardio. In the past 2 months my body has completely broken down. I have many nagging muscle injuries and pain. My knees are in great pain as well, one of my major concerns. Knees are slightly better since I cut down/out cardio for the past few weeks but still a lot of pain. I recently obtained medical insurance for he first time in about 10 years so I am only now able to get bloodwork/mri's, ect. My blood work came back very good with the only issue being my T was low (this is weird because my energy level, physique, aggression is that of something with High T). It came in at 279. I feel this may be from overtraining. I am going this week to my GP to see the recent test results and if T is still low he is going to prescribe me a Test-supplement such as androgel.

Besides good genetics, my diet is nearly perfect; I take every important vitamin, natural anti-inflammatories, and use supplements to help recovery, muscle preservation and protein synthesis. I am 5'8" about 160-165 lbs, very lean, and have a well built physique (I dont want to come off cocky, but I would consider myself in better shape than 80-90% of the population)

Recently I injured my right Sartorius leg muscle. I took off a week, then resumed exercise but it wouldn't heal. I started PT a few weeks ago and it has helped only a little. I am very disconcerted in general but especially with this injury because I will warm it up, stretch it, and then later the muscle will be very sore and tender. It's like if you don't stretch it, it re-pulls, and if you do-stretch it, it re-pulls. I am very worried about this injury as it has debilitated my way of life and what I love to do; Train.

Last week I threw down my cards and decided to take 2 full weeks off to try and reset my CNS and heal my injuries. Today starts week 2. To be honest my injuries are still prevalent and I feel like doing the most harmless action triggers a pain response from some of muscle injuries. Simply stretching my shoulders the other day triggered a small re-strain on my right pec. Then this morning, doing nothing out of the ordinary my right tricep strained slightly(and this was one of the injuries I thought had healed up by now).

I would really appreciate your advice as to how to go about recovering my body from years of punishment and lack of time to recover. I assume that my body adjusted to not recovering for so long that this is actually a shock to it and it takes a little time for the body to equal itself out again. I've been going to acupuncture, I go to PT, use a foam roller, roller stick; Anything that can help me.
I am not a powerlifter, I aim to have a nice balance between strength and power while keeping flexibility and athleticism. I do a lot of dynamic training; plyometrics, TRX suspension training, ect. I would sent a link to my current build but I havent posted enough to post a link.


I used to lift 6x per week and cardio 5x, but I have cut down cardio, and when I come back from injury recovery I'm going in with a 5 day split and 1-2 days cardio per week. I also do mixed martial arts 2x per week for an hour. The 5 day split will be something like:

M-Shoulders/Traps
T- Arms/Abs/MMA
W- OFF
TH- Chest/MMA
F- Back
SA- OFF
SU- Legs

I deadlift every once in a while, but used to deadlift more. I don't really like them so much and prefer not to implement them more. When I do deadlift its at moderate weight loads; nothing too heavy. I squat heavy, and go heavy on bench as well, but I don't go heavy every week. I like to switch up weight and rep schemes. My workouts besides legs are non-traditonal.

My goals are really to keep my current physique with maybe 5-10 more pounds of muscle and more definition. I like and am content where I am. The key for me is to get healthy and come back training smarter so that I can keep doing what I love for the rest of my life.


I feel that my scenario is very specific and not so common especially how long and hard I have over-trained. Its amazing I haven't broken down already. I think that at 30 my body cant recover as fast and allow me to keep training without injury. I'm not old by any means but we all surely recover faster at 21 than we do at 30.

I may have not supplied enough pertinent info for you to properly advise me so please let me know if you need more info.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR HELP.

Michael

 

[musclemom]

Honestly, find a good sports medicine doctor and listen to what they say. If you can find a sports medicine doc who is experienced in prolotherapy/PRP, even better.

Two weeks is not enough to fix 10 years of beating the shit out of yourself and you really need to revise your priorities. More muscle, really? How about living pain free and be happy if you can maintain what you have now.

I have OA, I have RC tears in both shoulders. I'm 18 years older than you and nobody took me and shook me. I'm shaking you. TAKE A FREAKING BREAK, talk to a doctor, get assessed and eventually develop a livable workout routine. Pain is your body's way of saying what you want to achieve is beyond our limits. Sorry.

Look, it's like height or shoe size or hair loss. Sometimes you just have to go "these are the cards, I gotta play the hand". Take it from me, you got a choice between more muscle NOW but pain, daily constant friggin' pain in the future which will be your lot in life, or just finding happy medium, pick the damned medium.

Chronic pain sucks.

 

[stevesmi]

what a mess.

I will give my thoughts on this

I knew a guy who trained everyday who was an ironman. he never had an injury until he played a friendly game of flag football where he blew out his knee from a fluke hit.. he has been running everyday since he was 8 years old. so my point is running shouldn't cause you injuries if you are running correctly.. this means having proper footwear, not walmart shoes. it also means not killing yourself everyday when you train. nobody trains like that.. you should warmup properly and cool down properly. and don't go out there and do interval sprints everyday. you should have light days as well.. tempo days, etc etc. just like if you lift weights dont go in there like a gorilla and throw around heavy weights everyday and max out. you should also be having de-load weeks every 3 months. this means a week you cut everything in half.

as far as your T levels i would NOT get on androgel at 30 years old with those numbers at all. you do realize if you get on that stuff you will be on for the rest of your life. if you were 50 i would tell you get on it, but at 30 i would not. it will suppress your natural T levels. think about that.

 

[Soulthief]

One of two things will happen. You can listen to your body and take a break or your body will do it for you. Your body is telling you to stop but your drive (mind) is saying go.

I know it sucks to consider a long break. I put off a shoulder surgery for 5 years. During my break I got very depressed. I decided to spend my time reading more about diets, exercise, etc. Anything to keep me busy but still feel like I was involved in exercise.

This place helped me a lot too. There are some amazing people on here that will teach you a lot if you are willing to learn. Welcome to EF and good luck on a quick recovery.

 

[rustilldown]

I'm going to go against the grain and say don't stop training. It will beat you up mentally just as bad and over taxing your joints will beat you up physically. I know how you feel about missing gym sessions and it's brutal for some of us to accept this.

I would focus on working muscles that aren't often worked on. Focus immensely on rear delts, focus on doing butt bridges and hip flexor stretches, do as many a exercises and core work as you can without lifting big. Planks, crunches,
BW back extentions. Do glute ham raises. Alot of problems also stem from having a muscle imbalance even if you don't believe you have one. Work on your rotary cuffs specifically. Light weight and range of motion are your friends on this recovery. Don't give up activity levels completely,
You still need to be active to remain healthy, and sane for us fitness freaks.

Lastly, I don't Recommend taking supplements to mask problems, but I have had joint pain many times, and specifically in my si joint. There are
A few things I have found that help alot.

1- quality fish oils and omega 6s. Higher than recommended doses.

2 - cissus rx

3 - tb 500 peptide has really helped me feel better at times, but this isn't something I'm pushing on you, more so something for you to research.

4. Stretching.. Every day. And hold them until you feel the release.

5. Creatine and glutamine combo.

6. And surprisingly , the multivitamin" Orange triad" seems to help me and my joints out. ( I don't work for them, just personal opinion)

8. Whole foods adrenal strength has worked for me in the past too.


Continue to do low impact liss cardio to keep your heart healthy and keep you lean. Just no sprints or intervals that are going to best up those joints more.
Quality sleep.

 

[gjohnson5]

Everyone is right except the one person who went against the grain. At some point overtraining will cause reduced test levels. Rest is the answer. You also do not need anti inflammatiries. Rest will reduce inflammation.

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