Overtraining / Injury Recovery Advice Needed

I'm thinking there might be some people here who can help me. All of the other places I've looked are geared towards athletes, and I am certainly not an athlete. I'm just a former skinny kid - turned obese man - turned skinny-fat man.

After spending last winter and spring making fantastik progress on my weight loss I went too far and lost too much weight while simultaneously boosting my metabolisim and still keeping my low caloric intake. Not recognizing when to slow down apparently resulted in some serious overtraining / muscle loss. This had seriously messed up my summer adventure plans (I still pushed myself very hard) and now it looks like I'm going to cancel my November mountain bike trip.

I've started to seriously increase my caloric intake (the ten years of dieting are over!!!) and I have been resting (No cardio above 60% max heart rate and no weight training).

After 4 weeks of "resting" I think I have the caloric intake under control, but I still have serious muscle tightness in my legs.

So I need to know when it will be OK to ease myself back in to my fitness routine. Do I need to wait until all the muscle soreness goes away? How long after the soreness goes away should I wait?

I don't want to start too soon, but time at the gym really helps reduce my mental stress, so I would like to get back, albeit slowly, ASAP.

Any advice would be appreciated. Never would I have imagined I could get to the point I am at now, so this is all new to me.

 Depends. Are you currently at a calorie equilibrium? If so, easing into your routine should prove easier - the downside is of course that while your fitness and strength will probably increase you won't see much of any body transformation.

 That's all right though - at this point your number one priority should be to establish your physical baseline parameters, that is to say to evaluate your current physical fitness. Only when you know where you stand and where you want to be can you devise a plan for how to get from point A to point B, neh?

 When restarting any training regime some initial muscle soreness and delayed-onset muscle soreness (DOMS) of varying severity can be expected. As long as you aren't in acute pain, but rather the kind of soreness where it goes away when you've warmed up your muscles, you should be okay.

If this is the same soreness you started with before you took off the time, then I think you should see a professional for an evaluation. Some overtraining injuries involve tendons and ligaments, both of which (esp. ligaments) are notoriously hard to heal.

Have you tried something really different, like swimming, as a way of getting in some activity while letting your leg muscles heal? Some moderate water time, emphasizing arm strokes (you don't have to use your legs, even) might be relaxing.

In the meantime, you might want to work on very gently warming the muscles with VERY light weights or movements, just to the point where you can stretch them. Don't stretch them while they are cold! Once the soreness goes away, you need to be really cautious about resuming because those same tissues--ligs and tendons--are, I find, really prone to re-injury. It would be a good idea to work on strength-training first, to build up to cardio.

It's hard to take off the time you need (I'm better at saying it than doing it, haha) but it is the only solution for overuse/overtraining. And it can take a LONG time--months. Maybe not, but don't ignore any twinges, etc., while in the recover/rebuilding mode. Those are signs to back down and restart, with an even slower pace of increasing your workouts.

Good luck.

Thank you for the advice. I think I am finally at a calorie equilibrium, although I am finding it difficult to shove 2500 - 3000 calories per day down my throat, especially since I've been so used to my 2000 calorie diet for so long. This is a good problem to have and I can get through it.

My routine for the past four weeks has in fact included swimming, along with the elliptical very slowly with no resistance. Stretching and massaging helps immensly. This week I started some very light upper body circuit training, but I am leaving my legs alone.

Unfortunately my legs still get sore just sitting at my desk at work. I'm guessing I still have not healed and need to wait until all the "coach potato soreness" goes away. Once I get there I have a plan to slowly get back to where I want to be. Its the wait that is killing me. I want to dive right back in.

I will be going to the doctor next week just to make sure I'm OK, but I know what I did to get where I am (pushed way too hard with to little fuel), so I'm guessing its just going to take a very long time to heal.

I've had days (like yesterday) when it felt like I was force-feeding myself to get enough calories in to fuel my planned activities (85 miles of bicycling, burned almost 5000 calories for the day, shoveled down almost 4000).

Pizza is your friend.  Specifically, barbecue chicken pizza.  :-)

Stretching will help the soreness, especially with a light warmup, as was suggested above.  Trigger point massage (you can do this yourself, even) can offer *tremendous* relief (see if your library has a copy of the Trigger Point Therapy Workbook, by Clair Davies).

The people who responded seem to make sense but I would underscore the need to stretch.  Stretching was mentioned but in my experience the vast majority of people are wildly too tight and have no idea how much range of motion they have given up (because they have never experienced it)  Many who say they  stretch do little more than a few half hearted side stretches.  My experience comes from a dance and martial art background.  I recommend 10 mins devoted to stretching a day, you can watch TV while at it.  While it would take most years to become flexible you will make serious progress in 5 weeks.  Your legs should feel like they stretch like a rubber band a little when stetching.  Form is very important and knowing the difference between good pain and bad pain.  Sounds like you have really made a huge change in your life with your diets and work outs, great job.