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Has exercise helped your mental health?
(pawb.social)
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this post was submitted on 20 Mar 2024
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Extremely mixed. Last year my mental health was probably at its lowest after realising how bad my health was (weight and muscle atrophy from becoming a hermit in COVID times). I did a lot of work and I was finally able to go on walks daily without being exhausted and that felt really good. This in turn gave me more energy in the day and that also felt really good.
Also started doing weights. That didn't feel as good. Making progress was nice but I was basically always in pain or aching, and when I wasn't, it meant it was time to work out again. After exercising and the muscles were popped, it felt really good but that subsides. And seeing muscles like that start bringing out the body dysmorphia badly. It was the best Ive ever looked and it made me feel awful. Then I injured myself and it got it was even worse.
Tl:Dr light cardio yes, weightlifting not really
Try the Wendler 5/3/1 weightlifting stuff. Someone on reddit made it into a spreadsheet somewhere.
Basically, don't try so hard lifting weights. You go in the first day and put an estimate in for your 1 rep max, then that day it gives you a workout and the last set you do as many as you can until failure, then you record the number.
From there, the spreadsheet calculates all the rest of your workouts with a gentle progression. His philosophy is basically, leave one rep in you (besides that testing day) for the heavy sets. Then with the BBB variation you do a ton of reps of a really light weight to build a strong foundation. He suggests a "training max" of 85-90%. Meaning there will never be a time the spreadsheet asks you to lift your entire max.
Since I've used that I haven't had any injuries at all, and I don't get super sore (just lightly sore, which I kind of like). Progression is slower, but I think that has to happen because muscles seem to develop faster than tendons adapt to the extra strain, which leads to injuries.
The injury was unrelated to the weights themselves. It was a lack of understanding of how to correctly do lunges. But I appreciate the advice.
Just in case someone else is in the same position. Do not think of it as pushing your knees to 90 degrees. Get in position, loosen your knees and focus on moving your hips down. It's the same principles as squatting but in a different position
Could be the case that your stress levels are too high for exercise to benefit you. Moving, like walking, is fine in those cases. But anything that gets your stress levels up, like weight lifting or running might feel like torture and not provide benefits afterwards. You have psychosomatic therapist who might be able to help with this.