If you’ve ever started a new workout or even done some work around the house or yard, most likely you’ve suffered from Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness. Or, DOMS.
DOMS is the reaction that happens after either a day of painting, yardwork, furniture moving, or even a day with the grandkids!
It’s also often found after a new workout regimen, a super hard workout, or adding more weights.
Actually…It can also come from not working out often enough to get your muscles used to being used.
Here’s what your body is telling you when it’s sore.
Working out, and a new activity that uses your muscles creates microtrauma to your muscle fibers.
Delayed onset muscle soreness means you’ve engaged your muscles and used them for something great!
When we place a demand on the body that it is not used to, as in weight lifting, or a busy day of activity…the muscles get little baby tears in them. What happens after a day or two is that super sore, stiff, restricted feeling you get when you spend a bit too much time sitting still.
So, therefore, more movement and more exercise is the way to reduce the inflammation that you have created.
However, don’t just rush back to the gym the next day! You’ve got to “feed” your body and your muscles what it needs to repair, and rebuild. OR…you’ll get weaker and possibly set yourself up for an injury.
There is bad inflammation as in heart disease. And, there is good inflammation as in what happens after a week back to the gym or a day of hard physical work.
Rest is when the muscles recover…but too much rest keeps the DOMS coming back over and over.
So what do you do to prevent or get rid of Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness? (DOMS)
As a woman that has lifted weights, co-owns a gym and was a former gymnast…I have some remedies that I swear by.
- Drink a whey-based Protein shake within 30 minutes of exercise. This may or may not prevent DOMS, but it will facilitate repair and recovery of your worn out muscles. We like BioTrust’s Whey-Protein that’s low carb, non-GMO, and comes from grass-fed cows. No hormones or artificial fillers.
- After years in Kettlebell Sport, and with many competitions under our gym’s belt…many Russian kettlebell competitors swore by pickle juice!
- Yeah, I know…sounds nasty but there was a day that I was so sore I could barely walk without making a groan.
- I decided to listen to the pro’s and drank 2 shots of pickle juice. Within 3-4 hours, I was moving better and wasn’t sure if that was the placebo effect, or if it had something to do with the enzymes and salt.
- Either way, I swore it worked. But…I’d pick the BioTrust Whey Protein ANY day for recovery!
- Take a hot bath in Epsom salt. Epsom salt has magnesium in it. Our bodies can have a series of health issues from muscle cramps to fatigue, constipation, and poor sleep if deficient in magnesium. We take a 200 MG magnesium supplement every evening before bedtime, and have taken Epsom salt baths in the winter when super sore!
- Don’t sit and watch a movie. Even though you are too sore to move…the best thing you can do is just that. Move. What that means is take a walk, do some foam rolling or stretching. Anything to get the blood flowing that isn’t an all-out new extreme workout. After all, we’re trying to heal, not create more pain!
I’ve had people ask if they should miss a class at the gym if they are too sore? My answer? Take one day of rest, and get back on the horse. If you’re too weak to push in class, then just go through the range of motions. You can pick up the pace the next day and go harder.
What you don’t want to do is keep taking a step backward and never getting past the pain. Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness affects the strongest and the weakest. The new to the gym, and the regulars.
Be sure to remember this.
“Your next workout is only as good as your recovery from your last one”. Even though there is no scientific evidence that my remedies work…I can attest that they will surely help!
Now go create the body you love so that you can live long and strong!
Coach Dawn
*I may be compensated as an affiliate for BioTrust offers.