That's Fit

What do headaches, depression, fatigue, illness, irritability, weakness, joint pain, insomnia, loss of appetite, and muscle atrophy have in common? If you answered a day in Amy Winehouse's life, you're probably right, but that's not the answer we're looking for. What is the answer, then? They are all signs of over-training.

As important as it is to push yourself during your workouts, it's entirely possible to push yourself too hard and too far. To help remedy the effects of an overzealous workout program, Men's Health offers the following five tips:

1. Take a Week Off Exercise. Rest is the most effective way to treat over-training, as it provides your body with the time it needs to fully repair the damage.

2. Eat Whatever You Want for 1 or 2 Days a Week. Varying nutrient intake gives you new repair agents your previous diet may have been lacking, say the folks at Men's Health.

3. Train Outside the Gym. Low-intensity exercise (such as walking, cycling, etc.) is considered active rest; it gently pushes nutrient-rich blood into your spent muscles.

4. Get a Weekly Massage. Now, this one may be pushing it a bit. I'm sure all of you would love to get a weekly massage (the author of this post certainly notwithstanding), but that can be an expensive proposition. But, considering that massage has been shown to drive blood into damaged muscles and reset injured fibers, it may just be worth the dough, after all.

5. Bracket All Resistance Training Workouts with a Protein/Carb Meal. Flooding your muscles with the right nutrients at the right time will help boost the healing process.