Peculiarities of a post-overtraining phase

Part 1: Rock bottom

Battle of Coimbra (2018) — #65

February 4th, 2020

A while back I started thinking. I thought, and I made a decision. It wasn’t an easy one. It some time to actually take that step and say it, out loud, but here goes.

This is a little bit of me. Perhaps I shouldn’t write it, or publish it. Maybe it would be best to show you the pretty. But we all know that we have much more to learn in moments when things get tremendously ugly and “slightly” deeper.

I am not an athlete. Never have been. I’ve never enjoyed using that terminology referring to myself. My hobby is not my job. It never has been. It never will be. I don’t want it to be although, in the past, I have. It’s simple to mix things up and use training as an escape. There’s nothing wrong with that. The problem is when it evolves from an occasional escape to an absolute priority. The problem is when you start avoiding facing your real problems to filter them into “athletic” ones, obsessing over being unable to do that movement or lift that weight.

I’ve always been one of those firm believers in that phrase that has turned into a big cliché, “our qualities can also be our worst faults”. And isn’t that right? The thing is: where there is excess, anything can become a sickness. And our body warns us. It alerts us so much. They say we are more than our bodies, but I believe our bodies might be more than who we are. It feels and sends us messages. It feels everything, even the things that we consciously avoid feeling. I don’t think you are quite aware of how much our bodies actually warn us. It does trust me. This belief doesn’t solely rely on the concept of “listening to the voice within”, in fact, I would alter that to “feel your bodies”. For real. Feel them.

I have made a terrible mistake. It’s true. Not because I didn’t feel it. I did. A lot. But I would shut it down with excuses and justifications, absurd training volume, and loads of futile worries about things that weren’t actually the ones that tormented me. I listened to whom I shouldn’t have, I allowed external and internal pressure to get the best of me. I allowed my self-esteem to be degraded to the point of feeling weaker instead of more confident while working out, not in a humble way, but in a self-destructive one. Everything can become a sickness if it’s excessive. Even the challenge, coaches’ “tough love”, personal overcoming, and even the ambition to become more systematic and methodical and shut down the emotions at all costs.

I have no regrets. All that I have done has made me who I am today. A person that is very different from the one most of you have met. If I hadn’t lived through that, I wouldn’t be able to analyse the situation from both perspectives and help others. But that’s me. I’m not afraid to speak up because today I can say that I feel stronger, healthier, happier and apt to support others with more consideration, rationality, and empathy. To me, that’s all that matters.

Deep down, my intrinsic motivator has always been helping others and, in some way, inspiring someone, even if it’s only one person out of all the ones who have been following my journey. It’s for those who feel they are unfit and, like me, have grown with self-esteem at a lower altitude than the shores of the Dead Sea (which according to Google, is one of the lowest points of the Earth).

For those who are reading and thinking that they know someone like this, or that this person might be you, you must keep in mind that the people who have warned you with that fondness that comes out kind of humorous, sort of sarcastic, a little critical — that maybe you are being excessive — they are not against you.

It’s quite the opposite of that. It’s because they see you. So, don’t take those comments as an offence and realise that at the moment silence is all that you hear, it’s because they have already given up on you — and nothing is worse than bringing people to simply give up on your common sense. So, listen. Listen to those who waste a second of their time to tell you to rest, to take care of yourself more than in between those four gym walls, but outside — out there in the real world.

Overtraining is associated with physical and emotional symptoms, but I believe there is a “post-overtraining” phase, that does not mean that you have healed. It’s when it has evolved into something much more dangerous and destructive, which is when you embrace your overtraining with pride as a landmark of discipline and hard work. I’m not going to deny it though — in order to reach the top, feel invincible, tolerate excruciating amounts of pain until it becomes all that you want to feel… It takes a lot. Believing that the consequences of that are positive and still believing that you are indestructible, although your body is screaming for help…? It’s really something. But believe me: it will eventually catch up to you. Your body will speak louder than your recklessness. You can silence it for months, years, or even decades, but one day, you will feel this void, look around you and realise that your biggest conquest in life was attaining the incredible capacity to tolerate pain. Nothing else.

AgiAGD Comp (2019)

Part 2: The consequences

Anniversary Cup of the Portuguese Weightlifting Federation — (9/2019)

January 10th, 2021

I’ve been avoiding it. I’ve been resisting the urge to remove myself from the team’s group chat, unfollow athlete friends from social media, or take a quick glimpse at someone lifting a barbell when I walk across the gym. But I’m a liar. Truth is, I’m a little heartbroken.

I’ve opened the drawer to look at my singlet, grabbed my medals and closed my eyes to remember the days that magnified me while simultaneously humbling me. Yet I don’t really feel sad. Or angry. Or frustrated.

People think I do. Because I loved this sport. Because it gave me so much. Coach tells me to be optimistic and believe in a comeback. In all honesty, optimism and comeback are two words that don’t make sense to me any more. The reality is, I don’t want to go back. And that lack of passion for something that used to move me every day is what breaks me a little when I actually think about it.

Truth is: I fell out of love with the sport that I’ve come to earn respect in. I fell out of love with the sport that gave me friendship. I fell out of love with the sport which made me feel joy and enthusiasm. I fell out of love with the sport that made me feel (and overcome) great amounts of physical pain. And just like any relationship where there is inspiration and admiration (the two essential traits that in my view define love) — I tried.

I tried to adapt, to switch up the scenario, to remember the good times and to push through. And I did. I pushed through. I pushed through for a year, on a body that was wrecked, unhealthy and fractured, in hopes that the flame would burn out again enough to numb the pain as I once had been able to. But at each training session, I found myself hating it more and more. Just like any love-based relationship, where the love fades, but you keep fighting to the point of exhaustion in a failed attempt to bring back what is forever gone.

That’s a first. I used to love the impossible things. I guess I grew out of those tendencies. I guess now I know better than to put my health at risk. I guess now I know better than not to do what I have to do because of how I think about me (catchy phrase by a good bloke, that I often quote to friends). Because I had reached a point where the only thing that was holding me back from walking away for good was the fear of losing all I had achieved and the respect I had earned from my coach, and mates. But then I remembered that, just like any authentic love-based relationship, good memories always stay, and true respect doesn’t just go away.

And that is why I have made my decision — to let go of this beautiful sport that I once loved. A sport that taught me lessons of grace and humility. A sport that led me to the realization that resilience and grit are the real determining factors of victory. A sport that proved to me that if you truly set your mind on something, you’ll achieve great things and gain much more than you can imagine.

Now, I am free. And the lessons, those I shall never forget. Because just like any love-based relationship, sometimes letting go is the only solution to grow out of resentment and heartache to one day fall back in love again with something else. With no hard feelings, only peace and trust that next time, the outcome will be different.

Face2Face Games (7/2019) — Gran Prix Internacional Gandía (3/2020) — Weightlifting Initiation Tournament (9/2015) — Gran Prix Internacional Gandía (3/2020)

Part 3: Freedom as a verb

Promofit Games (Nov 2019), shot by Filipa Ribeiro

So, you want vulnerability? I’ll give you vulnerability.

It’s not a bed of roses. Letting go of the sport that made up a big part of your daily life — it’s really not a bed of roses. Eight months later. It happened. The fear, the anxiety. The sadness. The grief. The wondering if refusing to touch a barbell or watch sports is a subconscious avoidance method to dodge the pain of facing reality of what had happened, or an actual decision that was taken voluntarily.

I debated myself with these thoughts many times and found out it was neither. It was a decision, yes, but it was born out of several discoveries. Then I avoided writing about it, maybe because I hadn’t processed everything that had happened.

Either way, I’ll give you vulnerability.

In December 2020, after a year of ongoing pain during every single workout and sleepless nights, I found out that what I thought was a soreness that had to be overcome with the no pain, no gain mentality was a complex diagnosis that would change my life.

Isthmic spondylolisthesis (aka fractured vertebrae), which would require months of rest, physical therapy and rehab, and a lower back undergoing a peculiar degenerative process. I was told right away that continuing competitive sports could worsen the injury, potentially even after full recovery — with no prognosis of when that would be.

Then, three months ago, after months of bed rest and little to no exercise, I found myself in the strangest of places. A place I thought I wasn’t capable of going, a place I thought I would never go back to. And it’s not like I had lost my passion. I had just forgotten what I was passionate about. I thank adversity for in a peculiar way — perhaps the most peculiar way of all — pushing me towards my true love. Dance.

I don’t know why I was so surprised considering that in the lowest of moments, it’s where I would always instinctively find myself. Alone in a dark room, any music could simultaneously awaken and pacify me in ways that nothing else in the world has. It is a strange thing, to realise that you’ve been lost. But how beautiful it is to find yourself, a decade later, when all the odds are against you. Even your own body.

I discovered that all along, I knew how to be free. To have the feeling that no matter what challenges and hurt life might throw at you next, you will never be empty because you have that safe space in which melodies can compel you to create movement and for a moment in your life — simply exist. With no particular motive, for no particular reason.

And I swear I was so different. I was so unlike myself. I even wonder how I was able to take my body to such lengths to restlessly attempt to become perfect in something just to prove a point. To put my physical and mental safety at risk, so I would not get sidetracked on my mission to achieve perfection.

The irony of this whole story is that it was in dance that I was taught the basis of striving for perfection, but it was not in dance that I applied it. It was in life and, especially, in things that did not represent my identity. I traded who I was on a quest to be enough for others, and I lost myself along the way. And finally, a decade later, great adversity reminded me of who I was and took me on a wild ride towards self-discovery.

I learned to live with a new body that on one hand is more fragile than ever and, on another, is home to a brain that has never been this resilient. Truth is, my body will never be as healthy as it was, and sometimes I will get a reminder of it in the form of temporary impaired movement and crippling physical pain. But I believe I learned my lesson, I learned it the hard way, and I would not have it any other way.

So, you wanted vulnerability? Here’s vulnerability. And of all of humanity’s flaws, I am pretty sure vulnerability is not one of them. Vulnerability is not a flaw. Vulnerability is being human. It’s connection. It’s reality.

Dance video still photography (2021)