Overexercise

The Daily Mail profiles an average woman addicted to exercise, Janice Utley:

Every day I must jog, weight-train or swim for several hours (a minimum of three to four) or I feel ratty and unable to concentrate. Exercise gives me such a high that it feels like I'm floating....

I have a calorie calculator in my head and am always working out how much exercise I need to do to burn off every mouthful. A bowl of pasta, for example, equates to an hour-and-a-half of running. Being unable to work out for all that time made me feel depressed and out-of-control. I know it sounds ridiculous, and I know I overdo it. I'm always pulling muscles, and there have been times when I've had fainting spells.

Although I worked - as a nursery nurse - I'd go to the gym, go running, go swimming and follow exercise DVDs at home for a total of two or three hours daily. I exercised right through my second pregnancy, too, and James was born healthy. When people gave me compliments about how quickly I'd regained my figure, I felt great and it gave me an incentive to keep up my hard work.

I don't really think I have a big problem with exercise. After all, I'm always reading about the hours celebrities put in to keep their figures in shape and nobody calls them, or the other people at my gym, addicts.

3 to 4 hours of daily exercise is something that professional sportsmen and women, or Olympic athletes follow. And they only do it in the run up to their playing season or a major competitive event. And they have coaches, fitness instructors, physical therapists, and sports medicine professionals to guide them through such tough training.

Moderate exercise only takes up 20 minutes a day, and can be done for just five days a week. Moderate exercise will maintain your body, optimum exercise will build it, but overexercise will cause injuries. Janice is right about one thing; being addicted to exercise, and using it to tide over grief and personal loss, is at least better than turning to drinks or drugs and getting addicted to them!