Allostatic Load

In physical fitness, the training load is not just the volume and intensity of the workouts, the training load also includes all the various slings and arrows that life inevitably supplies. While I’ve long known this, I recently experienced how increased allostatic load drains the proverbial fuel tank. 

As many of you may know, my adoptive mother recently passed away. In the months leading up to her death, daily workouts were precious time to process the myriad emotions, to de-stress and to converse with the trees, rocks and streams of Blue Mound State Park. While workout time was a daily priority and supportive of mental health, objective performance measures declined steadily over the past few months.

Only in hindsight do I fully appreciate how much energy emotional labor required, and the necessity of factoring this into training load calculations and expectations of performance. More than likely running 3-minutes/mile slower this past Summer than in previous Summers is not indicative of anything other than holding and processing emotional intensity.

 

I mention this observation as a reminder for all of us, whether athlete-in-training or training-to-be-more-fully-human, to listen carefully to the body’s signals. In my own experience, I’ve found that my capacity to gauge training load is pretty coarse, and I’ve come to rely on a heart-rate monitor to provide a biofeedback reality check. With this direct feedback, I continued to enjoy the time and space to move my body, while maintaining a baseline of fitness, all while staying injury-free.

 

In due time I hope to get faster, though allostatic load continues to remain perniciously elevated. In the meantime, I’ll continue to monitor my body’s perception of stress with the heartrate biofeedback device, and use workout time to nourish, rather than deplete my system.