If you are a regular at the gym or have a passion for fitness, you might have often heard the term DOMS or Delayed Onset of Muscle Soreness. But what exactly is DOMS? Let’s say you have been very consistent with your exercises and are making progress with each day when suddenly one day you have sore limbs and a sore back. This soreness sometimes becomes too unbearable and you have no energy to carry on with your exercise routine.
Sometimes the soreness is so much that you can’t even perform your day-to-day activities with ease. There are many remedies advised for this soreness, one of which includes using magnesium body lotion just after your post-workout shower to relax your muscles and reduce soreness. However, understanding the root cause of this soreness and how it affects your muscles might be more helpful to deal with it.
Delayed Onset of Muscle Soreness or DOMS is nothing but the soreness or muscle pain that you feel after intense exercises on a daily basis. This is usually caused due to the breakdown of muscle cells. DOMS can come with pain, swelling, and loss of flexibility in the affected muscle.
How to deal with Delayed Onset of Muscle Soreness (DOMS)?
If you are experiencing DOMS or Delayed Onset of Muscle Soreness, you would observe that you are not able to do the activities at your normal capacity because your muscles just won’t allow it. This makes you think that you are falling behind on progress and it also causes severe pain and may even lead to injury if you keep pushing yourself. This is why finding a way to deal with DOMS to get back to your performance level is very important. Some of the common and effective ways to deal with DOMS or Delayed Onset of Muscle Soreness are as follows:
- Reduce the intensity of your exercises
Reducing the intensity of the workout will give your muscles time to recover. This will eventually help in relieving the soreness so that you can get back to your high-performance level soon.
- Avoid targeting the tight muscle for a few days
If you notice that you have a sore back or sore neck, you should try avoiding exercises that target your back and neck muscles and focus on some other activities until your back and neck muscles are back to normal.
- Stretching
Stretching the tight muscles will help to elongate the muscle fibers and relieve the stiffness from the muscles so that they can get back to their normal state. This will also help to improve flexibility and relieve pain caused by DOMS.
- Flexibility training and light activities
Light activities like yoga, stretching, and much more have been proven to be effective in maintaining a certain level of flexibility in your joints that will help you to deal with DOMS or Delayed Onset of Muscle Soreness in detail.
- Massage
Massage is another effective way that would help to relieve the stress from your muscles and leave you feeling relaxed.
- Ice application
If your muscle tightness is causing you a lot of pain and stiffness, then ice application is quite effective. Applying ice to the affected part will help to relieve the pain and swelling.
So, to conclude, DOMS or Delayed Onset of Muscle Soreness is quite often in people who exercise on a daily basis. If you experience such acute muscle tightness or soreness quite often, then you can come back to this article any time and use these simple yet effective ways to get rid of DOMS and get back to your daily life and your exercises with comfort.