Tuesday, February 19, 2019

Stepping off the Struggle Bus

My 13 year old son is going to Montreal on a field trip.  Today, as we discussed renewing his passport, as his is expired, he talked excitedly about the coach style bus they would be traveling in.  Cushy seats, TV screens and even a bathroom.  I remember it well.  The giant field trip of the 80's where we got to graduate to the luxury bus.  We could bring our favorite snacks, our gigantic Walkman with a back pack full of 80's mix tapes and we even got to sit near who we wanted to.  This was a far cry from the drab junior high bus of day to day life.

No sir.  That junior high bus was not cool.  I was always one of the last ones picked up, the bus was full and I had to squeeze in, a third person in a two person seat.  There were multiple issues here.  I was obese.  People were not exactly excited to squeeze in to let me sit.  The bus was hot, I was sweating the entire trip.  There was the random pubescent boy I would always seem to end up next to, who had yet to discover deodorant and was not capable of much interaction with a junior high girl other than awkward conversation about science fiction that made no sense to me.  Surely, anything was better than that brand of daily torture. 

I suppose you could say I have been thinking a lot about buses lately.  It probably is a function of it being close to the end of February. Shiny New Year's resolutions far in the rear view, spring way out front and I am now routinely getting messages from clients who are riding the "struggle bus."  That proverbial time when goals seem amazing, but the journey from here to there seems impossible.  Missed workouts, bad meals, feelings of failure, I suppose this would be the fitness version of Seasonal Affective Disorder.


Where was our coach bus and backpack full of mix tapes that would somehow make getting from here to there easier?  I maintain my friends, that coach actually IS the struggle bus.  We struggle by surrounding ourselves with comfort.  Comfy couch, comfy snacks, comfy company and yes, even our favorite 80's jam.  When we hit the realization that we are here, we find ourselves suddenly disembarking in the middle of nowhere far off course and angry at our own failings.



"Oh, we're not gonna take it,
No, we ain't gonna take it
Oh we're not gonna take it anymore 

As we look around this wasteland of broken promises to ourselves, I think the better answer is this.  It's time to toss the iconic mix tapes and trade them in for something a little grittier, like Twisted Sister to yank us out of our self created comfort zone.

"We've got the right to choose it,
There ain't no way we'll lose it,
This is our life, this is our song"

We need to take a minute to sit down in the virtual nowhere we find ourselves in after exiting the struggle bus to find out where we truly are and where it is we want to go.  It is time to remind ourselves our stumblings are not fatal and we have the right to change direction.  It's once again time to put pen to paper and choose the goals that matter.  Only then can we find the right vehicle to get there.  

"Oh you're so condescending,
Your gall is never ending,
We don't want nothin', not a thing from you

Your life is trite and jaded,
Boring and confiscated,
If that's your best, your best won't do"

As we redefine our goals, we are also forced to look at the negativity that resides in the comments that we make to ourselves throughout our journey on the struggle bus, and realize this form of self defeat is only keeping us further and further away from where we want to be.  As we sit in this place sifting through it all, I think we need to take another look at the boring smelly school bus we rode every single day that we labeled as "torture." 



 Maybe this is exactly where we belong.  Maybe the place we need to be is actually quite uncomfortable and sweaty because after all, it isn't the proverbial field trips that will get us there.  It's the hard work in a place we don't always want to be, next to the sweaty guy on the next tread trying awkwardly to make conversation.  So, to my fellowship of fitness seasonal affective disorder sufferers I offer the following challenge.  Head out and find the smelliest most challenging virtual junior high school bus you can and climb aboard.  Do not apologize for your sweat or making the someone else uncomfortable.  Find that awkward person on the tread next to you and make conversation just a little easier as they may be fresh off the struggle bus just as you are.  Besides, adding another person to our mutual support system is never a bad idea.  One thing building a community to support us all has taught us:

"We're right,
We're free,
We'll fight,
You'll see"

Don't ever forget, anything worth having is worth working for, no matter how many times we stumble.  We always have the right to decide we're not going to take it anymore and fight for our goals even if the vehicle to reaching them is not glamorous.  When we do that we absolutely know, the best is yet to come.  



Sunday, February 3, 2019

Pain, It makes Me a Believer

Yesterday, as I was getting ready for the gym, I found myself instantly annoyed.  Shorts, sweats, uggs, tank top, sweatshirt, North Face.  Did I have my shoes?  How about my heart rate monitor?  So many layers and extra steps just to go do the least glamorous thing, train.  Nobody tells you really that behind those shiny medals you get when you cross the finish, there are a million mundane days of training just like this one that was made infinitely more difficult because it was February in upstate NY. February.  That's a whole other thing.  As I got in the car, the only thing to get me to the gym was loud, reasonably angry music.

First things first,
I'ma say all the words inside my head,
I'm fired up and tired of the way that things have been



Imagine Dragons, echoing my sentiment about the cold multi layer requiring winter, but honesty it was more than that.  February is supposed to be this love infused month of hearts and flowers, at least that is what Hallmark would lead you to believe.  In my world, it is something different entirely.  Three years ago this week, I laid in a hospital bed with a fresh batch of shiny titanium installed in my left hip.  I had stubbornly let progressive worsening hip pain go for months and continued to push until three days before Christmas I slipped and had the worst pain I have ever had in my life.  Still refusing to believe anything was seriously wrong, I spent the six weeks that followed trying to walk, stretching and even ride an exercise bike,only to find no relief of the pain.  I finally caved on an unusually slow work day and asked my x-ray tech to take a picture.  Staring at the images of my intertrochanteric displaced femoral neck fracture in disbelief I had the defining moment of realizing my stubborn unwavering devotion to my new found fitness at the time, had pushed my body until I broke the biggest bone in it. A staggering thought, to this day I cannot fully get my head around it.

Second thing second,
Don't you tell me what you think that I could be,
I'm the one at the sail,
I'm the master of my sea

 I would say, staring at the x-rays and the blatant ugly meltdown that followed after a call to the orthopedist during my shift, I was seriously questioning my ability to master my own sea.  Besides, I can honestly say that statistically speaking I knew the cards were stacked against me in regaining any sort of activity level.  The six weeks of crutches that followed my February surgery in ice and snow brought with it a lasting fear of water on the kitchen floor and ice on the driveway.  My hip would never be the same, and my pity parties were epic at that point.  Since that time, I have been more tentative mastering my fitness sea. The comeback has been slow, and despite the physical gains since then, the mental scars left behind have been a bit more challenging.

Third things third,
Send a prayer to the ones up above, 
All the hate that you've heard has turned your spirit to a dove

The ones above. Yes.  That's the other issue with February.  This year makes 12 years since my best friend and sister-in-law died for no good reason.  It marks the birthdays of my own mom and my mother-in-law, who also were strong women in my life, both of whom passed suddenly. My mom a year and a half ago, and my mother-in-law 13 years ago.  Perhaps this truly was not the tune to listen to on the way to a workout I didn't really want to do.

I was chokin' in the crowd,
Building my rain up in the cloud,
Falling like ashes to the ground,
Hoping my feelings, they would drown

I would arrive anyway and do my best to put on my best Mama Shark game face.  After all, this was a fundraising class and I had made a promise to my friends.  What met me when I got there was 11 members of my Shark Shiver, laughing and singing along for the full hour.  Hell, there was even some pretty funny dance moves in the transitions.  I couldn't help but shake the funk that arose on the drive over. I would come  to realize in this class that I may want to consider laying off  my annual, oh my God I broke my hip and it was my fault pity party, and instead embrace the laughter of the moment and enjoy the gains I have made despite the odds not being in my favor with this type of injury.


 Back in my car I would go headed to a local eatery to meet these amazing women in my life now.  The music would pick up right where it left off.

Pain!!! You made me a believer,
Pain!!  You break me down and build me up,
Oh, let the bullets fly, oh let them rain,
My life, my love, my drive, it came from....Pain

I had to stop driving to think about that for a minute.  Incomprehensible loss, devastating injury, the season of February hitting once again.  All of those things made me who I am.  My hip taught me I just might be a little tougher than I ever gave myself credit for, after all, I have done 9 Spartans, two Ragnars, a half marathon and the Dopey Challenge in the post op period.  So what if my gains were slow, I was still gaining after all.  I also learned a valuable lesson about balanced training.  As far as the hole in my life left by the women who left me that mattered most, it has allowed me to cultivate a new tribe of strong women who love and support me making this thing called life so much more full, even in the absence of family.  I would ultimately pull into the restaurant and spend the next hour and a half with 5 members of my tribe laughing and retelling stories of our previous times together helping me to see I have truly entered one of the greatest seasons of my adult life. 



Last things last,
By the grace of the fire and the flames,
You're the face of  the future,
the blood in my veins   

Maybe this was really what loss and hard times was about.  If we look hard enough we find there is a greatness that can exist when our trajectory is unexpectedly forced in a new direction.  Pain can truly help us to see we all have a strength in us we know nothing about and a beauty we have yet to see that lives beyond difficult times. 

As we all got into our cars, my tribe and I, I took a good look around.  There were smiles and friendship and vows to get together soon.  Would I trade the things that happened that made past Februarys anything but flowers and hearts?  Well, I can't, but what I can do is focus on the beauty that has followed the pain and realize even more that the best is yet to come.