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.