Movement update and retrospective

This time of year in 2021, I was pretty sure I was going to die. Not of COVID, or at least that wasn't the only fear. I was essentially completely sedentary. Standing or walking for more than a minute was almost impossible. Taking the stairs in my house felt, at times, insurmountable. My knees would get angry, my back would hurt, my hips would protest. I was convinced that I would have a heart attack any day. 

I didn't do anything reasonable like talk to someone about it, or even practical things. I woke up every day, amazed I hadn't died in my sleep and simultaneously already exhausted for the day ahead. 

I have had a lot of cycles of increased and decreased movement in my life. In 2008 I was a runner and glowed with pride crossing the line at fun runs. By 2010, running was a distant memory, but my job and lifestyle kept me walking. In 2012, I was attending burlesque classes (is there video evidence? Yes. Will I share it? You have to earn that. And it's worth it for comedy reasons alone, I promise). In 2013, I was running again, hitting up the indoor track at nearby city gyms multiple times a week. In 2015, I was not but I walked a lot for work still. In 2017 I was attending a boutique fitness studio more days than not. 

And then the cycle changed. 2018 was both an amazing year (I married Kyle, I bought a house) and a devastating one (I planned a wedding, I bought a house, and Grandpa Tony passed unexpectedly). I took a couple of big falls, including (I believe) breaking my tailbone after slipping on stairs. I didn't listen to my body and tried to push through grief and pain even when it said no. I have a distinct memory of trying to push myself through a cardio class while sobbing with grief and refusing to give up even though my body was refusing to function.

And so it shut down. By Fall of 2019, I cried while trying to move boxes across campus for an office move. I was walking less because it hurt. My knees hurt and physio only went so far. My hips hurt, my back hurt, my body was saying no as loud as it could. 

And then COVID hit. I went from working on campus, where I was forced to walk even though it hurt (and I had already cut way back on unnecessary forays), to working at home. For the first few months I tried to get out and walk around the block. But it still hurt, and so I walked less and less frequently. I fell off from working with my trainer (the amazing Zita), for reasons that are all on me.  And this brings us back to when I thought I was going to die. It felt like this time I had gotten stuck. 

So, I reached back out to Zita. In June of 2021, we started small. I practiced walking by doing laps of my back yard. We found songs that made my heart sing and put moves to them. We build stability with focused work. And we focused on finding joy in movement where we could. That movement changed over the months - with weather, with pain, with interest. Some days I was doing a few songs of cardio or Pound. Other days I was aiming for 5 minute chunks of movement of various forms, or going into the studio to try things out, or doing part of an online class. 

More importantly, we got to work on my brain. I faced the fear and hurt that my body had not processed, and did not understand how to let go of. I incrementally taught it trust again, in tiny steps. I slowly, very slowly, started to get to understand what my body was telling me. I started learning how to recognize the smaller signals of 'yes', 'no', and 'I'm scared'. I began unpacking the ways I have been told, over and over again, that I can't trust my body. 

Jump forward. Today, I did fun stuff. I did back-loaded squats on a Smith machine with joy. I giggled as I did balance exercises and felt my body adjust without fear. I relished doing lat presses and tricep pulls. I played by choosing things that sparked feelings of fun and curiosity. I asked for more weight, because my body told me it wanted more of a challenge. And I stopped when it said it was done. 

And then I cried happy tears, because I am no longer walking around convinced I am about to fall over dead. I am excited to see what my body can do next, and what it tells me it wants to do. 

If you go back in these entries (I strongly suggest you don't), you will see a long journey with my body. You will see lots of work on trying to shape it, and learn to love it, and learn to live with it. You'll see a slow shift in focus, and a lot of fumbles along the way. That journey is far from over, at least I hope I have a lot more time with it. Because there I hope I have a lot of life left and a lot of joy left to experience. And a lot of time to play.