Brain Shake

Aztec a week and a half ago or so, I forgot to tell you all that I had a run in with a caber.

It was super odd, last event of the day, second to the last caber attempt.  It was Sheila.  A decent straight stick that lots of the women hate...she doesn't bother me much.

So I pick her and she turns in my had a little and swings around and taps the side of my head.  My glasses are driven into my nose and I get pissed.  I know I should have dropped her, but I held on and tried to toss her.  I didn't of course, but the next go at her I got a 12....so whatever sheila....

Well...I had a nasty headache that night.....and yes the next day.  I figured it would go away.

I went to the gym Monday and I was ok...but it was light.  I still had a headache on Tuesday....

Wednesday morning I woke up and felt a little better, except my neck was killing me.  Got to the gym and it was a heavy dead and sled day...I was supposed to do 4 rounds, only got through 2....

Nasty Nasty headache.

I knew I was jacked...I rested Thursday (which I seem to do a lot of these days) but that night I said to Grant, I gotta see some one.. I thought all I needed a massage.  My sis in law is recovering right now so I was going through my list. But frankly not thinking very clearly....Ahhhh my amazing friend Grace...(she's got some magic...) but the weather change was kicking her ass. I looked at Charlesy Schedule but she wasn't available and frankly I was scared to see her...needles in my neck!!  My dear friend Gwyn is not really doing that kind of work right now, and I didn't think to call Dan til much later.  I also knew it was super short notice shit for any of these folks.

I was at work by Friday with my head in my hands when I suddenly thought...MAGIC MAN...

Duh...go see Paul.

But it was already Friday afternoon and I was not looking forward to the weekend plans we had made at all.

But I got lucky.

He got me in.

And I did NOT need a massage....

I walking into his space and he looked at me and said "your head is crooked."

Ew....

Yeah.  He adjusted my skull.  It was kinda gross.  He looked at me at one point and laughed..."this should really hurt, but you are so used to pain you really don't care do you."  I laughed too...No Paul I don't, just do it.

Paul really is a magic Man.

My jaw was wonky, I had ribs out, my hip was twisted, and my sacrum was jacked as well.

I just thought my neck hurt...but it wasn't even my neck.

All this from a little tap on the head from Sheila.

I had one more game scheduled this year. This weekend. A new local game.  Well, we are short judges, so I volunteered... given all this twisty jacked up body stuff going on....it's a blessing we were short a judge.

I am still looking forward to the game and to letting Sheila attack someone else.

back to that annoying place

What annoying place is that?

Well, I am not working out enough.  I have been super irritated about that.  The programing is very cool...not boring, not standard, specific to my sport...all the good stuff.  I am doing the "important" days...according to BJJ, but that's it.  I am not going further.

I have goals....maybe....sorta, have I written them down? no....so I don't even know what they are.
 
So what's my freaking problem.

Oh right, I remember this feeling....

I hate exercising.  I really do.

I love to train.

I'm not training.

That's no one's problem but mine.

Not sure what I need to do about that.  I mean, I guess all I need to do is change my mind set, but I gotta get there.  It seems stupid to me, that I can't look ahead to Pleasanton for 2019 and drive my training toward that...but...I can't seem to do it.  Waa Waa, it's too far away....blah blah...I need a year to train. 

Today's workout was fun, we moved into the speed and volume portion of this 14 week program.  Lots of jumping and weird shit.  I just need to get my ass there and do the work.

So dear readers....what to do....kick me in the ass.....what should to focus on?  Queen Mary games...that isn't that far off... that's a possibility.

Or I just ride out this malaise....and try this:

On a different note, today is a weird anniversary for me. It's the evening that I used to call my "dark night."  For a very long time, I really knew that I would never move past the violence of that day.  That I would be forever changed.  I was changed, but something has happened to me 5 years later that I feel it is important to share.

I did change, but I am  no longer defined by what happened to me that night. In some ways, I noticed this during the selfie project I did (am doing).  Also, by things that people that I used to be friends with see me now.  I went to this Theater Walk thing in Santa Fe and I had so many old friends say things like, "You look so happy, or You look great."

The fear, the pain, the PTSD is not written all over my skin anymore.

There is life after violence, after abuse.  It takes time, but more importantly, it takes a lot of work.

I know it's easy to say, "just let go." But that is so far from what has happened.  I hate that phrase actually...I had to grow, to change, to sweat and cry and scream, and the hardest of all, learn to trust.  Perhaps for the first time ever.

We all know what a silly PollyAnna I am...at least on the surface, trust issues are weird for me...on one hand I am way too trusting...WAY TOO TRUSTING.....I will always try to see the good and that has left me open as a target for liars.  But on the other hand...I never trust on that deeper level...especially of myself and my choices or of my instincts

Perhaps THAT is the shift that has happened to me recently, that is what is some how reflected on my skin these days....

I know I will have shadows of that night and more than just that night swim around my soul.  I know there are things that send me spinning some times.  But something has "let go" and for anyone reading who feels like it will never change, I hear you, I see you, I believe you.  And I ask you to see me...and hear me, that it can get better.

'cause I never thought it could either....but tonight, five years out...I feel...different and for that I am grateful.

Something

No idea what is about to get typed out here....But I promised myself I'd keep writing.

Had a rough game in Aztec...I probably should not have gone; I already knew that, but things (meaning my anxiety) started to chill about 1 PM, so the afternoon wasn't as hard as the morning.  I felt fine when I got to the field, but as this PTSD thing does sometimes, it grabbed me by the throat and covered my mouth and sent me spinning. 

I threw the whole game...not sure how wise that was, can I tell you how disconcerting it is to throw hammer when you can't feel your feet?

I won't post numbers...because, well....hahahaha.  No.

I do love Aztec, both the game and the folks who run it and the town. So being there and eating too much chocolate from Derrick and eating too much pizza with Edie and watching Cindy get like 25 pr's  was ultimately worth it. Hiding doesn't actually help me, it feels like it does in the moment; but that is PTSD lying to me again.

I'm seeing some super ugly things in people lately and I am wondering if it is the ugly in me or if I am just seeing a little more clearly.  I may be in that place again of needing to check the energy around me...letting go of some and drawing others closer.


On a happy note...or a couple of them, I had another audition last night...and I was calm...no chocking, no panic....wheee!  Funny side note, I saw a bunch of actors I haven't seen in a while..but most of them were auditioning for the same role I was....and they were all men...  I don't really know if I was the ONLY woman who had auditioned for the role as there may have been someone there earlier in the day, but yeah....I was looking around thinking, "did someone make a mistake here?" I've had that happen before, when I've been the only old lady in a room full of beautiful, trim, young women.  But all dudes?  Oh well.  I felt good about it regardless. And you already know how I feel about auditioning.  I really enjoy it now; I don't put too much into "booking" ...I put a lot into the audition, but I know that the booking of a role is so freaking far out of my control that there is no reason to get all twisted up about getting cast or not.  It doesn't define me like it did when I was young.

And I got my ticket for the GRRRL event in June....that's a way bigger WHEEEE.

Especially since Heather is going to be doing a Highland games clinic.  She may use me to help too...I mean how cool would that be?  I can demo bad form on just about anything she needs.  😁

I also had a break through moment with my past and my hubby this weekend....There were some things that I guess I had alluded too and that he perhaps, assumed as well; but because of the crap over the last few weeks and the anxiety being ramped up...he asked.  I told.  I spoke. He listened.

And with no proof other than my words.

He believes me.

Imagine that. 

And we heal a little more,  we love a little more,  I trust a little deeper, we move forward together. 

Happy October

A new month...

This crap leading into it is pretty terrible.  I am doing all the work I can, but I have found myself back under the thumb of anxiety and flashbacks.

Seems that the thing that doesn't work for me is silence...Imagine that...I just keep trying to deal with it quietly...but when I let myself express my fear and rage and confusion, the anxiety is reduced.

Again...

IMAGINE THAT.

The flashbacks have been the worst...jumbled times, faces, fears.  I am super grateful for the team of ladies that are checking on on one another...Those of us who who believe one another, who have spent so many years in disbelief and dis-believed.  And silent.

I have modified my commitments. I had to back out of gatherings, couldn't face questions about old things.  I can't practice, I have a hard time going to the gym. "Peopling" has just been a challenge lately.  Especially around people who I know are lying.  Something about that is just too much for me right now.  You know the ability to say, " hey that's their stuff....it's ok." has left me for right now.

Frankly, I'm not sure if I will make it to Aztec.

On a different-yet the same- depressing note~

I have been hearing this on the radio...

Good Old Days

Grant and I were talking about it...this idea that there was some better time before is a bunch of crap, we just look back and see what we want to remember...and that really...right now....are "good old days" too....which brings me to the other platitude...

"You don't know what you've got til its gone"

I have only really heard this phrase i used in such a way that implies you really miss something or you took for granted something you had. 

I am not discounting that...I mean it happens.  But as we were chatting, I told Grant...for me, it has taken a lot of time away to see just how bad things were. 

Yeah, I didn't know what I had til I got free.

Try to put that to a snappy pop tune.

But....hmmm is there a but here?  Yeah....my hubby, my kid, my boss, this group of women who are checking in and for whom I check in... 

These are the good days.  The support in these days make these the good days.