What do you do when you fall down?

Howdy Folks! 


I can't believe all of this time has passed and I'm back at square one.  To catch you all up to speed, basically I've spent the past year and a half or really two years putting my mother in a nursing home, getting rid of her assets, moving her things into little corners of my apartment and my partners house because I just don't have the heart to throw them out on her and going through every scrap of paper that is related to her life from her birth certificate to her ugly divorce papers to the will she wrote over and over and through every little financial thing that was her life for the medicaid audit, dealing with doctors and lawyers and real estate people and administrators.  We're almost there sort of.  At this point the last things to take care of aside from waiting for Medicaid to approve her, in which I'm getting a Medicaid cocktail when she does and lastly the sale of her house.  


I do not regret doing the right thing because how could you not.  I am really frustrated right now though.  I didn't maintain my workouts. My music and my band suffered and I feel like I sort of lost my way.  I tried but failed and tried again and failed.  I'm trying to take one day at a time and work in small bits but it's hard.  I have some really positive co-workers who cheer me on and help to guide me which I am totally grateful for in a way that they will never really know.  It gets me through those moments.  


I do not necessarily have a specific goal right now - well, that's not true.  My goal is to not give up on myself.  I had a very long day at work because work is just nuts right now but I did hook my bike up to the trainer and ride 90 RPMS per minute for 25 minutes (rotations per minute).  


I've probably had a ton of inspiration around me but just can't see it right now and I'll forgive myself for that.  The thing I'm holding on to, even though I do not necessarily feel it in my heart, is this:


Many years ago I was watching and Adventure Race on TV.  The race consisted of teams made up of 4 people which had to have at least one person of the opposite sex and they had to travel from point A to point B over some of the worst terrain in the globe with various types of weather conditions.  There were check points they had to get to by a certain time or they would be disqualified and each leg of the race had to be completed with a different sporting expertise such as mountaineering, fixed ropes, mountain biking, kayaking, horseback, you get the picture.  The race lasted for days.  Some of them last for 5 or 10 - I don't remember the specifics of this one but either number of days it is a brutal, brutal sport.  Last detail is if you need medical assistance then your team is disqualified - ps people do die doing these sort of events.  


There was a team that needed medical assistance.  They were disqualified in the middle of the race.  What did they do?  They carried on.  They wanted to cross the finish line together.  On one part of the race, the one male on this team nearly collapsed.  At that very time a message was sent from his four year old son.  The message said, "What do you do when you fall down?"  and the answer so simple and so true, "You get up!"


I'm really really tired.  I've been really really sad and literally just miserable but I'm going to get up again.  I will fall down and get back up.  Join me on this new journey and let's see where it goes. 


See you all soon!  Shane

Returning home....

So I finally went to kickboxing with my good and very funny friend Erica. We kept having to reschedule the start date because of horrendous weather. After the blizzard and then after the ice storm the week following the snow, we finally did it. This past Wednesday we got organized and managed to get over to the martial arts school for some serious training.

WOW - That work out seriously kicked my butt. I forgot just how hard Master Robert's training methods are. He's nuts - out of control - merciless and I missed it. I can now say that I've been lying to myself about just how hard I've been training. Don't get me wrong, I've been training harder than your average bear, but this wasn't a class of average bears. This is the place you go to find out what you're really made of - where you find out how far you can go and then you go beyond that.

Pre-class Erica asked me how long the class was. I said I honestly did not remember because I hadn't been there in about 10 years. I replied with "I don't know, maybe 45 minutes, maybe an hour."

We went in the training room which has a floor covered in a very thick mat - puzzle mats to be exact and glass walls for all the world to see you sweating and being tortured. They had a lot more heavy bags then they used to. I can't say exactly how many people were there, possibly 30. Master Robert split into groups of three and used a variety of targets and heavy bag for training. We started with hook punches while doing slow squats, punching and squatting, going up and down and up and down. We moved through an assortment of kicks and punches that we would do for two minutes straight dropping into push ups and hand combinations on the bag - combinations changing every two minutes.

We did this for 45 minutes straight.

It was fast. Go Go Go. Music cranked and lots of yelling "you can do it - push it - don't quit - don't stop....etc."

When we hit the 45 minute mark he said, "now that we're done with the warm up everyone put the paddles back and get into pairs of two each with one body shield." My good friend gave me laser eyes. He then goes "Now we can work out. We're going to do the Circle of Death." Erica who wanted to probably murder or mace me was like "are we going to die now??? what is he talking about 'the circle of death?" LOL. It felt like death. The class was about an hour and forty five minutes of complete hell and I loved it. My good friend was awesome. No matter what, she did not quit and that's what it's all about. Never give up, never surrender!

Day two - Waking up and not being able to move, bend, lift my arms, move my big toe....you get the picture. When I was at work the next day I dropped something on the floor. One of my co-workers was like "aren't you going to pick that up?" I responded with "I'll pick it up tomorrow - or maybe the day after that."

I felt every part of my body that's been asleep for ten years wake up. I felt my spirit wake up. I was sore as heck and still am today but I feel better than ever.

The goal will be to go twice a week and do the third day of training at home and in March add in a supplemental Yoga Sunday at a Yoga school in the neighborhood.

Going back to the past after the 11th I went to martial arts class one last time that very week and had to leave. Being that close to the trade center coming down really screwed up my head. Post traumatic stress disorder is a very real thing. In the days and months after those events I felt very bad for Vietnam Vets and just vets in general. Holy cow! Sounds that were once comforting - screaming that once meant a release of energy and pounding sounds that were part of the rhythm of my life thereafter came to mean chaos and terror. It took me many many years - probably all ten years to not jump at thunder or have an anxiety attack when a passing truck would hit a bump in the road and shake the ground. I walked out of that class back then, to be exact it was Sept 13th 2001, and couldn't stop the tears that streamed down my face. It had nothing to do with sadness and everything to do with a now deep seated anxiety that I would spend the next many years battling - without medication (that's just not my way of handling things. I do life without the anaesthesia - thank you!)

In the Now, this past Wednesday is the first time I re-entered the doors of an institution where I spent four to five days a week training and working and breathing for a great number of years. I can breath again. I can be in the Now.

A very wise friend of mine, out on the northwest coast (isn't that where all the wise people in the U.S. live?) told me after I ruptured my calf muscle in 2007 that I had to return to the scene of the crime. She told me that when something traumatic happens to the body it knocks part of yourself out from you and you have to go back to that place and reclaim it. (Mind you, she said it a lot better than this.)

I ruptured that muscle in a substitute martial arts school I went to because I was not ready and I was afraid to return to my school, the one I am back at now. So once it healed enough and I was allowed back on the mat, I returned to the "substitute" school, stood in the spot where it happened, performed the same moves and nothing. I didn't feel my body or spirit return. I remember thinking "maybe you're not supposed to feel anything and it just magically happens. You just reclaim part of yourself and feel nothing."

This week, this past Wednesday, I walked in the door, went through the same motions I repeated with some of the same people and heard the voice that taught me, guided me for years and years and I felt it. The rupturing of my calf muscle in the other school was not the fracture point. It was not the place where I my spirit was knocked from me. It was in Master Robert's class, in that very room during a really horrible point in history - way back there in the past; I left a big part me there, the part of me that is very high energy.

I did feel it return. I feel whole again. Sore, and suffering in physical pain but whole and alive and Now.

Till next time. Class on Monday!

Third Month of Training

Hey Guys, Hope everyone's been well, especially those of you out on the east coast like myself that have been suffering from the blizzard blues. I keep telling my little boston terrier that winter will be over soon. I'm starting to wonder just how true that is.

So, what's been going on here on the home front? Still training three days a week faithfully. I haven't suffered too many muscle spasms, maybe some in my hamstrings but I added in a number of stretches to fix that.

The news I bring is that next week, weather permitting, I will be going to kickboxing once a week at my very first martial arts school. It's a total training and conditioning program that I'll be doing once a week in preparation to return to martial arts officially at this school which I trained at for many many years. I'm excited and nervous because I know how hard this instructor pushes people, but I think I'm ready for it and will be kind to my injuries so as to not have to stop doing this.

In truth, I can't wait to hit other targets besides my 130 pound muay thai bag. Some of you know, especially my cousin out on the west coast, how much fun it is working with body shields and an assortment of hand targets. There's a certain amount of fluidity that's lost when working with a heavy bag.

Anyway - keep on keeping on. I will let you all know what happens and maybe one day will actually post pictures of this. maybe....

Ready Steady Go

Life is this long, winding road. Sometimes your transmission feels like it's going to give out when your climbing a steep hill and going through the mountains. Sometimes it feels like your going to slip off the road on some sheet of ice. And sometimes your going down hill with the windows open and breeze going through your hair, music cranked and good company on a long drive.

The thing to carry you through those long drives in stormy weather is to know that rounding the corner somewhere up ahead, the sun will be shining and you'll again see, with your own eyes, how beautiful life is.

I have now made it successfully through one month of training. I kept my promise, the one I made to myself to not give up.

Over the past four months while I was not training or working on music, I had a lot of time to think about restructuring and rebuilding. I have been trying for the life of me to get back to a certain place in life. Through this family crisis I have realized that I need to stop trying to go back and certainly go forward. I was saying forward to myself but I was still living in that old moment which did carry me through, however now it's time for new moments. And greatness happens in small moments. This is one of them.

I learned to train myself over my years studying martial arts with my teacher. It's funny because I spent a great many years training with him and after the 11th I could not go there. Like all of us I was wounded and I needed to go somewhere or some many places to heal those wounds. Everything I learned in that school from that teacher allowed me to do this. It was not as fast as I would have liked it to be, but in truth time heals all wounds and time does take it's time.

Of the most important lessons I learned that I carry with me is that consistency is what makes things happen, persevere - overcome and there really is not difference between one and one hundred.

My training goes like this: 3 days a week, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. I know your supposed to split it up but this is about consistency and coming up with fail safe methods meaning I stay in that training head for those three days and do not give myself the chance to slip up and miss a day.

1. Know Yourself

I started by knowing I would not be able to get through a 45 minute session after being stagnant and overwhelmed for almost half a year. So when I started I said my goal was to get up to a 45 minute session but I expected myself to do 25 minutes. Week one I did 25 minutes all three days. Week two I made it to 35 and by week three was at 45 minutes. This week I have it the 55 minute mark and will stay there for a while.

2. Don't Waste Time

It is more important to do more in a short span of time then drag your butt and stretch it out over a longer increment of time.

3. Always Warm Up Or You Will Suffer The Consequences

I start with about a ten minute vigorous warm up making sure I've started to sweat and then I do some serious leg stretches for five minutes. I do not want to tear any muscles and now know that, yes, working out before warming up can cause serious injury.

4. Work Out Hard! Give Every Bit Of Yourself And Do Not Cut Corners!

For the next twenty five minutes I am constantly moving and keeping my heart rate up and steady. This entire time is spent on my heavy bag which is 6 feet long and 130 pounds. I start with hand combinations, then leg combinations where I work to keep good form, speed and power. Then I do both hand and leg combinations in patterns for sparring. In between combinations I will drop down and do mountain climbers. Very painful. Go into push up position and start running. This will make you sweat like you've never sweat before.

5. Cool Down Does Not Mean Sit On Your Can

For the next ten minutes I take my gloves off and train using 10 to 15 pound dumbbells. The goal of this is to continue constant movement but with weights. I stand with my feet together, butt tucked and good posture and then go through right and left curls, front raises, chest press type movements and triceps. I do these for three sets. Once this is complete I continue with the dumbbells and go into a fighting stance and slowly practice torquing motions such as uppercuts to the torso. Always work both right and left equally.

After this I have been consistently doing 300 crunches plus a little something something I added this week. First 100, lay on your back and keep your legs at a 90 degree angle, feet flexed. Do not lift any more than your shoulders off the floor and you can support your neck but do not use your hands to lift your neck. This should all come from your abs. Second Hundred stay in the same position but point your toes and let your legs drop into a split stretch. Last 100 at a 45 degree angle with knees up by your chest. In between these sets I have added in keeping my legs straight out and about one or two inches off the floor. I rest my toes on the bottom of the heavy bag and roll it off my feet. I do 25 of those in between sets.

6. Always, Always Stretch And If you Do Not Know Enough Stretches, Google Some New Ones

After this I pull on a hoody so I don't get chilled and stretch using martial arts stretches. I think these are more painful than the workout but a necessary evil.

Let me tell you this one last thing after I've bored you all to death with detailed training information. I feel great. I can still feel the burn from this weeks work out.

Now for month two......

No I did not fall off the face of the planet....

Hey Everyone - No I did not fall off the face of the planet. Due to a total family crisis my life and my partners life came to a screeching halt. My mother, who has been in bad health for a very long time, became gravely ill about 4 months ago. Truth be told, this all started Thanksgiving of 2009 and just progressively got worse until it was critical. The end result is we had to move her into a nursing home and basically have been doing this for the past four months. Today we finally finished moving all of her stuff, her most prized possessions, to our house and Jamie's folks house. While the health issues are seriously frightening, the nursing home has not been a bad experience so far. My mother is now surrounded by people who can take care of her and she also has friends in the home that care about her and spend time with her; whereas before we were her only resource.

Where am I now in regard to Treading Curves? Well folks - I am still treading but not quite for this years triathlon like I had planned. Due to the fact that you can't be in two places in the same time, my training was put on hold and I have now missed the window to make the training requirements for 2011 - but I have not quit. My new goal is 2012 and I will get there. Since I will have longer training time for the 2012 window, I am looking at some events up in Lake Placid.

Meanwhile, what have I been up to?

About three weeks ago I started training in Martial Arts again. I got in 9 training days in a 3 week span. I am working from where my body is at meaning a little slower than I'd like, but moving forward as planned.

Never Give Up! Never Surrender!

Be in touch real soon. I will give you updates and for those of you who are not up on Martial Arts - here is your opportunity to fill in that learning curve as I will be using this as my cross training method of choice before I get back out and hit the road.

PS: I miss my running partner, my very, very cool cousin!

Struggle

The thing is, you can lie to the world but can't really lie to yourself. You always know the truth about yourself and where you're at. You can be in denial about it but that won't get you real far.

The last two weeks have been a struggle against weather and physical pain. The last time I posted we were in the middle of a heat wave so I only got two runs in that week which was fine by me because they were awesome runs. The following week we had pouring rain for days. Our jeep had to go in for repairs and while this was happening we literally got caught outside in the storm. My shoes and pants were soaked for well over 8 hours and the rain kept on coming. The following day we took my cousins to Great Adventure and it stormed again and my legs and shoes were covered in damp wet for many hours. The only difference that day was that I actually brought dry clothes and shoes just in case that happened. Yes, I was a Girl Scout and no - I did not learn survival skills there. I was glad to have something dry and warm on day two of bad weather.

By Thursday of that week my feet were aching and sore. I woke up and when I stood up I had severe pain. I waited until Saturday to do another run but the heat was so bad that my cousin started to feel sick and so did I so we had to stop. BLAH.

I rested for the remainder of the weekend as well as Monday. Yesterday I made my irritable self go back out in the park but I made sure to do a full warm up and stretch for 20 minutes. I did module 4 yesterday but I suffered through it. My feet started to ache some more and I was really down about it, but I did finish the run and did a 15 minute cool down with stretches and crunches.

This morning sucked because my feet hurt the way they did when I was recovering from the ruptured gastroc I suffered from back in 2007.

Today was a mental challenge for me. I had to beat down those fears that scream "you'll never be able to do this." I quieted them and decided that tomorrow is a full out stretch day with some core training exercises.

I read a bunch of stuff online and this all sounds like Plantar Fascitis. I do suffer from Fascitis, but this is a very specific type of pain. The funny thing I found out was that stretching the plantar when it flares up is actually counter intuitive. The suggested stretches are for the calf and hamstring plus rest.

I'm going to do this over the next two days and try to get back out on the road one day on the weekend. I do believe this is all related to the two days in the rain because it wasn't happening before that.

On the bright side, many athletes suffer from this, especially runners. This is frustrating and I may have to struggle through it but in the end it's just another part of the challenge; a test of sorts, one which I plan on passing with flying colors.

Never Give Up! Never Surrender!

PS: I stepped in dog shit as well yesterday. Nothing like stepping in what you feel like so you can smell it for the next two miles.

Mod 4: Day 2 At the Beach

"Commitment starts when the fun stops."

- Robyn Benincasa

This morning I woke up with one of those headaches that make your face feel swollen. I would assume sinus headache. I took a piping hot shower which helped until I shut the water off and then proceeded to clumsily grab my stuff and be ten minutes late picking up my cousin. Doesn't help that we stopped off at Great Adventure late last night and then got home after midnight and fell asleep after 1:30 AM. But I did get up and we did get out there even with storm warnings.

Getting out there and training with the physical ailments that make you want to go back to bed and conquering your training session really does feel good.

We arrived out our slab of cement at the beach and pulled out the hand targets and paddles and got to work right away. I said to my cousin let's do start with 20 jumping jacks counting every other one and she said, "but we did 25 next week." I'm impressed and glad somebody was awake. We picked up where we left off last week and ran through all forward movement drills meaning no kicks that involve pivoting on your foot. That will come later. We did work on foot placement and the difference between your rear leg and leading leg. Next training session I'm going to incorporate some traditional exercises that will help with balance.

After a vigorous warm up we hit the road and went right into a 3 minute run. Now remember, this mod is 3 min run, 90 sec walk, 5 min run, 2 1/2 min walk, 3 min run, 90 sec walk, 5 min run and you are done. Before we finished the first 5 minute run we hit the turn around and headed back. This is good. We completed a mile and a half in under 18 minutes. Before we hit Mod 5 we may very well be at the 2 mile mark.

This morning we conquered the run and it feels great!