Feb 26, 2014

"Winter Song" -The Head and the Heart


This blog was created with strength as the focus.  Strength in body.  Strength in mind.  Strength in attitude.  Strength in character.  As of late, I haven't felt very strong.  The last few months of my life have been a whirlwind, and it's only now that I look back that I see that.  I called my parents "the kidney twins," seeing as my mom received her long awaited kidney (doing well, by the way, which I am everyday grateful for) and my dad (due to the vigilance observed by multiple physicians and the insistence of a friend/restaurant frequenter that my dad "looked like shit" and needed to be looked at), had surgery and a short stay in the hospital for his prostate, which was instigated by an inability to pee and a high creatinine level.  Thankfully, so thankfully, they are both stable, and my fleeting fear of having one parent leave dialysis behind just to have the other find it, never manifested itself. 

Aside from that, I've had a grandmother (who lives with my loving aunt, uncle, and three cousins, and had since before I was born) who was in and out of the hospital and nursing homes, battling a fight that was more than 30 years old.  I helped when I could.  Maybe I could have more.  But it's those thoughts I struggle not to torment myself with.  I'm not going to hash out all the details, because it just makes me sad and teary, but I will say that she lived in defiance of life since a stroke in 1983 that probably should have killed her.  There are too many things I could say, mostly concerning guilt, sadness, smiles, stress, revelation, and feeling unsettled.  She passed on January 27, 2014.  It all seemed to have spiraled so quickly, but I was there the evening she passed.  I didn't want to be there just because of what was happening, but I did want to be there, and I am grateful that I was.  I've felt a multitude of things since then, and haven't been able to qualify these emotions.  It has opened up a lot of wounds or emotional scarring I didn't know were there.  I've been putting off processing what happened and acknowledging the depth of my grief and how it is intertwined into the rest of my life, but this is a small step.  This song popped up on my iPod one evening shortly after my grandmother died, and it articulated what I didn't know I was feeling. The lyrics offer painful truth, painful hope, and painful disillusion.

"Winter Song"-The Head and the Heart

Tell me somethin', give me hope for the night
We don't know how we feel
We're just prayin' that we're doin' this right
Though that's not the way it seems

Summer gone, now winter's on its way
I will miss the days we had
The days we had
I will miss the days we had
The days we had
Oh, I'll miss the days we had

Loving, leaving, it's too late for this now
Such esteem for each has gone
Has time driven our season away?
Cause that's the way it seems
In the world of the speech that is new
I'll be back again to stay
Again to stay
I'll be back again to stay
Again to stay
I'll be back again to stay


There were a couple of weeks where I didn't feel like talking to anyone and going to work in a nursing home similar to the last one she stayed in, day after day, was grueling and literally drained me of any energy to do anything else.  I struggled to love my job and I struggled to do that job, well.  I didn't Crossfit for two weeks.  I ate junk.  My relationship with food took a turn for the worse, mirroring bad habits that I have worked hard to confront and demolish.  I didn't want to talk about anything real.  I didn't really know what I wanted or what I needed.  And those feelings still come every so often.  And I think they will for a very long time.  I kept waiting to feel better.  And I keep waiting.  But it isn't just going to happen.  But this is a small step.  I've stopped using sadness as a crutch to not participate in the rest of my life.  Especially the parts that I just recently learned to harbor into a healthful self.  It would be a disservice to myself and dare I say it, to my grandmother and parents, too.

I wrote in my Crossfit notebook, "Not going to Crossfit isn't going to make me feel better."  It was there, that I had a chance to just focus on me, and forget whatever else was going on, but still be doing something productive and helpful.  I am not going with as much gusto as before and those initial feelings of nervousness and shyness tried to creep back in, but I've punched those in the face, and am learning to rely on myself and to rely on my coaches and to rely on my Crossfit community to be their wonderful selves, allowing myself to bathe in  their unabashed positivity and strength, despite whatever else is going on in the world.  I know this, now.  No matter what happens outside of the box, inside the box is always a positive, supportive, strong space.  Nothing, as far as I know, can shake that.  It felt really good to revel in that and to soak it up.

That being said, one of the first workouts I did when I "came back" was 3 sets of "prison rules."  (Prison Rules is to do the same movement every 15 seconds for 4:00.  Typically 2-3 of the same movement).  We were asked to do the following:

I. Prison Rules Hang Power Snatch (HSN)
   Prison Rules Clean and Jerk (C+J) **start at about :30
   Prison Rules Thrusters

*prescribed weight: #95 men/#65 women

With a minute of rest in between

II. Every Minute on the Minute (EMOTM) 10 wall balls **start at 1:10

*prescribed weight: #20 men/#14 women, all trying to hit the 10' mark

I felt like Crossfit was saying, "fuck you for not coming for two weeks," but in the friendliest way possible.  It felt good to get right back into it.  And I wimped out a little, only doing #55 lbs for the first part and only #8 lbs for the second part.  It was still freaking hard.  But despite my wimpage, I felt good about what I did when I left that night.  What a relief...I could still rely on this place to be there for me and my health.

In spite of all the seemingly negative things in my life, I have truly felt the support and comfort from loved ones, acquaintances, and strangers.  In my state of mind, I ended up having two minor car accidents (no injuries, just a few thousand dollars worth of damage).  I have been shown such kindness through words, prayers, thoughts, hugs, people doing things for me, positive attitudes, through people showing up, and gratitude.  Even with all that has happened (I struggle not to finish that phrase with "...to me." These things didn't happen to me; they just happened), I am beginning to feel a little renewed. 

The concept of strength has taken on such different meaning.  The same struggles are still there from before, but added, are the goals to find emotional strength and spiritual strength.  I have many models of strength in my life.  None moreso than my grandmother, who like I said, lived in defiance of sadness, defeat, solitude, physical ability and life, relentlessly being strong each and every single day just to live normally and be independent.  If I don't see inspiration in that struggle, who the hell do I think I am?