How to Render Your Arms Useless

1.  Demonstrate push up progress in front of entire TKD academy.  Crank out 47 of those bad boys, beating your previous record of 40 set mere days ago.

2.  Follow with a punching drill.  Punch standing bag for 1 minute, rest 15 seconds, punch bag for 2 minutes, rest 30 seconds, punch bag for 3 minutes.

3.  Test for your next level belt.

Oof I’m going to be sore tomorrow.  I passed easily and even broke my board with a jump spin kick (ddwieu dwit dollyeo chagi) on the first try.  Also received NO negative critique about my performance.  Every one else was told something they needed to work on and improve, I was told my performance was excellent.  Being in that zone where everything goes right is such an awesome feeling.  I had two totally different experiences this past week with my performance and wasn’t sure how today was going to go.  In Tuesday’s class, I got the normal level of hot and sweaty, but right before sparring it changed into that clammy icky feeling.  I sat out the rest of class so I wouldn’t have to be peeled off the mat that evening.  Thursday’s class went better, and today before the test when Grandmaster was checking my kick, I nailed every single one with ease.  Even a few black belts said that it looked really good.  I have to admit, it felt damn good as well!  Even better, my sparring has improved.  I still have a long way to go, but for the first time I didn’t dread it, and I didn’t feel as though I did poorly.

I wish my kids had my same enthusiasm, but alas, it is not to be.  My 10 year old has decided, with Grandmaster, to take a month off from TKD.  She is currently a purple belt, and apparently it is common at this level for the kids to suffer a bit of burnout.  She has been throwing tantrums about going to class that puts her 8 year old sister to shame.  She still is coming with me, but will not be participating for a while.  Hopefully it will help.  I think she got a bit overwhelmed with the overlap her swim schedule had on class.  Her swim season ended last week, and with it our horrific schedule of not being home every day Monday through Friday.  She did end her swim season well, she had 4 time drops and she won one of her heats.

My 8 year old has surprised me this week by actually practicing her guitar and making excellent progress there, and I got to see her ice skate for the first time since she started lessons at the beginning of the year.  I never imagined that watching her skate in circles around the rink could be so captivating.  She seems to be a natural, and I can’t wait to see how she progresses.  It’s so rewarding as a parent to see the kids choose activities they love and then see them do so well at them.  Now that swimming is over, we need to keep the 10 year old active, lest she become a couch potato.  Unfortunately, that was one tendency she inherited from me that I would like to eliminate.

I also submitted my next project for TKD.  I’m going to start a meditation/visualization routine.  I’m planning on setting my alarm about 15 minutes earlier so I can find a quiet space where I won’t be disturbed, and I will focus on my breathing and getting a good start to the day.  Every evening before bed, I will visualize for a minimum of 5 minutes.  I will work on going through all my TKD requirements in my head, as well as reviewing and reflecting on the day and focusing on my goals.  Other students who have done this in the past have seen amazing improvements in their attitude and focus.

For my last project I’m picking a photography project.   In a flash of inspiration today I knew exactly what to do for it.  I decided that I will document all facets of my life.  As a mother, as a wife, as a woman, as a martial artist, etc.  I will take pictures of what I do, where I go, people I interact with.  Not only should it be a lot of fun, but there are a lot of opportunities for creativity.  I’m already itching to figure out how to light and capture the awesomeness that is Grandmaster’s hands.  He has these gnarly looking hands that are endlessly fascinating to look at.  Ideally, I would like to have the pictures bound in a hardbound book.  The more I think about the project, the more excited I get about it.

February 28, 2009
Categories: 100 Push-Ups, belt testing, board breaking, offspring, Tae Kwon Do . Tags: , , , . Author: Amy . Comments: 1 Comment

I Plead the 5th

At physical therapy today, during the massage and manipulation, my therapist noticed a bruise on my heel.  Actually it seems she felt it first.  I told her it was nothing to worry about and tried to change the subject but she knows me much too well.  She asked if I was breaking any boards.  Me, with my inability to lie, I told her the truth.  Thankfully, she wasn’t too fussed about it.  I told her it didn’t seem to bother my ankle a bit, and that had I broken the board on the first try instead of the third, there would have been no bruise for her to find.

So, as you all might have guessed, I broke a board this past weekend.   Since I had injured myself a few weeks before my red belt test, I wasn’t able to do the board break (a spin kick) at the test I took.  I was so looking forward to it too.  I love a challenge, and this particular kick is one that students much better than I struggled with.  My instructor held the board between his thumb and forefinger (fingertip hold) and I had to break it doing a spin kick.  I was a smidge nervous that I was going to rattle my ankle so much that I would have to quit after the first attempt.  On attempt #1, I didn’t speed up the kick at the end (which is necessary for this kick, I can’t just muscle through it), so my heel just thunked on the hard 1/2″ piece of pine and flew out of my instructor’s hand.  On attempt #2, my heel throbbing, I sped up a bit more, and the sound the board made wasn’t as much of a hard thunk, it kind of….sang.  If you’ve broken a lot of boards, you know how it sounds slightly different when you are very close to breaking it, but fail to do so.

At this point, I was pissed at the board, my heel was red and throbbing, and I was not going home without the board in two pieces.  I took a little longer on the set up, took a few deep breaths, concentrated on relaxing my hips and upper body and let it rip.  The board EXPLODED out of my instructor’s hand in two pieces (and many splinters), and I am not embarrassed to admit that I did a fist pump and shouted “Yeah!”.  As I said, I’ve seen plenty of better skilled and stronger students struggle with this particular kick, so knowing that I could do it within the three try limit (with a questionable ankle) was a great confidence boost.

After the other students broke their boards, I tried my second break, which is a palm strike.  The trick with this one is that the instructor is holding two boards, but I am only supposed to break the front one.   To be successful I have to strike it on center, and forcefully with the heel of my hand, but also “snap” my hand back so I don’t try to strike “through” it.  My first attempt was more…..feeling out the mechanics.  I had never broken a board with a palm strike, so I had no idea if it was going to hurt or what.  I was surprised to find out that the wood didn’t budge, but it didn’t hurt at all either.  Not like the throbbing heel of my foot.  My second attempt, I swear I heard that board creak.  The third attempt was more of the same.  I couldn’t get that board to break at all.  I’m not upset about it either.  It’s more of a stop-gap method until I can do the required kick, which I can’t right now because there is too much risk of me horking my ankle again with the landing.  As long as I have demonstrated the required kicks before my black belt test, all is good.  I test for Recommended Senior I on Saturday, and other than the cold from the depths of Hades that has me producing more mucous than a single human should, I’m feeling good about it.

December 15, 2008
Categories: belt testing, board breaking, injury, Tae Kwon Do . Tags: , . Author: Amy . Comments: Leave a Comment

Just Keep Swimming

Difficult advice to adhere to when I feel like I’m sinking fast.  I’m sure the shorter hours of daylight has something to do with it, but yesterday I sank like a stone.  The test I was supposed to be at is this coming Saturday, and I think the reality of how long I’ll probably be out hit me hard yesterday.  Thankfully, I had my PT evaluation today, and I start therapy tomorrow, at least in some way.  I’m actually looking forward to the time when the tenderness is mild enough that they can massage my ankle and do the ultrasound therapy.  It’s the best thing about PT in my opinion.

I skipped class last night.  Well, I wasn’t going to participate anyway, but I was going to be there for my daughters.  Except since I didn’t go, they didn’t go.  And neither did my husband.  I think yesterday he and I both had the same general malaise.  He’s going to take them to class tonight, but I’m still not sure I’m going to go.  On one hand, I want to stay in the environment so I know what I’m missing and I have motivation to get back when I’m healed.  On the other hand, it’s painful sitting there, not being able to participate in the way I want.  It’s becoming increasingly difficult to keep a positive attitude going.

Surely some of you are thinking “Geez woman, get over it, it’s only a sprain”.  And in some ways you are right, but I have never in my life hurt myself the way I did two weeks ago.  I’m also not as young as I used to be.  The other sprains I’ve had in the past, bah, they were but a little ankle tweaking.  Something I could totally walk on less than a week later.  Just today I can almost walk with a semi-normal gait, even though I’m not really supposed to, so that’s progress.  But because I want to make sure I don’t destroy my ankle again in the future, I’m trying to follow orders and give it time to heal.  The PT explained it nicely.  She said I need to give the fibers time to heal so they can heal all aligned, which will make the ligament just as strong as it was before.  If I push it too hard and the fibers heal criss-crossed, it will cause that area of the ligament to become more inflexible and more susceptable to future injury.  She also told me to expect the swelling for a few more weeks.

My foot was swollen enough already by noon (and I was a bad girl this morning, hobbling around and up and down the stairs a lot), that when she let go after grabbing my foot to test flexibility, the indentations from her fingers remained.  Not cool.

Gah, enough about that, I’m obsessing already.

In an effort not to be the ankle injury blog 24/7, I’m going to attempt to bring a little bit of personal blogging into this here blog.  Some of you know that I had a blog for a few years (Psychobabble), and I recently closed that one down.  I had felt that I no longer needed that outlet.  And maybe I don’t, but I still like keeping in touch with people using the blog.  I’ve made a lot of virtual friends in the past few years, and I don’t want to bore them by being a one note blog.  I also have a book blog (one entry – HA!), a photo blog, and a fiber blog (knitting/spinning stuff).  I’m still going to keep them, but I will also cross post a lot of that content here, mostly just to post regularly, and also for variety.

Even my hairdresser knows that I get bored easily.  I’ve never had the same hairstyle/color twice.  I’ll do my best to tag and categorize my posts in such a way that they are easy to find by topic, should any of you not want to hear about anything other than martial arts.  Or my whining about my ankle.

October 21, 2008
Categories: blogging, injury, Tae Kwon Do . Tags: , , , . Author: Amy . Comments: 3 Comments

A Small Measure of Relief

At the doc’s today, I got the results of my MRI. I did not break my ankle (there was much rejoicing!), but on top of the sprain I did bruise my talus bone. I need to go look up which one that is….

Ok, that’s the main ankle bone that the lower leg bones sit on top of. Doc seemed rather amazed that I didn’t fracture it. He said between the severity of the sprain and the deep edema I have, I must have put a lot of energy into whatever I did to injure myself. Next week I’m starting physical therapy, mostly just to get back to being able to put weight on that ankle, and eventually ramp up to stability exercises.

I saw some scary stuff while Googling the talus bone, so I quit while I was ahead. I really don’t need to be any more neurotic about my injury. As it is, I’m gun-shy so to speak. I can’t imagine getting back to the activity level I was at before toasting my ankle. I’m doing my best to take things one day at a time. It’s actually a good thing that my kids are in TKD, because I get to be in the academy, and I can actually help out a bit. Tonight for instance, Grandmaster had me working with a white belt who is testing next week and with a young brown belt on her poomsae sequence. It felt really good to be able to help and be involved, and I actually enjoyed it without the pressure of having to work on my own stuff. I was supposed to test this month, but I’m thinking next month is more likely, if not maybe a smidge over optimistic. Plus, I’m not sure that foot will be up to board breaking anytime soon. I may have to work out an alternative. If I do a hand or elbow break, what are the chances that I’ll be seeing my orthopedist about an injured hand or elbow?

I’m supposed to limit my weight bearing to “with crutches” and I’m trying really really hard, but I suck at it. Especially when I’m home. It just seems easier to hobble ten feet than to wrestle with the crutches. And have you ever tried to carry a plate and use crutches at the same time? No? It’s totally impossible unless I had the grace to be able to balance it on my head. Hmmm, if I had that grace I probably wouldn’t be needing crutches in the first place.

October 16, 2008
Categories: belt testing, board breaking, injury, poomsae, Tae Kwon Do . Tags: , . Author: Amy . Comments: 3 Comments

Rolling, Rolling, Rolling

Was in class tonight doing tornado kicks and was actually doing really well, when suddenly I wobbled on a landing and next thing I know, my foot rolls under me and I hit the ground. My ankle immediately swelled up like a golf ball and I’m stunned. I swear it happened in slow motion, I could see what was coming and couldn’t do a damned thing to prevent it. The kids and my husband finished up class while I elevated my ankle and put ice on it, and then we high-tailed it to the emergency room. The doctor was worried that I could have broken by tibia (fibula? I can’t remember which one he mentioned), so I was off for x-rays.

Thank goodness it isn’t broken. It is a severe sprain though and I’ve been instructed to use crutches for a week and limit activity for a while so the ligament can heal. I’m supposed to test this month on the 25th. Either that’s going to happen with some limitations imposed on me, or I’m going to have to put it off a month. That pisses me off more than anything. I was doing so well, and I feel like I’ve improved a hell of a lot in the past month or so, and now I need to back off to heal…..again. Not only that, but I get gun shy when it comes to my ankles. Thankfully, it’s not the one that was bothering me a few months ago, and it’s also not the foot that I normally land on, which makes it puzzling as to how I rolled it. I think it was going into the tornado kick, I must have overturned or leaned a little bit to far when I was turning and threw my balance off. There’s no other time my weight was on that foot, since it’s the foot that I usually kick with (my right).

Tomorrow I call my sports doctor and will probably wind up going through therapy….again. Unfortunately, it’s my driving foot, so I’m not sure how I’m going to manage when I need to get my kids to their activities as well. I’m sure my husband and I will be able to work something out. I’m going to take it as a sign that I need to slow down a bit. Staying in the Tae Kwon Do environment is a priority for me though, so I’m going to try to do something at the dojang, even if it is just standing there and doing the hand and arm movements to my poomsae or my applications. Shoes for martial arts might be in my future as well. Given that my flat feet already cause enough foot pain to be distracting, the extra support they give might be the best thing for me. As soon as the swelling and pain is gone I’m going to try some out and hopefully I can find some that work for me. Until then, I’m sitting on the sidelines.

*sigh*

October 9, 2008
Categories: injury, Tae Kwon Do . Tags: , . Author: Amy . Comments: 5 Comments

I am a Warrior!

Had what we call boot camp over the weekend. It’s a requirement for those of us that are planning on getting our black belt in the next year (I’m planning on testing October 2009). I don’t want to go into to many specifics, except that it was very much like a self-help seminar, led by Grandmaster. I did get to climb and jump off a 30 foot pole and there was some hands-free rebar bending involved as well. At first, I wasn’t so sure I got much out of the weekend. Then something changed. Something subtle. I barely noticed it until I was asked to stand in front of class and talk about the weekend and I noticed something. I wasn’t nervous. At all. Usually I’m fighting a flop sweat and stammering and stumbling all over myself. Today I actually felt taller. I’m not of course, but I’m walking a little taller than usual. My performance in the dojang improved (except for sparring, that I still suck at). And Grandmaster sent a few pictures he took of us over the weekend, and I look relaxed! The biggest change I’ve noticed is that no longer do I just think about wanting to be a better person and taking better care of myself, but I’m actually doing it. The lack of specifics is frustrating, I know, but it’s the nature of the beast. It’s kind of like, if I try to explain, the magic disappears.

The running is going well too. Since I started last week, I’ve already increased the amount of time I’m running compared to walking, and I’ve reduced my time from a 13 minute mile, to a 11.5 minute mile. I’m sure I’ll get even quicker as I get stronger.

I now leave you with a thought to ponder in your moment of Zen:

Donald Duck’s middle name is Fauntleroy.

Wait, that’s not it. Here it is, a wonderfully apropos (at least to me) Note from the Universe I received the other day:

Amy, it’s high time that you step forward to claim and demand whatever it is that you want from life.

Just remember though, the gate keeper who will give it to you is the same gate keeper who has kept it from you… your gorgeous self.

Basically, I think the Universe is telling me that I need to get out of my own damn way.

October 7, 2008
Categories: motivation, Notes from the Universe . Tags: , , , . Author: Amy . Comments: 1 Comment

I’m Baaaack!

Imagine my shock when I realize that my last post was over a month ago! It is a sign of how busy I’ve been with the new school year starting and trying to juggle an increasingly busy schedule. My 10 year old daughter joined a swim team, so any free evenings we had have disappeared. Along with free weekends. I’ve also made a conscious decision to limit my time online. A few weeks ago, in a moment of self-awareness, I realized that I use the internet as a distraction and an avoidance technique, and I thought that at least for a couple weeks, making a clean break was a good idea. It really has made a difference too. I’d much rather engage with the world around me than with pixels on a glowing screen.

Anyhoo, on top of that I’ve been busy constantly memorizing and reviewing what I need to know for my test next month. For the first time, not only do I need to know my red belt requirements, but I also need to memorize and learn the command sheet for the white belt sequence.

What this means is that I basically memorize the format of the white belt class, with commands, as though I was leading the class. There’s quite a bit of Korean involved, and working on the pronunciations and making sure I have the order down has been a trip. From this upcoming test on, I will need to learn an entire sequence. Providing I pass my test (which, barring total catastrophic failure, will happen), I will then have to learn the requirements for senior belt and the yellow belt sequence. Also after this test, I get my senior belt (which is dark blue) and it’s the last actual “belt” I’ll earn before my black belt. Every test after this next one, I’ll earn stripes for my belt while I test for recommended senior I, senior I, recommended senior II and senior II.

When I give myself a chance to sit back and think about it, I can’t believe the progress I’ve made. But I also realize that I have a long way to go.

Oh, I almost forgot! My 10 year old retested this month. If you remember, she totally fell apart at her test last month and didn’t pass. Well, she was a totally different child on Saturday. She nailed her poomsaes (both her blue belt and yellow belt which was her favorite), she looked awesome during the sparring portion of the test, and she broke her board (again)! She was so proud of herself, and even Grandmaster noticed that her performance was hugely improved. I think I actually was more nervous than she was.

Today also marks the beginning of my first leadership project. I need 3 such projects to earn my full leadership, and they are supposed to be in different areas of multiple intelligence. For my first project I chose to work on improving my endurance. About half the time, I tend to run out of gas during class. Part of this, I know, is due to diet, which is improving. The other part though is that even though I’m pretty active, I’m still fairly wimpy in the cardio-vascular sense. I’ve got no staying power, and get winded and tapped out pretty quickly and easily. So I’m implementing a jogging program. I’m starting off very slow and alternating walking and running. I listen to my iPod, so I use the songs as timing (except when Kashmir started playing, that song is 8 minutes long!). I pretty much ran one song, and walked the next, in an attempt to keep my heart at a normal workout level and not pounding so hard I feel like puking. It worked out well, and I was actually out for about 40 minutes this morning (2.6 miles when I mapped it). It was a great start to the day, and I’m looking forward to going out again on Wednesday. This project is supposed to last a month, and that is by design, so we can try to implement a new habit. My goal is to jog/run for 30 minutes without stopping to walk. Not sure if I’ll get there by the end of the month, but I’m definately working towards that goal.

My second project, I think I’m going to do something with photography. Something to challenge myself, but I’m not entirely sure what that is yet. I may talk with Grandmaster about it, since he is a hobbyist photographer as well.

Well, it’s time to try to figure out how to get the songs on my iPod into iTunes on this computer since my laptop is dead, and has been for some time. I currently can’t sync to this computer without losing my music, which sucks. I also want to put together a few running playlists as well. I’ll try not to be such a stranger.

September 29, 2008
Categories: belt testing, board breaking, fitness, leadership, Tae Kwon Do . Tags: , , , , , . Author: Amy . Comments: 2 Comments

Test Day Ups and Downs

Ups:

  • I tested for and earned my red belt.
  • I broke my board the week before with my 7 year old (who broke her board at the same time)
  • Both my children earned their assistant leadership
  • My 10 year old broke her board on the first try with a beautiful looking kick

Downs:

  • I tried to break at the test with my alternate kick which requires breaking two boards. Didn’t even crack it.
  • My 10 year old didn’t pass her blue belt test so she will be testing again next month.
  • She fell and sprained her wrist 2 days before the test, so she was a smidge distracted and couldn’t quite get her poomsae right.

I felt so badly for my oldest daughter. A few cracks started showing at her test and then she just crumbled. She had to do Sah Jang and Il Jang. She performed them flawlessly yesterday at class. One of the requirements of assistant leadership is knowing how to tie your belt correctly and doing it in front of everyone. By this time she knew she didn’t pass her belt test. That and the splint on her wrist made it difficult for her to do in front of everyone. Immediately after the test she proved she could do it, so they allowed that to count. I was so worried about what this would do to her confidence and motivation, but she seems to have bounced back with a vengeance. I think she is out to prove she knows her stuff at the next test, which is the kind of stubborness I encourage. At my lesson today, I believe I learned the whole sequence to my red belt poomsae (chil jang). It is all sorts of new and one of the more difficult ones I’ve had to learn so far. Tiger stance FTW!

August 26, 2008
Categories: belt testing, board breaking, injury, leadership, poomsae, Tae Kwon Do . Tags: , , , . Author: Amy . Comments: 7 Comments

Not Ready for Prime Time

I decided to watch some Tae Kwon Do footage from the Beijing Olympics. Given that it is the art I practice it should be interesting, no?

Forgive me, but I found it dead boring. It’s not much of a spectator sport. When each round is 2 minutes long and all the two opponents do is bounce around for 1 1/2 minutes unsuccessfully taunting the other person into striking first, I tend to drift off.

I know, I know, TKD is a defensive art not an offensive one. Still, I think I now know why it’s not televised. In my opinion, Olympic TKD doesn’t really capture the art of TKD. You don’t see a hell of a lot of it in the matches. I also think my attitude explains why I’m not all that interested in competition outside of poomsae.

In the interest of comparison I watched some Olympic Judo. Far more interesting with the takedowns and actual, I don’t know, action?

August 21, 2008
Categories: competition, Tae Kwon Do . Tags: , , , . Author: Amy . Comments: 3 Comments

Got It!

After several choice words and a disconnect in the middle of uploading I have the video…with sound!

There is a smidge of background noise (fans) and the color looks hideous because the floor and the three walls without mirrors are GREEN! But here I am doing Tae Guk Yuk Jang (my brown belt poomsae).

August 20, 2008
Categories: poomsae, Tae Kwon Do, video . Tags: , , , . Author: Amy . Comments: 5 Comments

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