A Return and New Start

I am really sorry to have been away so long – much longer than I intended!

It hasn’t been from lack of desire to write, but more from a lack of time. A lot happened really quickly once I returned from my deployment and part of that has meant figuring out a new routine – including time to blog.

Backing up a little, the deployment was really rewarding, although by the time I got home I was legitimately exhausted. We had a lot of weather issues which meant we either weren’t able to get into port or stay in port as long as we should have for down time.

Despite that, I was able to fairly consistently practice and even sent the bosses a video of my practice to which they provided feedback after realizing fully the limitations I was working with (it’s one thing to hear it, but another to see it!)

That helped a little to get me on track, but once I got back there was some uncertainty until last week with regards to whether or not I would be posted to another location back east. That put everything I was doing in a bit of a holding pattern as I wasn’t sure how long I would be able to work with the bosses.

Thankfully, last week I got confirmation that while I am going to be changing positions, I am going to be staying in the same location. As if that wasn’t enough, once I returned to work after my deployment, due to an unexpected departure I almost immediately was called on to take over temporarily as the senior public affairs officer in the area. That required a lot of extra time and energy to sort out as the unexpected departure left a lot of holes and issues to be sorted out.

Also in the middle of all that, I finally made the choice and transition to move myself and my cats to live with my spouse so we can establish residency for common-law status. I was more or less living at his place without my kitties in the months leading up to my deployment, so it wasn’t too much of a transition in general, but still meant quite a few adjustments overall to my basic routine, working out how those changes all worked.

I have also made some adjustments to my diet and workout routine. During the deployment, I realized I need to make some changes because what I had been doing wasn’t really working. So I went back to the program that worked for me the first time (and was pleased to see that the changes that had led to me leaving it last time were better incorporated), and committing to a counseling program to talk a little bit about the reasons behind my weight issues as well as being more mindful about eating only when I am actually hungry and stopping when I am full. It’s still on-going, but I have been able to get most of the weight I gained while deployed.

For fitness, I am also working with a new trainer. Not because there was anything wrong with my other one, but just because I wanted to try a change – some new exercises and a new way of training. It is also going quite well, although I have run into one exercise I recently discovered is causing my back to flare up that I will have to avoid in the future. Running is still happening, and it’s been challenging. I had to change to new sneakers as I found about a month ago I was being plagued by shin splints. Progress is still slow, but it is happening, so that is something to hang on to.

On the dance front, that is not without changes as well. I realized shortly after returning to lessons with the bosses that while I really enjoy working with them, I was also frustrated with only being able to work with them once every 2 weeks. Even though I was working and practicing regularly, I MISSED just dancing – something there isn’t a lot of time for when you are trying to cram 2 weeks worth of stuff into a couple lessons.

It took me a little while, but I realized I had to find a way to work with an instructor during the week without interfering with what I am doing with the Bosses. After considering a lot of different options, I decided to go with our local dance franchise as it also gives me a better place to practice where I am not competing with basketball players and kettle bell swingers. It’s also located between work and home which is convenient.

At the franchise I am working with Smooth Guy on, you guessed it, smooth. The focus there is not on competing or even a lot of technique. The goal there is time dancing with a partner, working on building a repertoire of steps. I am currently reviewing the end of their bronze program which is where I left off when I worked at the franchise many years ago.

I also worked out a deal where even though Smooth Guy is not familiar with International style at all, his Boss is and together they are learning my latin routines so each week at my lesson we can spend about 15 minutes dancing through the routines. It’s been a week and so far he has most of the sequence of steps in my rumba down, although there are some differences between Latin and Rhythm that are showing up, but considering it’s a week and he has never done Latin before I have 0 complaints. I think that is the final piece to my dance puzzle overall.

In the details, I also had to sit down with Boss to sort our my solo practice. I felt there was not organization or direction to what I was doing as I didn’t know what it was they wanted me to focus on and I had so much information I couldn’t filter it. After finding out I am sticking around for at least a year, that made it easy to sort and in the end Boss gave me two things to focus on: Focus and Timing. I have two main exercises over 3 dances, and then I am to work on incorporating those 2 points into the first 30s of each of my routines.

It’s been a week and already I feel much better and motivated, and at my lessons today Boss commented he already noticed a big difference.

As a final bonus as I close this out – with knowing where I will be – we are now looking at planning to compete in early fall. Our fist competition today. Finally, a competition goal!

I promise not to be so much a stranger from now on.

Last post til Christmas…

This will be my last post for a while.

I am heading out for work and I won’t be back until almost Christmas. It should be a great experience and I am looking forward to it. I leave Sunday night, but it does feel like there is still a lot to do and that needs to happen before then. Part of me is still doubting I will really leave; I feel like something in the universe will interfere and I can’t get that feeling to go away. Perhaps it will when I get on the plane.

My lessons last week were really good. We went through my questions about my exercises and then focused on the jive because Boss really wants me to work on improving my technique while I am away, especially as it is something I can do in minimal space on the ship.

It makes great sense to me and its an area where I can really make small changes that make a big difference overall. The other area I can focus on a lot is samba and we have a great exercise we do in the group class that will be great and easy to work on during my time away as well.

It occurred to me during my lessons that what I need is to really nail down those areas I want to (and can reasonably) improve while I am away and let that be my focus that drives me. Once I started thinking that way everything began to come clearer for me.

I’ll be doing a lot of exercises and not focusing as much on the routines because in the end there isn’t a lot of room for that, and the floor surfaces are really not meant for turning and spinning. That seems reasonable to me and manages my own expectation.

Boss and Lady Boss also offered to evaluate and provide direction on any videos I send them of my exercises, so I will probably take them up on that, if internet connectivity allow it. With some low res videos I might be able to email them back.

Overall I am excited and looking forward to the deployment for the experience it will give me, not only for work but personally – it will be a great experience! In the end though, like anything it is one step at a time, one day at a time. There will be ups and downs, but I’ll keep positive as I always do and take it as it comes.

If I have a chance to write, while I am away I will, but I don’t want to make any promises.

So therefore, so long for now, see you at Christmas.

 

No more ‘flat’

That was one of the themes of my last set of lessons.

We were looking at the cha cha which has an elaborate new york sequence and in doing the new yorks we had a conversation about body position. Part of that included a switch from a flat body position to one that emphasizes angles.

Essentially, I was told that no matter what step I am doing, I need to work to stretch from shoulder to opposite hip. There is no more being ‘flat’. Its a progression to move my dance forward and bring it to the next level.

It’s actually quite a mindset change for me. Its going to take some work, but because it involves a stretch it should be easy to mark when I can feel when I am doing it. Its a challenge to give myself, especially while I am away.

We also discussed my right arm and the limitations from the scar tissue. We tried a few different positions for it with it elevated and we really couldn’t find a position for it extended over my head that didn’t raise my should or even look really good. My left arm was ok. In the end, we agreed that we would avoid having my right arm up from now on we wouldn’t ever put it into that position, and agreed on 3 positions that would work – on my hip, bent to my head, and extended at shoulder height.

I feel better with that agreement. It really doesn’t look good when I put my arm up and that is a good compromise. I can do it on the left side and in many ways that allows for some built in variety.

We really worked through the cha cha which helped break it down and identify the problem points for me. In a few places it was a matter that I was overturning and ending up facing wrong direction in places.

We also went over the beginning of the samba again to review the promenade runs and iron out and clarify some of the points there. We got pretty much to the same point as last lessons but I feel like I understand it much better now. I have to sort out some arm issues, but in general at least the first few steps are coming together. We also spent time working on cruzado walks, the main point being I need to move my hips more and (of course) work on getting the angles.

In the group class we also focused on samba, working on whisks, bota fogos, and voltas. It was a good review of the technique overall and left me with a lot to think about.

Work has been crazy again and despite trying really hard I haven’t been able to do practice so far this week. Thankfully with the long weekend I will get a chance to practice Friday, Saturday and Monday without worrying about work. I plan to definitely catch up. I am also dealing with a bit of an ear infection, so I am hoping that clears up as my balance has been a bit wonky.

Time to move things forward from flat to angled.

Returning to Dance

Sunday was my first lesson with New Boss.

I will have a lesson with him again this week because he and Lady Boss made some changes to their competing schedule which meant they are here this weekend, but not here a couple weeks in a row in July.

It was really great to get back on the floor and be working again. The first lesson was better than I expected, and even the commute wasn’t as bad as I feared.

He is still evaluating, which is understandable, but it is interesting to see what he has picked up on. One thing that is the most interesting are the number of small idiosyncrasies he picked up on that I didn’t even know I had. Every now and then he would ask me why I did something he noticed I was doing consistently and on purpose that seemed strange to him, and I would have either no idea I was doing it or no idea why.

For example, in rumba I have a habit of automatically stepping to my partner’s right side before the twist in a hip twist, instead of stepping straight towards him. I think Old Boss always led it that way so that is my habit. Another was my starting position when my feet are together – I would stand with one foot slightly ahead of the other in almost a pressed walk position to prepare to move with the free leg turned out (this is also my position when I close the fan). Old Boss neither encouraged nor corrected it, but New Boss had me adjust so my ankles are together, my feet are more closed, my ‘free’ foot is on the inside ball of the foot and my knee is facing forward…plus other body adjustments.

We worked on rumba and cha cha, starting with rumba. He immediately noticed some issues with how I follow (no surprise, Old Boss and I were only beginning to work on it), so we made some adjustments to how I use my arm, such as focusing on relaxing the elbow and not allowing the wrist to collapse and to not grasp his hand with my thumb (another idiosyncrasy).

We worked through a basic pattern (hip twist, fan, hockey stick) to focus on using the body more, especially to turn. We also fixed my hip twist position to face it out to the audience instead of across my partner. We also worked on sliding doors, which led to a conversation about cucharachas – another correction.

From there we moved to cha cha walks which was interesting because I have never done cha cha walks backward before, except in the aida or if needed in a routine. It never occurred to me to practice walking backward lol. I have done back locks, but never with the walks before. That was interesting because we talked about the lock steps, how they are done and worked on them.

One of the main things to come out of the lesson is my general foot position. New Boss was watching me move and he said he felt like every step forward and back I made was like I was doing a series of ‘checks’ instead of flowing movements, and the main reason was because my feet were too turned out to allow full hip movement and it stopped my action. We talked about how checks are good for changing direction (like in the basic), but for moving in a line it is better to close the feet to sixth position to allow freedom of movement in the hip.

That is going to be a big change for me, especially my right foot which loves turning out. Another thing was my tendency to take big steps and swing the foot ahead of my body. This means I have to go with the foot and move my weight almost instantly onto the forward foot for balance instead of allowing the trailing foot to control the movement and stabilize me. I have to work on placing the foot under my hip, which also lets me separate the foot and hip movement instead of stepping with the hip already more or less settled.

So lots of little details to work out, but honestly I prefer focusing on little details than finding I have really big fundamentals to fix. Details I can work with and tells me I do have a good foundation to allow for work on the details. I even have DOMS in my side lower back muscles from the lesson and in my hamstrings and calves – places I haven’t really had it before (usually dance gives me core DOMS or upper body more than anything), which also says I am using my body in a new way – a positive thing!

We haven’t talked about level or routines yet, but as we have only done two dances that is not surprising. I have two more lessons this weekend, so perhaps we’ll try a new dance. I also have lessons the following weekend so by the end of that I hope we will be able to discuss levels, etc.

Mainly my mind is processing all the new information, but I wish this week wasn’t so busy for me work and life-wise. My graduation from my Masters program was today, so I officially hold a Masters in Intercultural and International Communication! For work, I have to spend the next two days commuting almost 2 hours one way to work on an issue taking place at one of our remoter communities.

 

The extra time back and forth will take away from time to practice, so I am fitting in little pieces of work here and there where I can this week. My mom is also in town for my graduation so I am also taking time in the evening to spend with her.

 

Next week should be a better week for nailing down some good practice and working through a pattern for practice.

 

Either way, the good news is I am on the floor!

A Solid Run-through

Finally!

The last week and a half have been about working to get the routines to the point where we can go through them all without stopping and almost mistake free.

Today we had a rounds practice where we mainly focused on standard and it went extremely well. Not perfect of course, but solid enough to alleviate some of the anxiety around the open routines.

It also helps that we received our heat lists and the most number of dances we have in a row is 5. We don’t always have a big break between, sometimes only 5 or 10 minutes, but it is enough time to recollect ourselves and reset for the next round.

I will also compete in 4 events with semi-finals and 2 with quarter finals. The two with quarter finals are both open scholarships, so I don’t really expect to make it to the semi in those, but I am optimistic to make the finals from the 4 semis because they are closed silver events.

That said, in the end it is all about doing my best – that’s all I can really control. I expect there to be some tough competition in many of the events, and much more seasoned competitors than myself.

We start fairly early both days, 730 on Friday and 8 am on Saturday, both to dance one random single dance I needed to qualify for the scholarships. After each we have about a 2 hour wait for our next group of dances. It means pretty early days to have my hair and make-up all together. We also have a good gap of about 3 hours between our last silver events and our open ones.

With the rounds practice behind me, I am slowly starting to feel myself getting excited for the competition. I have been checking off my ‘to do’ list and am counting the days.

I do have two small ‘hiccups’ to finish working out.

First, a month ago at our first rounds practice I snapped the post on the buckle of one of my standard competition shoes. I took it to the cobbler’s and they fixed it. Last weekend they worked well, but today when I went to put them on, the post was too short to hold the strap. I am not quite sure what caused that, but I have to go back to the cobbler’s tomorrow to ask them to replace it again with a longer post.

Second, I ran into some issues with my new standard dress (but my latin one works great!), in that the body suit was too loose and long which led it to shift as we moved. In addition, the floats were too long, especially on the left to the point where there was risk of stepping on them. I had to go over to the mainland on Thursday to meet the dressmaker so she could make the adjustments while I waited.

First, the ferry was booked full for cars (odd for a Thursday afternoon), so I had to walk on the ferry with my dress to make the timing, which was the only time available to get the dress fixed. I then had to take a taxi from the terminal to the studio. She was able to see the dress on me to figure out where the adjustments needed to be make and started to sew, but her needle hit a stone and broke shortly after. Therefore, she wasn’t able to finish the dress while I was there.

She finished it that night and sent it by UPS Friday morning. I should receive it tomorrow before my dance lesson, which should give us a chance to run some of the routines in the dress.

Needless to say, the next 3 days are going to by busy and bit non-stop, followed by flying to the competition and competing. The week after the competition will be a crazy one at work and then I fly out for 2 weeks of training in Germany. I won’t really get a break until the last week of May.

I really can’t wait to get on the floor again and see how I do.

Hopefully the comp will be as solid as today’s run-through.

It looks good…

Today was almost hip pain free.

I started to feel a dull ache during the last 5 minutes of my lesson, with things feeling tight and tired about 20 minutes before that.

Compared to Monday, its like night and day.

Today in my lesson I didn’t hold much back. I had moments where I could feel myself being tentative because I was expecting what I was doing to cause pain and I was really surprised when it didn’t. Once I got through that first hurdle, doing it the next time was easier.

We even started with open jive and did 2 fairly good run-throughs- one slow and one more medium. We then switched to standard and ran through the silver routines, followed by the silver latin. We ended with the Quickstep and Foxtrot pieces we worked on at the end of Monday’s lesson.

Overall, a much more productive lesson than I have had in quite some time, but I am still being diligent and about icing and heating, physio and massage therapy. There is still 3.5 weeks until the comp and I don’t want to temp fate. I am also not going to be returning to the gym until after, just in case.

Small interesting fact: since I got injured and stopped going to the gym and reduced dance, I have actually lost more than 5 lbs out of the blue, putting me at the lowest I have been since chemo. Interesting that…

I have one more lesson this week on Friday and the weekend will be dance free as the rounds practice is cancelled due to a concert in the hall where it takes place. The weekend off will likely be good in the long run.

The plan is to review some of the latin styling on Friday and then do as much of a run-through as we can in the smaller hall on Monday to see how things feel. Hopefully my hip will continue to recover.

Looks like the competition is on! Words cannot express the relief I felt today throughout my lesson as I realized that I wasn’t getting pain like I was. I am feeling much more optimistic even though I am a little more sore tonight than I was after my lesson. I’ll do another round of ice and heat before bed and continue on with my routine.

Fingers still crossed.

A hope and a prayer

That is what I have right now.

The doctor wanted me to get an ultrasound guided injection, but unfortunately I won’t be able to get in until mid-June. At this point, she is going to try a blind injection tomorrow in the office.

It could work, it might not.

Doing it blindly, she might miss the bursa which won’t help reduce the inflammation and runs the risk of not being effective.

Unfortunately, based on the past week alone, if I am unable to get this hip pain managed soon there is no way I will be able to finish training to compete, let alone compete itself. Its less than 30 days until the competition and their policy is that they will only provide credit towards next year’s event and only with a doctor’s note for a cancellation.

So, competing is down to a hope and a prayer that the blind injection tomorrow has strong positive effects.

There is also still the possibility that its not bursitis at all, but a tendon injury in the area, but given the symptoms, bursitis is still the most likely culprit.

Other than the injection, my biggest ‘help’ is rest and ice – not great options and certainly not ones that feel very productive.

Yesterday, to rest my hip we looked gently at a small section of the quickstep followed by styling in latin. It was productive, but really limiting. We had already decided not to do the rounds practice this weekend, but with the injection tomorrow I have to cancel my lesson as I have to rest for 48 hours to give the shot time to work.

With a hope and a prayer, hopefully I will be back to being at least a little functional by Monday and can breathe a sigh of relief, but in all honesty my anxiety levels until then is going to remain pretty high.

At least I have the option of having my doctor try a blind injection, rather than being left with no option at all until June.

The other thing I have to try to do is not lay on my right side. As I have a habit of sleeping on that side, its a bit of a challenge but even after not doing so last night and a lot of ice there does seem to be a little bit of progress.

Here goes nothing…

Its Definitely the Hip

Bursitis is the likely culprit.

I saw physio yesterday and since I didn’t get much relief after my appointment last week he looked into my hip a bit more. After examining it and seeing how tender I am to touch he is leaning towards bursitis, with tendon issues being the back-up.

At least it isn’t my back, which is a relief since the back exercises I was doing weren’t having much effect.

The way forward is for me to get a cortizone injection tomorrow morning into my hip. From how I react to it, that will determine whether it is bursitis or bigger tendon issues. Basically, if the injection results in things getting better overall, it is bursitis. If the injection has minimal effect, its the tendons. If it is bursitis, the injection could potentially solve the issue or at least minimize it enough to settle it down.

Its hard to know what is causing the issue, but from what I have read once bursitis gets triggered (usually from an injury) it can be hard to settle down. This could be related to the strange pulling I experienced a few times doing standard and other movements back in February.

I am really trying to stay optimistic, but its difficult to do when I have had to really modify and baby my hip during my lesson. Last night we even ended early as working on the rumba I inadvertently leaned back too far into my hip and caused a huge twang that made it difficult for me to even walk after. Any time I rotate my hip causes pain and I am still experiencing a need to limp a bit today.

I am currently sitting with an ice pack on my hip (bursitis like cold, not heat) and really hoping that tomorrow brings some relief for me that allows me to get back to preparing for the competition. So many pieces are coming together so well in all the routines that we are even able to look back at some details again instead of focusing on full routines.

So my fingers are crossed (and toes too!) trying not to expect too much and being ready for bad news that the rest of my prep will be focused on resting and caring for the tendons as best I can.

Here goes nothing…

And then there were 2

2 routines that we still haven’t been able to get through top to bottom at speed with the music without a major disaster.

Not surprisingly, they are jive and quickstep.

That’s not to say the others are perfect by any means, but they are well on their way to being respectable on the floor.

That said, jive and quickstep are coming. Jive was the focus of today’s lesson and already it is going better than it was. We did get through it today once with slightly slower music.

I will say that spending almost entire lessons on either jive or quickstep can be pretty exhausting, especially when the majority of the lesson is spent running the routines or large sections of it. Its a good test of conditioning, which isn’t bad, but definitely still needs a lot of work.

I will say that I am not as concerned about either routine as I was even a week ago. I can see the progress and we are “this close” to having them together.

This week we switch from weekend lessons to weekend rounds practices with other dancers. They are the same practices we used to do way back when, so they will be really good for letting us know where we stand overall, especially in terms of endurance and conditioning.

I am looking forward to the rounds because they will give a consistent and steady run-through of all of my routines each week, which is what we really need right now. I am finding a little that as we move to focus on one routine the others suffer some. The rounds practice will help to keep them together.

Tonight’s lesson was pretty hard. We started with the open rumba which went really well then focused in on the open jive. It was already flowing better than last Friday, and I wasn’t mixing up the steps as much as I was then. It was just really obvious when my endurance starting lagging.

I should mention I have a black eye right now. I was at the gym working out and when I went to return some weight plates to the weight tree a person working at a pulley machine next to it let go of the handles without maintaining any control and it swung out and hit me hard on the corner of my left eye. I have a lovely blue goose egg I can see out of the corner of the eye and the swelling is irritating. It made it a little hard to concentrate tonight, but I am glad I got the lesson done.

We switched from open jive to silver jive to give a bit of a break (yep, that qualifies as a break!), before returning to the open jive for a couple more full run-throughs, first a little slower, then at regular speed. Some small mishaps, but we did get all the way to the end and learned the routine is 1:30.

We finished by running through the paso from top to bottom 4-5 times with only about a minute break between each one.

Unfortunately, that’s when a bit of trouble started with my body. I can’t really describe what it going on except to say I was experiencing a tight and sore feeling in my right hip. To me, that means either my back or my minor glute muscle is acting up again. Thankfully, I have physio tomorrow.

I finished my night by running through all the silver routines on my own with the music, and then some spot work in the open quickstep, jive and a change in the rumba I needed to just review for myself. My hip was pretty ok for the most part, but I did end up stopping 10 mins before I intended because my hip just got too sore.

I guess, truthfully, the jive is almost in the same place as the other open latin routines, perhaps about one lesson behind.

Which really leaves only one…

Speed

I can feel myself lacking this.

On Friday after my lesson I worked on running through the silver routines, and in particular I tried to do the latin routines with the music.

Oy. That was a sobering moment.

In all the routines, except for rumba (and even moments there), I generally felt really heavy and slow. In cha cha in particular it felt like I was constantly scrambling to get my legs moving.

It was a little disappointing because I know that once upon a time I prided myself in being able to run all my routines in time with the music and speed used to be one of my greatest assets in latin.

Now I just feel like I am constantly behind and no matter how hard I try my legs just wouldn’t keep up. My body wouldn’t move and I felt a bit like a lead block. It was honestly the first time I tried to do any routine in time with the music in quite some time, so I am looking at it as a first step which will get better every time I do it.

That said, the major victory for the week was getting through the open paso in time with music up to speed without any major stops or disasters. It was rough, the styling was pretty much non-existent, but we were able to do it a few times at the end of my lesson on Friday.

The other small victory this week was that I was finally able to work through the silver standard routines on my own. I haven’t tried to put them to the music yet, but I was have constant issues just putting all the steps together in time with the music. The silver quickstep is still a bit of an issue, but at least there is a starting point.

Yesterday we focused on standard in the bigger hall during my extra lesson. We started with running the silver routines which went really well, and they we walked through the open paso and samba to see how they fit in a bigger hall for the alignments. After that, we ran through the open waltz, tango and worked some on the open quickstep to finish the lesson.

One of the issues we are encountering right now is that both our open waltz and tango had lines that were too long for the hall. We have had to cut a few steps out of each line and to realign the start a little to make them fit. Its still a bit of a work in progress, and I am sure we will finish adjusting the routines this week.

The open quickstep didn’t go too bad, but the main issue was that neither I nor Boss had worked on it in a while, so it was just rough. Its top of the list for my lessons this week.

The one routine where speed is really concerning me is jive. I just can’t imagine the routine at the speed it needs to go.

That’s actually one of the issues I am finding right now – in my head all of the routines in are slo-mode. My head can’t visualize them at the speed they need to be because in all honestly its been quite a while since I have really done any routines at the proper speed in some of the dances. The dances themselves have become slow in my head and that is not helping me get up to speed.

But the hardest part of fixing a problem is recognizing there is one. At least I have done that.

The only place to go from here is faster.