Tag: hema

Serfo was good. I had an amazing Saturday and a pretty good Sunday. I made it out of pools but not out of elims. I had really good fights and did good fencing. I coached others from my group who got further than I did. I didn’t practice any of the headspace stuff I’d been working on.

Castle Wars was the following weekend. By then I was a few days into taking Wellbutrin, and I could see a big difference. My champion won the Invitational Tournament, and I was on the winning side of some awesome melees.

Since then I’ve gone to Krav twice and fencing at least twice. Even with medication, I’m scared to ask people if they want to fence with me. I don’t know what my problem is. I’m pretty sure everyone would say yes.

Krav classes have been small, but I’m making a point to go until the Christmas holidays because once my work schedule changes in the spring, I won’t be able to come regularly.

Last but not least, I’ve come back to the gym. I’m focusing on cardio for now because I want to improve endurance, and I don’t want to change the way my clothes fit. I ran 2.5 miles on the elliptical in 33 minutes this week. It was a struggle, but that’s my starting point.

I’m apprehensive about the Christmas break because the gym will be closed, and it’ll be easy for me to stay inside in a nest of blankets by the fire. I talked to Tiny Nick about working on combative, though, and I’m excited about that.

I’ve been busy with fencing every day leading up to Serfo. I had a rough night a couple practices ago, but I’m otherwise seeing improvement. I’m trying new things and re-covering fundamentals now in hopes that I’ll be able to turn off my conscious brain and rely on my lizard brain during the tournament’s.

In addition to all the fencing, I’m still lifting frequently. We’re adding more rest days since lifting and fencing together can be pretty taxing.

Everything else is kind of on the back burner for now.

I’m still around. I went to a couple tournaments but didn’t post about them. Basically I trained, I went, I fenced well enough but didn’t win… the usual. My mentor told me to lead less and focus on my fighting, so that’s what I’m doing now.

Right now I’m gearing up for a big tourney: the Southeast Renaissance Fencing Open. We’re about a week into our 30 days of fencing. I’m doing this on top of some pretty rigorous weight training.

Nik and I have been going to the gym pretty much every day since the summer. We do have rest days, and we miss when life gets in the way. When we go, we focus on arms or chest & shoulders (since fencing works the legs). In a month I gained a fair amount of weight but lost 3% body fat.

I’m still doing Krav but on a different schedule. Enrollment dropped enough that we cancelled that class. Now we’re doing seminars every couple of weeks. I took and passed my P4 test. We need to start studying P5, but I’m kind of focused on my tourney prep now. I don’t know if I will progress beyond P5. I have an opportunity to take CIC 2, but I’m apprehensive.

So for now it’s just a ton of fencing and weight lifting.

I’m back, baby!

I’m finally out of the sling, and I even got to fight!

Let’s rewind. I didn’t see much point in updating during my recovery. Mostly my life consisted of being uncomfortable in the sling, occasionally taking it off and doing light stretching, and icing it regularly. I had a few opportunities to go watch other people fence, which wasn’t quite as terrible as it could have been. I enjoyed little victories like being able to wash my own hair.

Then came Thursday. I wore my sling religiously, even the entire ride up to Atlanta. I was so very careful that I felt comfortable leaving the sling off all day on Friday. I attended a discussion about destreza that morning and then a practical lesson that night. To play things safe, I went through the drills left handed and avoided doing ringen afterward. I didn’t even do both halves of the class, partially because I wanted to keep some energy in reserve and partially because my friends had arrived in town.

On Saturday, I fenced for the first time since the injury. I rigged together a shoulder guard and fought in my pool in the women’s long sword competition. I met my goal of not embarrassing myself.

After that, I competed in the dussack tournament. I fought left handed and wore extra padding but didn’t deal with any hard blows to that side. Unfortunately I did smash my fingers and need to sit out the rest of the day, so I missed the first blood rapier tournament.

On Sunday I elected not to participate in the open long sword tournament, and based on some of the fighting I saw, I made the right call. I was able to compete in the conventional long sword tournament, and I made it out of my pools but washed out in elims (fencing right handed since the tournament was thrust only).

I went back to Krav on Monday without the sling. This time I got to participate since I need to catch up on my P3 skills. My Krav buddies marveled at my bruises, and I worked out three weeks’ worth of pent up energy.

Now I’m experiencing a delayed event hangover, so I’ll take it easy tonight. I’m looking forward to Krav practice tomorrow. I’ll let you know when I get to test.

The ortho says I have a Level 1 sprain (so not too bad). I’m supposed to stay in the sling, keep icing it, and generally resting up. I’ve been abiding by those instructions pretty carefully.

I told him about SERFO and what I wanted to do. He said that if I really truly rest, I should be able to compete, BUT (and I can’t emphasize how big this but is), if I’m not feeling 100%, I could cause further injury. A hard fall or blow could cause an AC separation, which would require surgery.

If I were going to SERFO today, I’d do rapier but probably not dussack and definitely not long sword. We’ll see how I feel in two weeks. I’m going to talk to the people in charge of the tournament, evaluate my armor situation, and otherwise figure out what I’m going to do.

In the meantime, my life is super sedentary and boring. I’m getting frustrated, and I don’t have much of an outlet. I am still doing yoga, but class doesn’t meet next week or the week after, so I’ll have to do gentle movement stretching on my own. I’m thinking I need to go for a walk or something to get moving around without straining the shoulder any more.

Last weekend Nik and I took a bunch of our UWF fencing students to Gatalop. I couldn’t fight, of course, but I marshaled, and I had a great time watching our students have a great time. This weekend is Panhandle Skirmishes. I’m considering gearing up so that I can be on the field giving orders, but again, I’m not fighting. It may be better to leave my stuff at home to remove all temptation.

Krav was canceled on Monday since people in my class have kids to take trick or treating. We’re back at it today. I have no idea how class will go since Michael (the other “TA” as I call us) is also hurt – from doing the same move. He’s hurt way worse than I am, so I don’t know if he’ll come in or not. I know we’re mostly doing review, though, so class should be manageable.

I typed a post (painstakingly slowly) on Monday with a lot more detail and then lost it. I’m not a happy camper, so this will be a little terse. 

Saturday was a good workout/fencing day. I lifted some weights with Nik, and then I practiced long sword with Nik and Nikita.

Sunday instead of fencing, I practiced Krav with Gaby and Kita. I did a high forward roll poorly (after doing it mostly right) and crunched my shoulder. I iced it, dealt with it, soaked it… realized I needed to go to the ER. The shoulder isn’t broken, but it is quite painful. I have to wear a sling, and no fighting for at least a week.

I stayed home from work on Monday and slept weird tramadol dreams all morning. I felt better in the evening and visited Krav to drop off the pads and help call out activities.

I was back at work on Tuesday, and I explained my situation to my yogi. She came up with some yoga that I could do, and when I couldn’t do something, I visualized myself doing it and focused on my breathing instead.

Tonight I’ll go watch Krav some more. This has been a nice exercise in teaching using verbalization since I can’t demonstrate anything.

I see the ortho on Monday. I’m going to ask for a fast (if temporary) situation so that I can possibly still fence at SERFO. At the very least, I’d like to do rapier and dussack left-handed. I really really want to do long sword though. Really. Keep your fingers crossed.

At any rate, #fightingeverydamnday is on hold. In the meantime, though, I can read, watch films, and visualize… and be jealous as Nik continues with #fencingeverydamnday

Holy cow it’s been wild.

Monday March 17 was my last night at Krav before I left for War. I led the class’s stretching, so that was pretty cool. I don’t remember exactly what we covered, and I’ve missed three days of class, so tomorrow will be one hell of a night.

Nik and I left for Gulf Wars Tuesday after work (so I skipped yoga). We set up the tent and visited with friends that night.

On Wednesday, Nik got up and mustered for the armored ravine battle. I volunteered to be a water bearer so that I could be near the action. After that, we mustered for the rapier field battle. Our army is small, but we held off the other side as long as we could – they had to send wave after wave of reinforcements to deal with us. I was especially proud of my fencers – my sub-unit consisted of six fencers, four of whom had never been in a big melee before. They did me proud.

On Thursday I attended my first Meridian Order of the Blade meeting. I was elected chairperson and am looking forward to filling this new role. I went to muster and walked down to the town battle, but it was canceled because of the weather. Nik tried to minimize the wetness in our leaky tent, and we hung out with friends until court. Court went well until the storm hit. I learned a new term: microburst. Apparently a microburst is “a small downdraft that moves in a way opposite of a tornado.” The wind was moving in a single direction, and it was gusting, not constant. I helped people get inside, and once I had done so, I made sure that my little SCA family was safe. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but it was pretty scary. I’m glad there was a permanent structure were people could take shelter, and we’re fortunate that there were no serious injuries. Our tent was undamaged but absolutely drenched inside, so we had a sleepover in Mikolaj’s RV – high and dry!

All activities for Friday were cancelled, so we spent the day packing up. We had planned to pack and leave on Saturday, but we went ahead and got our act together Friday instead since we had another trip looming ahead of us. While we were doing so, Her Majesty stopped by to check on our camp and see how everyone was doing. While she was there, she told Nik that if court had not been cut short, he would have received his writ to join the Order of Defense. It’s still official, even though it was issued privately. We have a LOT of work to do to prepare!

Now we’re caught up to Sunday, March 20. After spending two days washing and drying clothes, cleaning the rugs, and otherwise doing damage control, we packed up and got back into the car to head north. It had been awhile since I’d seen my family, and Nik had never met them at all, so we were overdue for a trip. We visited my aunts in Clarskburg, MD. Unfortunately I was too wiped to get Nik to fencing practice while we were there, but I promised we’d come back up and fight some Marylanders. We didn’t have an opportunity to practice while we were in Media, but we did do a demonstration.

See, my grandparents had never seen me fence, so I told my grandmother that we would bring our gear so that she and my grandfather could see. I told her that if any of their friends wanted to see, we could work that out – I was picturing a couple of passes in the courtyard or something. I should have known better! My grandmother contacted the activities director and secured some time in the auditorium for us. We saw flyers posted in the mail room and heard announcements in the dining hall! We had a decent turnout, and Nik and I talk about fencing with some regularity, so we had a presentation ready to go. Everyone seemed to have a good time, and my family managed to get some good pictures too. The retirement community even gave us an honorarium, so now Nik and I are professional fencing lecturers.

We got in last night and are getting settled today. I have to go back to work tomorrow, so we wanted to have a day to get re-oriented before getting back to the daily grind. In addition to rejoining our humdrum professional lives, Nik and I are getting back into our healthy habits. I’m looking forward to getting back to the activity level where I was in January. I feel like I’m full of energy that’s just bursting to get out. I want to harness that and take my fight to the next level.

Anyway, I’m back in town and will stay here for… oh, I don’t know… five days? However, when I come back from that trip, we are taking a much needed BREAK.

Day 34

Sunday

I went to UWF fencing practice. I did 100 lunges and the around the clock drill before gearing up and running a few passes with Nik. I tried something new, and it didn’t work. That’s okay, but when I went back to familiar territory, I still fenced poorly. It was frustrating, but I took a break and went back to it and ended the practice on a good note.

Monday

We worked on advancing and retreating while punching. This is one of the few times that “fencing” at Krav has been helpful.

Tuesday

Stretch it out! I went to yoga. We did a bunch of flows, and the movement really helped me stay connected to my breath.