YAY clinics!

I finally started clinics today!!  I'm FINALLY playing vet instead of sitting on my butt all day, listening to professors and staring at slides.  I've been going through cycles of excitement and nervousness for the past few weeks, but after today I think most of the nerves are gone and I'm just excited to actually be doing stuff.  We had a pretty busy day, not made any easier by walking to the parking lot to find my classmate's car under a gigantic tree branch that was blown down during the freak 30-minute storm/tornado. 

Unfortunately, this means I won't get to train as much.  I didn't get home until almost 8 (although I did spend over half an hour with my classmate of the treed car, taking pictures and such).   Then once I got home, I had to do some research on all the crap I didn't know today.  And we need to be there by 7:30 tomorrow.  On the one hand, I really don't want to give up jiu jitsu.  But I also know that I'm only in school for one more year, and I don't want to spend this year rushing out of the clinic at the end of the day and possibly overlooking something in my rush to get to BJJ class.

I haven't disappeared...

yet.  Clinics don't start until Monday, but even though finals were done two weeks ago, I've still been so swamped I barely made it to jiu jitsu since the Friday finals were over.  We had Open House the weekend after, and then a presentation on Foot and Mouth Disease, and now this contract negotiation project...it seriously never ends, even when you think it does.

I did make it to open mat today (yesterday, really).  Rolled with my boyfriend for a while, which was kind of nice even though he has  70 pounds on me.  I had to goad him into unleashing "The Thunder," which he finally did after much coaxing and prodding.  I'm not sure how many times I have to tell him that it annoys me more when he goes easy on me and hands me submissions, but hopefully he'll get it now.  Worked a little on how to modify a triangle going bad.  Then one of our "family guys" shows up, whose daughters both train.  One of them is competing in May, so I rolled with her for a little while.  I'm so jealous--she's only 11 and she's already really good.  I'm sure she'll do well at the competition, but I gave her a few pointers anyways.  There was a pretty significant size difference, so I did have a little trouble telling if some of the stuff she was doing was because she was so much smaller, or just because she didn't know it.

On the plus side for today, all of us soon-to-be-fourth years got Sombreros and free lunch for our "Scrubbin' In" ceremony.  They even had pinatas stuffed with candy, AND "pin the testicles on the donkey." 

Finally!

I FINALLY got to train as a blue belt on Friday!!!  YAY!!!!  It was the afternoon class, and of course I was late because even though we're finally done with finals, I had to go to a bunch of meetings and barely got out in time.  And then when I got there, I was the odd woman out.  I was so worn out from finals, though, that I didn't mind sitting and watching a bit.  We were working the elevator from half guard, and went over a few variations.  We did the same basic thing on Saturday, too. Starting from bottom half, protect your head with your arm from the crossface, and put one hand on their bicep.  Grab their belt around the back with the other hand.  Have your inside foot trap their leg, unhook your outside leg and use it to shrimp out.  In that space, bring in your foot, keeping the knee to the outside, making a new hook.  Now switch the bicep hand to the knee, unhook the inside leg and use it to shrimp in, bringing your hips under theirs.  Lift the outside (hooked) leg, elevating them.  From there you can continue to take them over for the sweep (catch the other leg with your hand so they don't just lock down half guard again), bring your inside leg outside to take guard, bring that leg outside to sweep them back in the direction you came from, etc.

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Ever since the weather started getting nicer, I've been running at a nearby nature park for my cardio workouts.  It turns out there's going to be a trail race there in the middle of May, and I really want to do it...I just don't know if I can survive seven miles of hills!  It's the Stalk Your Quarry Trail Race, and even though I've been through it all, I don't think I've been able to do more than half at once.  At least it was the hardest half, but that still really pushed me.  I think five weeks should be enough to make it, but we'll see how the training is going closer the race.  My first clinical rotation starts in two weeks, and it's Small Animal Medicine, which I've heard has some pretty intense hours.  If I can't find the energy to train properly, then there's no sense in hurting myself trying to run it.
 

Three more days

Just three more days...three more finals...and then no more finals EVER!!!  

No, seriously.  I am alive--just trying to make it through my last academic semester of vet school, and then I'll be back on the mats by Saturday.  Except it hardly makes me feel better, because once clinical rotations start in about 2 1/2 weeks, I'll be in the clinic so much that I'll hardly have time for jiu jitsu =(  And I wanted to cram in as much as I can now, but of course finals don't help that...and neither did last week's cold.  It would be seriously super awesome if we had a UT BJJ club, because then at least I wouldn't have to make the commute to the academy and I could maybe justify going to a class or two this week. 

Nice push press...

I haven't been to jiu jitsu since my belt test because I've had a cold, so no new techniques (or blue belt beatdowns) to report.  I did, however, manage to make it to the gym for some lifting today.  I woke up feeling better than I had all week, and my muscles were begging for something to do besides sitting.

So I get through my squats and my deadlifts, and I was putting away the weights and about to put the bar back on the pins when, for fun, I decided to push jerk the bar a couple of times.  I was doing it squat-style, when the guy next to me told me I could get better balance on my "push press" if I put one leg back.

Um...thanks?  I told him I was going more for a squat-style jerk, and pretty much left it at that.  I didn't want to be rude when someone was actually being nice in the rawr-man-hulk section of the gym, but at the same time...so many things wrong!  A) I wasn't doing push presses, b) I wasn't trying to do a split jerk, c) it's not like I tilted over or lost balance at any point during my push jerks. 

Don't get me wrong.  I understand completely that I'm a lifting neophyte.  I'm still nervous about lifting by myself without anyone to help keep an eye on my form, so obviously I would appreciate any help in that department.  But at the same time, I obviously need to be able to sift out erroneous information from "helpful" people.  Sometimes, I really wish I was back at CrossFit 516.

Belt test!

I woke up yesterday feeling like crap.  My neck was still really sore from all the headlock escapes we had been doing on Thursday, and my stomach was all kinds of knotted up.  But there would be no sleeping in--I had to get to the academy for my blue belt test.

I managed to stuff down two Nutella-smothered waffles on my way over, and found Paris, the one other guy testing with me, and Matt, the guy he was testing with.  Gavin, one of our instructors was also there, and Paris and I went over some last minute details while Matt and Gavin tidied up the place--there were piles of old mats that Gavin wanted put away for the test.  We got there around 10, but the test didn't start until 11:30, so we had plenty of time for last-minute review (and nerves!)  People started trickling in even before 11, and it was really nice to see so many of our teammates had come out to support us.  Plus, they would get to take part, so I'm sure they wouldn't miss out on it.

We started promptly at 11:30, and went through our usual warm-up.  Part of the test involved some of our "warm-up" moves, such as standing in base, shrimping, rolling forward and breaking our fall, so we had to go first for everything.  For the next part, they had everyone except for Paris, myself and our respective training partners stand at the edge of the mat.  Everyone had to watch while we demonstrated the techniques they called out.  We were told to continue doing the technique until they told us to move on.  Starting from the very beginning, they went through the entire Pedro Sauer white-to-blue curriculum, somewhere from 80-90 moves.  It wouldn't have been too bad, except we had to do each move at least three times, often more.  And there were no breaks, except when my partner Ryan needed to fix his belt or I needed to shove my hair back into a ponytail.  Within the first ten minutes, I was already breathing hard and sweating.  This would not be good.

Finally, after about an hour (and a few partner replacements in my place, just because Ryan was so lanky that sometimes certain things just looked awkward when I did them to him), we finished the technique portion.  Paris and I were told to take a five minute break, while everyone else huddled up for a meeting.  They're going to kick our asses, I knew it.  Gavin came over after he finished with them, to prepare us for the next part.  We were going to be rolling straight for anywhere from 45-60 minutes, and we would need to conserve our energy.  Survive, he told us.  Remember that it's a marathon, not a sprint.  But don't ever give up and don't stop moving, because they WILL be pushing you.  However, he also made it clear that if anyone thought they could go crazy on me (or Paris) he would not hesitate to give them an ass-whooping in front of everyone.  They did one or two three-minute rounds, and then called us back in.

Now the fun part really began.  Once again, everyone lined up by rank, except for Paris and me.  The two of us were to stay out on the mat the whole time, and every three minutes two new people would come roll with us.  No breaks, no mercy.  Just never-ending jiu jitsu.

I honestly don't remember a whole lot of what happened.  I remember feeling good my first few matches; I didn't tap anyone but I survived and, in some cases, got in a few good moves.  I didn't feel particularly dead yet, but it still didn't help that I was going against fresh people every few minutes.  However, as it got later I could tell I was starting to fade.  I still wasn't feeling terrible, but I just didn't have the energy to move as much--I waited when I shouldn't have, and my matches become more about survival.  Every now and then I had bursts of energy; certain people I wasn't looking forward to rolling with (i.e. the ones twice my size) would come in and I would try to start on top instead of pulling guard; but that never worked.  Finally, at one point, I got tapped by a 3-stripe white belt.  He was one of those big guys, and normally, I don't wait around to tap.  When I'm caught, I know it, and I know there's nothing to be gained from passing out on the mat.  But it still angers me that I was being "choked" (suffocated, really) purely because I was squeezed into a fake triangle that I had been muscled into, and not because he had a legit submission on me.  I fought that one as hard as I could, but I couldn't get out.  Maybe I waited too long to stack him, or maybe there was nothing I could have done.  I had another few decent matches after that, and then it started going seriously downhill.  I still didn't feel awful, but more and more I was curling up when my guard got passed, and not moving got me into a position where I was going to be submitted.  I got tapped a few more times, and then for my last few rounds, it was my three coaches.  Of everyone, they probably went the roughest on me.

Finally, they called time.  I sat up and tried to catch my breath, which was kind of work until I got hauled to my feet.  Then I felt like I was about to puke for a minute, but I managed to make it.  We lined up by rank, and they called me up.  After a short speech, they tied on my belt.

That's John tying on my belt, and Mike in the background.  Paris got called up next, and if anything, his journey was even more difficult--he has a four-month-old son, so lately he's only been able to get in maybe 2-3 times a week, if he was lucky.

So thanks to everyone in the above picture, who was there for our test.  You all participated and pushed me and without you, the test wouldn't have happened.

I have far too many more people to thank than just my KnoxBJJ classmates.  I left a note on my Facebook with some details, but I want to thank you, everyone who has ever given me advice or encouragement, because without the online BJJ community I might have lost the heart to keep training. 

I don't particularly like Mondays, but...

yesterday wasn't so bad.  One of my professors told me they were doing a laparoscopic ovariectomy on a lion, and I could stop by if I wanted.  I'm doing a paper on that for a different class, so I was excited to be invited.  Luckily, I didn't have class until 1 on Monday, so I got to help prepare the lion for surgery, and talk to the vet about the procedure. I only got to watch a little bit of the actual surgery before I had to get to class, but hopefully I'll get to participate in one when I'm a fourth year student. 

Later that evening, one of my friends had a bunch of us vetlings for dinner for Persian New Year.  Her parents came from Nashville and cooked Persian food, and it was delicious.  It was definitely one of those days to NOT wear just-washed shrunken jeans.  I had to miss jiu jitsu for it, but it was definitely worthwhile.  Sometimes a break is necessary.

Brick Wall

I came to this revelation on Julia's blog post about getting hurt in class:

"Honestly, until I started jiu jitsu I almost never cried. Even before when I did jiu jitsu (when I first started, about seven years ago, before my 4-year hiatus), I never cried from jiu jitsu. Now that I think about it, I honestly believe part of the reason I cry more is because I’m closer to more of the people I train with and as a result, I’m more emotionally “open”. Awful as it sounds, it’s so tempting to try and put those walls up again so I can at least function like a normal person."

I've been feeling this for months now, but until now I just couldn't put it into words and identify it.   And now that I finally know what's going, I think I can fix it.

I'm tired of being that girl.  I need to be able to function again without worrying about breaking down when things get hard or I get hurt.  I need to be able to brush things off and keep going, and not get so touchy about things that aren't personal.  So a brick wall is going up.  I'm not taking anything personally.  I'm not special and I don't expect anything from anyone.  I'm going to pass my blue belt test and then focus on vet school, at least until finals are over three weeks from now. 

Belt test review...epic fail.

Warning: This is one of those rambling emotional posts...you might want to skip this one if you're sick of hearing about the waterworks. 

My instructors did a blue belt test review for me today, and unfortunately it looks like I don't know the curriculum as well as I thought I did.  We got there at 9, which gave us about two and a half hours until regular class started.  I thought that would have been plenty of time to do the review, and then maybe go grab some breakfast before class.

BIG mistake.  We barely finished in time.  It seemed like there was still material that I either didn't know, or saw just once before (and this too was from asking one of the blue belts who had recently tested, not from class).  Also, my jiu jitsu memory appears to be like a sieve--I can't remember anything until I've done it multiple times, even if I just did it the day before.  Then there were the moves that I thought I knew, but I was doing it wrong.  I know a big part of it is obviously me, but I can't help but feel frustrated at the fact that a lot of the curriculum is self-defense, which we don't really work on a whole lot.  I feel like I'm learning things just for a test, and I'm not really sure why these moves are deemed important enough to be in the curriculum but not so important that they're part of the regular rotation of moves taught in class.  Obviously I've had times where I've been out for weeks and I've had to miss classes, but there are just a lot of things that we don't do because they're not really what people come in to learn Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for.  Also, there's a lot of headlock defense stuff that we don't do too much of because...well, BJJ players don't really pull headlocks that much. Going over it again now, I think I know it.  I really need to drill this stuff next week, and go over it in my head at least two times a day.  I really owe them (and the coach's son, for coming in and being my throwing dummy) for coming in on a Saturday morning.

They started class as soon as my review finished.  I was really tired and wanted to go home, but felt bad just leaving as class was starting, so I took a quick break and came back in towards the end of the warm-up.  We did a lot of drilling--basic cross choke, armbar, and triangle from guard, then guard breaks (our choice; we just had to do ten times each).  Then came the "fun" part--one person on bottom, one on top in cross side.  We had 30 seconds for the bottom person to escape and top to mount.  Whoever lost (if anyone) had to do five push-ups.  Then we rotated so the person on bottom stayed and the one on top moved to the next person.  Yup, guess who did about a bajillion push-ups.  Then we worked with one person starting on the back, same kind of deal: back-taker works to submit, back-taken works to escape.  Most people were blue belts or higher, so I wasn't expecting to "win" any of these rounds, but I kept getting frustrated and more and more upset at how completely useless my supposedly almost-blue belt-level BJJ was.  I was tired from not being able to sleep well the night before, already working for over two hours before class even started, and for some reason I just couldn't get out of my head the feeling that I was being picked on for being the smallest one in class.  Not like for fun, but by the other smaller people, because I'm smaller than them and they can finally work on someone so they take full advantage of it.  The end of every round was an exercise in holding it together and not crying (or at least, letting people tell they were tears and not sweat).  Our last round, I go with a pretty strong (but not huge) blue belt, and I can feel him really working for his choke.  He has it in, but it's not really applied right, and then right before time ends, he tries to switch arms and instead ends up grinding his forearm into my larynx, sending me into a gross hacking/retching fit.

I know it was an accident.  But the mean negative part of me that's been growing lately is convinced that he was getting frustrated at not being able to choke a little white belt girl and so he did what he had to do to make me tap.  They gave us  a water break after that, but I could feel myself on the edge of a breakdown, so I discretely changed and left, hoping no one would try to talk to me on the way out.

There's something more that's wrong than just frustration with jiu jitsu, I know this.  Even as I write this, just thinking about it is making me emotional again.  Part of me is turning into an emotional wreck that cries when something is hard.  The other part is turning into a nasty beast that blames everyone else for her problems.  This is everything I used to not be and I hate it and I'm scared.  I want to say it's just vet school frustration and the jiu jitsu on top is what pushes me over the edge, but what if it's not?

Later I found out that one of my coaches thinks I'm having too-frequent breakdowns in class.  He saw the whole thing that happened yesterday, and saw that they guy didn't intentionally go for a calf crusher and thought I might have overreacted a little.  I will readily admit: I don't think he was going for a calf crusher.  I don't think that was his intention at all.  But I'm still upset that, to me, it felt like he didn't release me until I tapped, even after I yelled out.  And then he brought up another episode that happened last week, when Jess decided to grab me, turn me upside down (pinning my arms to my side in the process), and then let me drop down a little.  I started freaking out and it just got worse once she put me down.  No, I clearly didn't want to cry.  I don't think it was an appropriate reaction.  But is it overreacting?  I don't know.  Maybe he can be turned upside down, arms pinned to his sides, and feel like he was being dropped on his head.  And the worst part was that I felt like if I struggle to get out, I WOULD have fallen on my head, with no way to protect myself.  I had ZERO control in that situation, and it sucked.  I know she's just having fun, but she's not that much heavier than I am.  This is another one of those picking-on-the-small-person moments--she's not doing it be mean, but I feel like she was taking a little too much advantage of the fact that I'm smaller than her and she can throw me around.  And she's a brown belt, so it's not like I could really do anything to stop her.  She felt really bad about it after and apologized, so I don't think this kind of thing is going to happen again, but I just hate that it's coming up again.  I don't like it when I cry, and I don't like being reminded of it.

Anyways, I went to a nature park after I left the school.  I blasted My Chemical Romance on the way, which made me feel better right away.  One of the guides had their red-tailed hawk out, so he talked about her for awhile, and then their vet was also outside sunning their albino box turtle, so I talked to her for a bit also before going on a walk.  I felt so much lighter just seeing the hawk, and I really feel like I cleared my head.  Of course, revisiting it all right now brought all those feelings back, but I'm hoping that now I've let them out, they'll stay in the interwebz and out of my head.  I mean, life is good, right?  I am so lucky.  I'm in school for my dream career (of which I'm nearly 3/4 of the way through), I'm in good health, I learn BJJ at a school with two black belts (who came in for ME on a Saturday morning to do a test review!) and a high-level brown belt and it's not that far away or too expensive,  I finally have pets in my life, a family that loves me, people who care about me, food in the fridge and a roof over my head.  What more could I possibly want? 

One of those days...

Well, most of the day was actually pretty nice.  It was just later in the evening that went downhill.  I lifted today, and went for a hike at a nearby nature center because it was so nice outside. 

Beginner's class went fine; we mostly worked on self-defense from the back.  At the end we did a bunch of short rounds.  One of my rounds was with a really big new guy, and while I did survive, it was frustrating not being able to take advantage of his obvious mistakes, like getting my guard passed instead of armbarring him when he practically handed me his arm in my guard. 

Advanced class was somewhat simple, and now that I think about it was probably (at least partially) for my benefit.  We started with drilling an armbar just spinning your hips around to either side, then progressed to omoplatas.  The technique was a sweep or an armbar if they put a leg up and spinning your leg around.  For the sweep, hook your arm under their leg when they put their leg up.  Move your leg on that side up to clamp on their back, and bring the other leg around.  If they try to hunch down and tuck their head in, sweep by swinging your leg back, down under them, and push over with your clamped leg and bring that leg down as you come up, so you're in mount.  For the armbar, start with the same set-up and take it if they try to posture up and have their head straight up. 

After that, we did our guard-pass drill, and that's when shit went down. 

I went into this one blue belt guy's guard to start.  We've had our issues in the past, partially because he's really big and strong and sometimes he likes to mess around with people, and partially because I'm much smaller than him and "messing around" for him means "getting hurt" for me.  But I thought we were past these things and I was ok rolling with him again.  As I'm working to pass his guard, I'm not exactly sure what happened, but he made a quick move and grabbed something and the next thing I know, my calf is getting crushed and my knee is at kind of a weird angle.  I freaked out and yelped (mostly likely dropped some f-bombs), and he did nothing.  Then I tapped and he let go. I'm still sort of freaking out, about to hyperventilate, both from the pain and from getting stuck in that weird whatever-it-was, and one of my coaches came over and sent the guy away.  I told him I was ok and he pulled me up to go walk it off, but for some reason I just keep getting more and more upset about it.  I take a seat facing the back wall, and I did nothing but breathe and tried to relax.  Then my coach came over again, asked me if I was really ok, and then I started getting upset and almost crying again.  That's when he told me it seems like something more happened than what I let on, and then he walked away so I could collect myself.  It took me a little while, but I finally managed to calm down enough to join the class for the last few rounds of sparring.

As I'm changing out after class, I started thinking about what happened in my head and once again, I started getting upset about it.  I changed fast and left, and called my boyfriend (who also trains) once I got to my car.  Shocker of all shockers, I started bawling as soon as I called him.  I tried to explain what happened, except he basically bullied me into going back into the school and talking to my instructors.  I tried to convince him I could do it another day, but he wasn't having any of it.

So I go back into the academy, and of course the guy who this happened with was there, and he asked if I was ok, to which I said "no" and then I kind of got into with him, asking him why he did what he did, and then why he had to wait until I tapped to let go when it was obvious that I was in pain and needed out immediately.  He said that he had gotten his wrist stuck under my leg, and couldn't let go until I moved.  Of course, talking about it got me upset again, and I got more so when he told me I needed to calm down.  One of our other instructors had kind of worked his way on over by this point, so I just told the guy to forget about it and went and talked to my instructor.  I apologized for making a scene and explained my side of the story.  As I'm explaining what happened to him, our third instructor also comes in so he can hear it.  I kind of held it together, but for whatever reason, every time I try to talk about it I get upset.  In the end, he basically tells me that this guy does sometimes mess around with people, he's so strong he sometimes doesn't realize how much pressure he can be putting on someone.  But he would talk to him about it, and then asked me how I would like him to handle it as my instructor; if not rolling with him was a choice I wanted.  For now, I definitely think that's best, because I just don't feel safe rolling with him.  

I don't know why I get so upset when things like this happen.  There's no serious harm done, and as far as I can tell he didn't mean to really hurt me.  But something about the incident scared me, and his intent still remains cloudy to me, and I just can't fathom what was going on in his head.  Does he forget I'm small and skinny?  Does he forget that I'm not Jess, the brown belt?  Or does he really just not think about what he's about to pull?  Or is it more my fault for freaking out over getting stuck in a really awkward position that just took time to get out of?  Let me make something clear, I hate crying.  I almost never do it.  There are certain times, like finding out my cousin was in hospital with a ruptured brain aneurysm, that I just break down.  It didn't help that situation that I was really stressed out.  Then there are certain movies, like Hotel Rwanda or Up, that I can't help but get a little watery eyed.  But other than that, I really don't cry.  Or rather, I didn't cry until I started jiu jitsu.  Then I would have moments--really, every few months there would be a couple of weeks--where everything just seemed to be going wrong and it felt like certain people were being bullies.  Usually there's other stuff going on in my life when these "crying weeks" happened, but I'm on spring break right now--I'm supposed to be relaxed!

Oh, and I'm starting to get heart palpitations again.  Wonderful.