Back in the Day

I’m sixteen and little do I know it, I am in the best physical shape I will ever be in. I go to early morning marching band practice at 6:30am and carry an eight pound instrument around my neck for two hours. Then I attend school, sitting at a desk for the majority of seven hours, followed by a drive to the dance studio and being on my feet, (or on the floor) for another five to seven hours. Somewhere in there is a break to slam down Taco Bell or Burger King, all before getting to go home just to sit at my desk some more and do homework until midnight. Sleep for five to six hours, rinse and repeat. 

Now, don't be fooled. I didn't do all of this with ease. I was never, and will never be considered "normal," if such a thing even exists. (Which it doesn't. But that's for another time and a different soap box.) I think my body has always been a little different compared to other females my age. As a child I was never particularly athletic, which is not completely unusual. But I started having back and muscle problems at the young age of ten and began seeing my mother’s chiropractor. The muscles in my hamstrings have always been “wound tight," which caused me to have to work much harder at stretching and flexibility in dance. The tightness, paired with my back spasms and alignment issues, also made recovery time from dance or other exercise much longer than most my age. My knees began giving me incessant issues around the age of fifteen. I had always had what my doctors thought were growing pains, but when I started dance it worsened quickly. Lucky me, I inherited my biological father’s Osgood Schlatters. This is when the tendons do not connect completely to the bone in your knee, usually due to a growth spurt in an active adolescent. Usually kids grow out of it, but in my blood line, it sticks around forever. Yay. Once I was diagnosed with this, I was told to quit any running, jumping, squatting, and anything that would cause acute knee impact, or I’d have to have knee replacements before I was thirty. Fifteen-year-old Me was not ready to give up what seemed like everything that was important and made me happy. Especially since thirty was so far away.

Naivety at its best, my friends.

Most people look back and joke about how good they looked “back in the day”. I’ll admit, I did look what I would personally consider "my best" back then, at 5’5” and 130lbs. Nearly ten years later though, I’m not looking back and thinking about how good I looked, I’m looking and longing for how much I was able to do. Thirty isn't that far away anymore... *shudder*

As a child, I never understood why my mother had to budget her energy, picking and choosing each little thing she would or would not do. She tried to explain to me that she had "Fibromyalgia" and it made her really tired sometimes. At the age of seven, I didn't understand it, nor was I interested. It was just a big F-word I couldn't pronounce. It frustrated me that naps and resting came before activities and fun most days. Sometimes I would get so bored having to play by myself, that I would “accidentally” be loud just to see if I could wake her up so she would play with me. If I knew then what I know now, I never would have made a peep.

I’m sorry, Mom. I get it now.