This is a bit of a tricky one to keep positive, but is something that keeps coming to the front of my mind a lot recently.
What I sacrifice for roller derby.
Continuing to play a sport when you've suffered an illness that significantly impacts your body's ability to recover and just generally exist is challenging. I am fortunate enough that (should things go well), by the end of the year I'll be symptom free and ready to continue a normal healthy life.
But in the meantime, I've had to make a lot of changes.
In no particular order, here are the things I sacrifice to skate.
1) A 'real job'. Due to the way the post viral malaise has manifested it would be impossible for me to work a full time, structured job and continue with the sport I love. I now only go into the office one day a week and not even for a full 8 hours. The rest of the time I put in extra hours from home when I feel able and teach singing/gig when the opportunity arises.
2) An active social life. Believe me, I've tried. If I consider behaving like a normal, single woman in her mid-twenties, going out and socialising regularly and seeing people outside of training I get sick. Glands up, tonsil stones, spontaneously vomit in my bin, sick. I have to plan any social ventures well in advance and anything spontaneous I have to weigh up the risks of before agreeing.
3) 3 days of my week. I hear a lot of other skaters and our coaches say it a lot. It's only 4 hours a week. If you want to do it you'll make time. When you're a spoonie, this is not even slightly true. My league train on Sunday's 6-8 and Tuesday 8-10. This means the following:
- Sundays have to be a restful day. I can do light activity but nothing too exciting or active. If this doesn't happen I lose extra time later.
- Monday mornings are a write-off. I can sometimes get things done on a Monday (if we've not been bouting I may manage a light work out and some work). But pretty much, it's a day of nothing.
- Tuesday I have to go to the office. With this and training, I am completely wiped out on Wednesdays. Again, I can sometimes manage something light but normally don't manage much more than a dog walk.
People think that the only time I am sacrificing is at training, but that's just not true.
4) My headspace. As it stands, I do not have the same capacity that I normally do to deal with and manage challenges in my life. When I'm healthy I can quite happily juggle all of the issues of life without too many problems. Now, I pretty much can only deal with one thing and that one thing is skating. Other life elements get to slip in and out of my consciousness on occasion, but most of my mental energies are dedicated to roller derby.
This means little dramas and the 'politics' of the league drag me down. This means lots of crying after training for no specific reason (which annoys me because it's a waste of energy).
5) Being financially stable. As I'm not able to work a 'real' job and roller derby costs money, I now spend my life living on a shoe string. Thankfully, I'm pretty awesome at budgeting, but it does wear you down.
So why do it?
When I skate, I feel like me again. It lets me feel like I did before I got sick.
I take pride in the fact that despite all of the challenges I face I can still out skate some of the healthy members of the team. I take pride in the fact that I don't let being sick hold me back and that I'm statistically one of the strongest skaters on my team.
I get to spend my time with (for the most part) wonderfully positive people that are incredibly understanding and care for me as a skater and a person.
I've been fortunate enough to be able to bond with other skaters throughout the roller derby community with similar issues.
It gives me perspective. It's given me a drive to be better, even if this means giving it everything I've got.
For 4 hours a week I get to feel like I'm Jez again.
To me that's worth it.
Stay happy!
x
