Impatient Patient

Recovery Day: 19

As the title suggests, I can be a bit difficult at times. Most of the time, when it counts, I can be the picture of patience. I can outlast most people even in the most arduous of circumstances. I think that on the whole I have been pretty darn good in dealing with this impossible situation over the last three years; especially in the last six months when it became exponentially worse and kept me from doing many of the things I love.

So, now it has been about 6 months since I have hit the mats. Part of the reason I have been able to keep pressing forward without going completely mental is the fact that I had an enemy to fight. I had suffered a number of small strokes with at least two of them leaving their autographs visible only via MRI. I was suffering with numbness down my right arm and focusing on getting better and finding answers helped to keep me preoccupied and my mind off training.

On 9 March when I had two strokes within 24 hours and found myself in the hospital with a diagnosed problem, a PFO (hole in my heart) I suddenly had a new mission. Time to get it fixed. Once I get that bad boy all patched, all is good. Its back to action. I got my PFO fixed on 24 April 2009, just 43 short days after it was discovered.

Now I have no more battle. No more fight. I am feeling fantastic. There is however a long way between feeling and being. It has only been 19 days since my surgery. This foreign object that has been lodged into my heart has not had much time to settle in and begin get covered over by scar tissue. I am in that precarious spot between feeling awesome and being awesome.

I feel like I could jump right back into what I used to do, or at least back into SOMETHING, but as one of my doctors just confirmed for me....I can't. I am not supposed to do ANYTHING physically exhertive for at least one month following the surgery. Now that makes total sense in my head, but now that I am fighting no other battles and I don't have that to keep me preoccupied or worried, I am dying to get back in action.

I go back to see the Doctor for my one month follow-up on 27 May. At that appointment they will do an echocardiogram and inject some bubbles into my heart so they can see if the hole is sealed properly. Hopefully I will also get the green light to begin to gradually step-up my physical activity level. Cross your collective fingers for me!

Side note: Grappling with Life in Seattle
I am going to Seattle this weekend. My wife and I are taking a short vacation for no good reason other than we need one. We will be the stereotypical tourists doing all the tourist things but we will also be seeing my BELOVED BOSTON RED SOX trample the Mariners at Safeco Field on Friday night. If there are any must see BJJ tourist spots in Seattle, please send me a note!!!

Something New

So this last week I tried something out of character for me. I took a week off of training. Now I know what your thinking...."Jay, you miss training all the time", I know, I know, but this time it was different. I chose to take a week off.

With the stressful year end schedule at work, combined with the normal abnormalities that this time of year brings, I figured that I deserved a little bit of slack. I knew going into this week that a normal rest/recovery schedule would not be possible and that if I threw training into the mix I might just end up on my butt by the end.

I resigned myself to the fact that at this time of year there are many times when total control is a luxury that I cannot afford. Isn't that something that BJJ teaches us anyway? To learn to pull when pushed; to roll with the flow until we find that optimal situation? So, this week I hung up my Kimono, put the focus on the other aspects of my life. My wife and I even went to a concert to see her favorite band. We didn't get home till about 1:30am on Tuesday night so just imagine how difficult that would have been to get virtually no sleep, work a full day and then go train. Rather than add to the mental stress, I allowed myself to take the time off.

And the result of this week away? Well, we'll see. I'll be back on the mats tonight. I'm sure that my cardio will suffer and that rolling will be much more difficult than when I was last on the mats but I can assure you that I will be excited to be back. I miss the gym when I'm away, but that's not to say that I don't enjoy myself outside of there either. Oh, that elusive balance.

The rest of this month I'm sure will prove just as problematic for me from a training perspective. I will probably be luck to squeeze in one or two sessions this week and next, and that's it, the year is virtually over. So when I hit the mats tonight and every time "this year" I will do so with the mindset that I am doing the best I can with the circumstances I am in, Sure I would like to roll more or make more gains before the new year but I will be content to remember that I am doing something love in spite of the impositions that life is making along the way.

Wish me luck tonight!