injury – Page 4 – Khaos Theory Derby

And now it’s March. And now it’s time to get serious.

Two more months of school. Roller derby bouts are starting. Last month of qualifications before the Herbalife Leadership Conference. One month before our first home bout.

I have a lot of things on my plate this spring and I am stating my intention that I will not only BALANCE everything, but I will excel at it. I am taking my business to the next level. I am doing more work in the community locally to support what I do in the roller derby community.

I have blocked out times for study, for workout, for follow up, for talking to people.

In the month of March I need to help 75 people find better health and nutrition. I want to coach 75 new people on how to live better and feel better. I want to inspire them and work with them. In March, when I change the lives of 75 people – I will change my own life.

Using my life as an example - I have carbs and junk around ALL the time. I avoid it by eating high protein and healthy! — Using my life as an example – I have carbs and junk around ALL the time. I avoid it by eating high protein and healthy!

I will do this on top of a reoccurring injury. Yesterday during softball practice I stepped in a gopher hole while [beautifully] sprinting to and fro across left field shagging fly balls. My right knee crunched three times before I went down like Frasier.

So after weeks and weeks of recovery – I feel like I’m back at square one. I can put weight on it and I am further along from the start, but the challenge with this knee continues. I will train despite it. My nutrition was structured well to begin with, so I will continue the trend and work my recovery tabs back in. I will show everyone that a knee injury is nothing to hold you back. You are limited only by your mindset.

Taken at as close to the same angle and perspective as possible. Sad face.

Health and wellness for my community is the goal. Strength and prowess for the derby community is my commitment. I am excited to build friendships and relationships this month. I am excited to meet the people who will become the leaders of healthy living on my campus and in my community. I cannot wait to conquer fear and start building my vision.

My Fit Clubs and Nutrition classes start next week. Though there is only two months of school left, I will not let that deter me from making any impact I can. I learned last week, while talking to the manager of the food and catering there on campus, that the student body actually petitioned for MORE fried food. He had actually wanted to do one fried-foodless day a week and was told no by our student government.

This Fit Club in Cali is a great example of the kind of friendship and motivation I will bring to Central PA

All the complaints I’ve had about food at school has been because of the student body. So I have a huge task on my hands if I am looking to begin transforming us into a healthy, fit school. I am looking forward to challenging myself to be a strong leader, and challenging my peers and those in my community to be best version of themselves that they can be.

If you are just as excited as I am to affect change in the health of your community or sports league, please e-mail me so I can tell you all about health coaching and my goals for March! KGreyActiveNutrition@gmail.com

And for good measure … here’s a photo of the sea monster that my parents call an “algae eater”:

Although this blog is a smattering of topics right now, I do want to make sure I have a log of my journey and progress in here from now on. I do have to make one WordPress complaint however (especially since I know my PR teacher will read this at some point) – there is a text delay. When I type, every four characters, the program stutters and then I’m reminded to just type it in Word, copy and paste.

Much better.

The last two weeks have been a blur for me. A huge, hazy, unproductive blur of “what the hell is going on”? It started before that, but what made the final piece of my life spiral out of control was the bout against Philly Roller Girls.

I had trained for two and a half months for this bout. I felt awesome. I was concerned about being able to warm up properly, since we were playing the second game (which meant that I had pre-game duties and would not be able to jog right before gearing up). Something felt off about the atmosphere, but I couldn’t place my finger on it. I just knew that I would be on the line against women who had played at Championship levels before.

Scott Johnson Photography at Dutchland Rollers 2012

I’ll tell you what – I held them too. Mo Pain could not get around my passive blocking. Mo Pain did NOT get lead jammer against me. However, I landed in the box on jam 3. On jam 4, I came out, tried to take the outside line (which I have been trying NOT to do) and Kick Ash clocked me hard enough to send me into the penalty box. My knee was sure to pop before I went barrel-rolling the 20 feet however.

That was it. I feared forever.

At the ER, I was given a stabilizer, some meds and told “follow up with it in 2 weeks, and if it feels better you won’t need an MRI.”

“Right,” I thought. “It popped. I’m going to need an MRI. I’m going to need surgery. I can’t believe this.”

I told my team and my friends that everything was uncertain, but my goal was January 1 to be back on skates. After the first day I could put weight on it, if I was pointing my toes. Day 2 I could put weight on it. Day 3 I could walk stairs without my stabilizer and could do one-legged planks, push-ups and anything where I was sitting on the floor.

The next weekend I hobbled around Championships.

Philly made sure to come up and talk to me and tell me that I looked awesome right before it happened and they were so sad to see me injured. People I had only known on Facebook found me to see how I was doing. The derby was so inspiring. The people and community were so supportive.

Medal Winners Grits & Glory 2012
Dave Wood Photography

Plus, seeing how the biggest weekend of the year is organized was a great experience and awesome insight for my internship next semester.

The next week I weaned myself off the stabilizer. I went to the gym. I did 16 miles on the stationary bike on day 12 and 14 miles on the bike on day 15. Today, day 16, I had an appointment with the Penn State Wellness Center doctor. After 20 minutes of questions, stability tests and poking the diagnoses:

I suffered a minor strain of the LCL, and the popping I heard was probably a few fibers tearing. My knee is too strong, too stable and does not have the swelling or pain indicative of a possible tear.

The doctor’s reason for my slight injury and quick recovery: My intense training routine and my strict nutrition. Because I am constantly feeding my body, constantly giving it vitamins and protein and because I am so relentless about my water intake, my body has every tool it needs for recovery. I have been diligent about my icing, compression and elevation as well which has had an impact.

My strength was good when it happened, which prevented a serious injury. The muscles absorbed much of the blow, and the ligaments/tendons surrounding the LCL were as strong as they could be.

If I hadn’t been in such amazing shape – I would have blown my knee for sure.

So I have a definite 4 more weeks off skates. He gave me strength routines and specific benchmarks to reach before returning to the instability of roller skates. I will follow everything. My off season is going to be fantastic and I will come back even stronger than before.

#HerbalifeforLife #EarnYourBody

Tag: injury

Creating community & evoking change this March

Khaos Wellness Update