(FYI, before I start. I hate the word diary. I just threw up in my mouth a little typing it in the title. Then I realized there was a story there — which I’m now telling you — so I left it. Now you know.)
FRIDAY
6:30a — Autotot has been getting up at the ass crack of dawn and so must I. I’ve had a low grade headache bordering on a migraine all week so I feel justified in spending a few minutes ignoring him, but then get up.
7:20a — Breakfast: I eat a large serving of high protein granola with almond milk and drink mint tea with creatine. I never know what to feed Autotot, but he seems happy with baked tofu and pear slices. I’m not worried about his athletic performance so I don’t scrutinize what he’s eating.
8:30a — We leave the house to drop off Autotot with Grandma. He doesn’t usually spend Fridays with her, but I have to be at the venue before his dad will get home from work. I spend the drive daydreaming about the glorious nap I’ll have.
9:45a — Grocery shopping: Which I hate. I realize, as I refrain from murdering the woman who has picked up and put down EVERY BOTTLE OF OLIVE OIL IN THE STORE without making her selection, that perhaps the aggression I’m building right now will help me in the bout tonight.
10:40a — The Girl Scouts get me on the way out of the store. I used to be a girl scout and cookie season was my nightmare. I take pity on her. Tagalongs.
11:45a — Lunch: Smashed chickpea and avocado sandwich. It’s like a vegan version of egg salad or tuna fish, but doesn’t taste anything like either. I eat an apple and drink a protein shake for good measure. Then I drink 3 glasses of water because I realize that I’m behind on my hydration routine.
12:15p — I lie down to take nap.
12:40p — I wake up in a rush realizing that I forgot to set my alarm and I need to sew the patches on my uniforms before I leave for the venue.
1:00p — I’ve stained my WFTDA patches with blood. I am not cut out for sewing.
1:15p — I complete 2 out of 4 scheduled circuits in my workout for the day. [45s pulse squat, 45s ratchet curls, 45s bentover row + extension, 45s front raise + side raise, 45s mt. climber] I lay on the incline bench wishing I hadn’t done any of it. I try to remember which team we’re playing first. I double check email to make sure there aren’t any more urgent rostering decisions requiring my attention. I watch the episode of “It’s Always Sunny…” with the musical The Nightman Cometh. I’m still laying on the bench.
1:55p — I drink 3 more glasses of water. I think I’m still behind.
2:05p — I listen to my 2 bout songs while I finish packing the things I want to bring to the venue. I spend at least 7 minutes deciding which self myo-fasical release tools I want to bring with me. I decide on just my foam roller and lacrosse ball. I also pack a protein cookie, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, two mandarin oranges, a container of almonds, and a banana.
2:15p — I stare into the fridge like it holds the meaning of life. I was really hoping I bought coconut water at the store. I didn’t. I try to wish it into being. It doesn’t.
2:20p — I unpack my foam roller and do some foam rolling while I listen to my bout songs on repeat.
2:30p — I get dressed for the bout and brush my teeth while I spend time staring in the mirror worrying about my weight in relation to how tall I am and how easy I am to push around on the track.
2:35p — Leave for the venue. I listen to an audiobook on the way: The 4-Hour Work Week. I hate the narrator’s voice and tone, so it gets me sufficiently aggressive again.
3:15p — Stuck in traffic. More aggression to use for the bout. Probably.
3:35p — Arrive at venue and walk in. It literally feels like a bomb went off in my brain. The fluorescent lights and constant whistling ramp my “low-grade headache” straight into a migraine. I feel like I’m going to throw up.
4:00p — Complete my dynamic warm-up. There’s not a locker room or team area really, so I kick several strangers while I’m doing my bird dogs. Still trying not to throw up.
4:15p — Half time of the bout before mine, so we get to use the track for warm-up. The floor we’re skating on belongs to us. We pulled it out of our old rink before the foreclosure. It honestly feels a little bit like being home. Still trying not to throw up.
4:20p — Foam roll post skating warm-up. Focus on my calves mostly. Lay in corpse pose with my jacket over my eyes and my earplugs in trying to ignore the lights and whistles. It doesn’t work.
5:10p — Our bout is ready to start. Playing the Eville Dead from Edmonton, Alberta. There’s a lot of vague standing around as everything gets set-up. I’m in the first wall, which I know a lot of people hate, but I actually like. I want to play as soon as possible before my mind can start creating nightmare scenarios. I think the first jam goes okay. I can’t really tell. Still trying not to throw up.
5:25p — With my migraine in full effect, I literally have no idea what’s happening on the track and am relying heavily on my team to push and pull me where I need to be. They seem to be doing it.
6:30p — FINAL SCORE: 92-308. It was a really rough bout, but a good learning experience for the team. The Eville Dead ladies were super fun to play and great sports. I’m excited to see where they go this season! I tapped out with 10 minutes left and stood outside in the dark and the rain. My head feels slightly better. I leave immediately after the game is over and have to pull over several times on the way home. Despite the way my head feels, I eat almost everything I brought with me on the drive home: banana, protein cookie, and two mandarin oranges. Arrive home and drink 3 glasses of water with lemon.
7:20p — Laying awake in bed with my head killing me. Still trying not to throw up.
MIDNIGHT — Finally fall asleep.
SATURDAY
{I lost the energy to keep strict track of time. So now it’s just a confusing mish-mash. Enjoy.}
Get to sleep in a little thanks to my husband being home. Wake up at 7:30a to a breakfast of tofu scramble, roasted red potatoes, and fruit. I drink my typical mint tea with creatine. Take a shower and use it as time to assess how I’m feeling and what parts of my body are sore. Turns out everything’s fine. My migraine **seems** like it’s gone, but getting back into the venue with all the fluorescent lights and whistles will really be the test. Do a quick couple rounds of a yoga flow to stretch everything out (typically I don’t do static stretching pre-bout, but the bout is several hours away and my muscle elasticity will have recovered by then). Foam roll, focusing specifically on my calves, hamstrings, quads, and glutes. After second thoughts, I go back and roll my lats too.
Enter venue. Bomb explodes behind my eyeballs. Looks like I’m in for another bout of excruciating head pain. The good news is that this will keep me from getting hyperfocused on other, unimportant things.
Team meeting at 11a. Dynamic warm-up, roll out hip flexors using lacrosse ball, skating during half time of the bout before ours (only 5 minutes), followed by my corpse pose meditation and bout play list on repeat. Someone shakes my foot and tells me I can’t lay there. I scoot over 5 feet and lay back down. I don’t get bothered again, so I assume this is okay.
Bout at 12:30. Played the Waimea Wranglers from Hawaii — score 342 to 64. Our team came together and played hard using all the things that we’d learned in the first bout. Waimea was also an amazing and fun group of women. (Away bout in the future? *fingers crossed*)
I legit spent most of the bout on the ground. My head, lower back, and left shoulder are killing me. Actually, I can’t feel my left shoulder anymore, so that’s got to be good, right? Left the venue to head home right after the bout. I’m pretty upset that I’m missing all this amazing derby because the venue makes me literally sick. On the drive home I eat a banana, a protein cookie, and two mandarin oranges.
Try to spend time playing with Autotot when I get home, but feel less than tuned in. He hits me in the face accidentally and I almost punch him. We both decide to take a nap.
Ended up reading for 90% of nap time because I can’t control myself when it comes to books. When I finally do fall asleep, I’m woken up by a squealing tiny human. Even that short nap makes my head a feel a little bit better. I decide to take an Epsom Salt bath (with Panaway oil) and put ice on my shoulder. The cold near my head versus the heat everywhere else helps the migraine and my shoulder almost feels normal again. I drink 4 glasses of water in the bath tub. The third time I ask him to refill my water bottle, my husband just brings me a pitcher full.
Take a family trip to Walmart (no I did not wear pajamas) to buy a teammate a birthday gift. I’m making her my gear spray. The Girl Scouts get me on the way out again, this time for a box of Thin Mints.
No one wants to make dinner, so we stop at a pizza/pasta joint on the way home. Of course. BRING ME ALL THE CARBS!! I order a huge side salad and a huge plate of spaghetti with marinara. It comes with a roll, which I also eat. Because carbs. Autotot spends the evening smearing spaghetti sauce everywhere and yelling “Hi” at a server — not ours — as loudly as he can whenever he sees him.
Bedtime for Autotot: bath, milk, book, song. I schedule my email and “Best of Articles” blog post for the week then do 30 minutes of foam rolling and go to bed. I think I fall asleep by 10:30p this time.
SUNDAY
I get up with Autotot again today which means a 6:30a wake-up time. In the next 2 hours I will do 3 loads of laundry, drink mint tea with creatine, and eat some yogurt, nuts, and fruit for breakfast. I manage to squeeze in the shortest nap in the world (15 minutes). Then proceed to do some foam rolling followed by yoga (I wanted to switch up the order to see if there was any difference between when I stretch before foam rolling versus when I stretch after. No difference that I could tell.)
It isn’t until I’m done with the yoga and foam rolling that I realize my head feels fine — although there’s a bit of a migraine hangover — and my shoulder also feels good as new.
The bout is at a weird time today, so I can’t decide whether to eat before I leave for the venue or not. I finally scarf down an egg salad sandwich before heading out. I drink 2 full water bottles before I get to the venue and, understandably, have to pee as soon as I arrive.
Team meeting at 1p. I miss the half time warm-up, but am beat up enough from the rest of the weekend that I don’t really care. I’m never one to be overly concerned about the floor or my wheels anyway. (Full disclosure: I only have 1 set of wheels and I skate on them everywhere.) I DO complete my dynamic warm-up, but don’t have time for corpse pose or my bout play list. We have 10 minutes to warm-up before the bout and run through our lines and get everything shaken out.
Bout at 2:15p. We’re slated to play the Anarchy Angels from Cloverdale, British Columbia. This was the same team that we scrimmaged last weekend, so we know what we are getting into. The final score is 79-303. Despite the score, it is probably our best game of the weekend and makes me excited to see where our team will go with more practice (we’ve been practicing together for less than a month). I lose the ability to move my left shoulder/arm during the second half of the bout. The alternating pain and numbness from Saturday have returned. I get it checked out by the sports med guy on hand who tells me I have a full range of motion and should be fine. He even goes so far as to say that there’s nothing that can be done for it, so I’m making a note to call my Physical Therapist. {Although he also clearly thinks I’m making it up because I can’t pinpoint a specific place where it hurts. Apparently, “everywhere” is an unacceptable answer.}
Get home around 5p with dinner waiting. *swoon* Dinner equals salmon, sweet potato with salsa and avocado on top, and brussel sprouts. I drink 4 glasses of water immediately upon returning home and probably knock down another 2 or 3 before I turn in.
Do some intense stretching and take another Epsom Salt bath with Panaway. Autotot and I have a Skype call with his auntie. He acts like a maniac and hits me in the face again. I’m briefly thankful that I don’t still have a migraine. Then it’s bath time for AT. Then milk, book, song, and bedtime.
I spend some time finishing up school work (since I have class at 6a on Monday), but have to alternate between bouts of sitting and working and walking around the house. I know that if I sit for too long, I will really regret it in the morning. While I’m working, I eat most of the Girl Scout cookies I bought this weekend. In bed and asleep by 10:30p.
Overall…
Despite how hard playing in tournaments is on my body (and this one was harder than most). I had a really good time. It’s tough losing by so much at a widely publicized tournament — where people might be paying to watch you struggle so much — but, in the end, it doesn’t really mean anything. My team isn’t “terrible” because of this. In fact, I’m glad we lost several times because by losing we learned something. And it made us hungrier. There’s now a list of specific things that we can tighten up to get better. And we have a picture in our head of what it will look like when we get there because we just played those teams.
I had a teammate that after our first home bout loss of the season (with a much larger deficit than either of the losing scores above) said, “It doesn’t hurt anything but your ego.”
And she’s right.
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