Goju Ryu 2-kyu Test Coming Up

I got the invitation to grade for my 2-kyu belt. I am so nervous that I can't stop impulse-studying. That is, I tune out from the world around me at different points throughout the day just to check my notes or replay a video.

For example, I've always struggled *hard* to remember kihon bunkai (basic applications). I never really know which ones I've got down. I know that's not everything, but I feel tremendous pressure to have excellent knowledge of technique to accommodate for what my body cannot adequately demonstrate. Sequencing has always been one of my greatest challenges, making math difficult. After I've practiced karate for a time I won't need to rely so heavily on kihon bunkai, I'll just be able to move from one concept to the next.

At every grading prior I've asked myself, "is my Sensei sure I'm ready for this?" and have learned to trust his judgement. He knows what he's looking for. He now has a well-developed eye for what my limits are, and gives better-than-ever feedback. I know myself better and am getting better at making decisions on when to push and when to ease up.

At some point I have to accept that I'm not going to be absolutely lethal as are many others at my level. They have prior training, combat experience, military experience, and mostly functioning bodies. But I will keep going; I have every intention of being just as steady and ready as they are.

The belt is not the point. The belt is there to help us identify what we know. The belt colour helps us grow consistently with one another and enables us to be more careful with beginning students. There are many compelling reasons for a belt colour system, but my proudest belt remains my white belt. Getting started was the hardest test of my willingness and perseverance, especially because I'd been deathly ill for several years prior. Now that I'm in, I just want to practice.

The belt test also comes with an increased responsibility. Senpai, higher ranking students, have opportunities to set good examples for kohai, junior students. The test is an opportunity to show everything you've got to your Sensei who has been watching you grow and now wants to take a closer look at his own efficacy as a trainer with you. The belt test means a lot.

Of course I'm terrified of the shodan black belt test, just two tests away. I've heard horror stories. But nobody has died from it and I won't, either. I've never been a good test taker, though I have always taken tests seriously and have studied hard. Often, though, I surprise myself when the pressure is on. I've come to enjoy taking tests. Even if I fail I will learn a definitive set of information that tells me what I know and what I don't know.

Attitude is everything, so pick a good one.

Zebro Warrior Challenge: 7 days to go

I once read on a sign at the New Carrollton D.C. Metro station that one pound of weight lost equates to four pounds of relief on the knees.

Just one week away from the end of March and the end of my Zebro Warrior Challenge, I am thrilled to say I have met all of my goals and then some!

It was a fair bit of reconfiguration for the entire first month, so I learned that quarterly challenges are better for me than short-term "burns" of exercise programming.  I had to adapt to sick time (a lot more of it than I had expected), going easy on weaker days, maximizing stronger days without overdoing it, the logistics of always having a clean gi and getting groceries regularly.

Those last two are very, very hard. I still need to figure out how to either get laundry and groceries done independently or get help with them. It's just too hard. Likewise, it's nearly impossible for me to clean pots and pans without pain and dislocations. I've squared away a lot of issues with Activities of Daily Living (ADLs) but these ones are just not options. Neither is vacuuming my stairs or my sofa.

How does one explain the legitimate need for an in-home health aid while also advancing in karate? "Self-determination" is the term for a person's right to choose, where in my case I am choosing my method of exercise as karate. It's so strange to think that karate, an aggressive and highly active art, is the most successful physical thing I have ever done. I have danced tap, jazz, acro and ballet; worked on stage crews in school and professional theatres; played hockey; ice skated; swum; played on the tennis team; done the gym thing, and run. All of these ended with very sad stories. Karate may well end the same, but never before has my heart been so fulfilled, nor my body so improved.

To be fair, physiotherapy is a part of my daily life and I am highly educated now about anatomy and physiology. I also have adequate access to medical care and protective equipment. I have the spoils of a support network too large to count. These are contributors to my success, but what also deserves recognition here is my dojo. My Sensei keeps a very close eye on me and if I miss karate it had better be for good reason. He holds me accountable, and I have beber had anyone look after me quite like he does. Sometimes I think he can see farther into my future with karate than I can. Other times we are both just praying that God watches over us all while I try a new thing with the body I have been given. Nevertheless, every day that the dojo is open I want to be there. I want to be learning, working, contributing, and growing.

By the time I was 18 years old I had moved 19 times, as I grew up in a household unstable at best. I have always ached to move back to my hometown of Buffalo, New York, but now I have finally found a place that feels like a home to me, and it is at my dojo. Nowhere in the world do I feel safer, more challenged, more centered or more focused. And now that I know what these feelings are really like, I will be able to recognize them when I have achieved them outside of the dojo. These are healthy feelings to have, and I have cultivated them over the courses of good and bad times.

Since I started karate, and thanks to this challenge, I have lost 50lbs. My pants are five sizes smaller. Maybe it's a little unflattering still, but I discovered tonight that I now fit into size 'L' t-shirts. (It might be more flattering than a baggy shirt, how should I know? I have zero fashion sense.) 50lbs is about five cats, think about it. Imagine carrying five cats everywhere you go, but without the snuggling and cuteness.

A weird thing about weight loss: my family is never as proud of anything as they are when someone loses weight. It's directly tied to self-worth. When I was young I heard a man on PBS say, "if you haven't noticed, I'm fat; that doesn't make me ugly or stupid." I think that man saved my self-esteem. I have never let my weight get in the way of my sense of self-efficacy or self-worth.

Since I have lost this weight my body is starting to take on a curvaceous shape that makes me feel incredibly self-conscious. I identify as genderqueer, having no claim to either the male or female end of the gender binary. I'm having trouble sorting out my feelings about my body as itself and my body as something with which society interacts. The pressure is finally so overwhelming that I'm dropping the subject for a while and trying to focus exclusively on health, letting my body shape develop as it may. In short, I just want to keep focusing on karate and getting stronger. I don't want my gender identity or expression to get in the way of who I really am. Who I am at my basest is pretty rad. That's good enough.

The most satisfying and exciting finale for my Zebro Warrior Challenge is that I have been invited to test for my 6-kyu belt in Goju Ryu Karate on 29 March 2014. That's five belts away from black. Two days from the end of my Challenge will be Spirit Training (where you train so hard on a Saturday morning the the only thing you have left to carry you out of the dojo is your spirit), my test, and a dojo potluck. Then I will have two days to recover from that and finish strong, ready for the next adventure.

I owe a great deal of thanks to Sensei Mike of Defensive Arts Dojo where I got my start in martial arts. He helped me design the challenge, set goals, and stay motivated. It didn't take much to make me feel safe, grounded and ready for this hard work. Here in Maryland, Sensei Tony has given me as much access to time at the Warriors of Grace Karate dojo as I could find, allowing me to practice during the day when the dojo was empty, to review and solidify my basic skills in the beginners' classes, to observe the advanced classes, and everything in between.

Life with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and dysautonomia is brutal. There is zero question. It should not be doubted that it is not as bad as it has seemed or that it is not a very real and disabling condition just because I have made improvements against the odds. The climb is supremely steep, with doctors not knowing what to do or what to recommend, assorted medical teams working rigorously to rehabilitate me, merciless stacks of paperwork and research, a bank account running on fumes from the cost of care, judgmental social pressure, and more. I am just writing this blog to prove--probably to myself--that this life, with all its hell, is still worth it. Karate is a wonderful adventure.

Whenever I get to heaven it will have a room that is just like my dojo, and I will have a body that can practice forever, with angels just like my fellow karateka on earth. I love them.

When I started karate one of the Sensei said, "I think you'll find that you belong here." Mission accomplished. I have never belonged anywhere as I do here.

ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: 7th kyu Green Belt

I got my green belt! As usual, it was not the way I had planned to get through the test. As usual, it was a little bit better than the last test.

After a recent injury outside of the dojo my pain has been at a constant level ten. Any extra pain at this point and I am in tears from the agony. This has an enormous emotional impact. But this post is about good news, so I digress.

The dojo is packed on testing day. People from different classes I don't usually get to see are saying hello and making room to line up beside one another, and I am greeting them, too. Well aware that my pain level is through the roof I recognize that I will have to be very careful. However, Sensei has a way of knowing the difference between somebody who is going gently because they're suffering and someone who is, as he puts it, "dogging it." I am going to have to push myself, but if I'm being honest with myself I need to own up to my limits. The test is two hours long and I am determined to complete it.

The whole reason I practice karate is because I refuse to give up just because of my disability. Furthermore, I refuse to be a victim of violence for seeming an easy target on my crutches or for being transgender in unfriendly territory.  Therefore, when I am perfectly safe and surrounded by love, with God beside me as I perceive God, it is a time to follow my dream of practicing karate. I am in a very good position to make myself proud by demonstrating that I am stronger, smarter, and tougher than I was when I got my last belt.

I love my fellow students, maybe even a little bit beyond reason, since I know little about them outside of our school. In a perfectly safe environment such as this it is easy to love openly until my heart is so full that there is little room to feel despair over the pain. So we line up, and I get ready. I say a small prayer for each of us in the dojo where I ask for safety, diligence, and understanding, with open minds to receive the guidance of our Sensei.

For the previous few weeks I had been on the sofa because my legs just couldn't hold me and the pain was too exhausting. I had to take karate easily and everything else very lightly. My life was work, sleep, and karate. I could not cook meals, provide self care, shop for groceries, or do anything independently. The only things I allowed myself to do were work and practice, both at attenuated paces. The only reason I even allowed that much was because being around people is very good for mental health, and the isolation of EDS is something traumatic to go through again and again, unpredictably, forever. Therefore, in some instances I am better off forcing myself to endure the pain because I may get some relief emotionally, which can in turn contribute to my physical wellness.

As expected, less than half way through my legs give out. They are weak and are not performing the moves that I'm asking them to perform. The Senpai who is testing me has a look on his face that shows me he cares and respects my challenges, and that he feels helpless against them much like I do. As we're talking my head becomes foggy, I can no longer complete a sentence, and I start to fall over. He suggests adapting the test to a verbal exchange, where I tell him how I would respond to this or that attack. I went through a brain fog and it was hard to think or speak, but we got through it together, and I felt a little bit stronger. At that moment I realized that as long as I don't give up, I will never be alone. I lt finally hit me that I have managed to develop my character into a person that other people want to be around, that I have the ability to connect with others at the heart, and that I can use those connections to help myself as well as them.

Eventually the fog overcomes and I am stumbling. I can neither think nor see straight.  I have a decision to make: go on, or go sit down. But why not both? After all, I am a wheelchair and walking aid user outside of the dojo, I have done my honest and absolute best, I am well educated and experienced disabilities advocate; here I am facing my own disability at an activity that I wish to accomplish. My goal is the belt and my plan is not to give up for any reason. So I sit down, have some water, and try to think about how I can continue. While I sit my vision returns. I decide to continue with just my upper body because that is what is working right now. Instead of working with a partner I remain seated on a stack of gym mats and fight with the nearby punching bag. I think I'm winning! I feel good, I can see that the people around me feel good, too. We are all smiling, sweaty and satisfied, hopeful and ready to refocus. I finish the class this way and Sensei says that we all did very well and he is proud that nobody gave up. I take the liberty of assuming that his message about not giving up is meant for me to hear. I let it soak in. Not long after he calls me to the front I take a bit of extra time to stand up on my wobbly legs and receive my belt.

Now I am an intermediate karateka.

The Frustrating Thing

Some days it's too much to ask of my body that it wake, prepare for the day ahead, wash, dress, (let's face it-poop), prepare and eat breakfast, pack medical supplies and splints for the day, pack for the day itself, and so on. Every little thing comes with a deliberate plan of execution. Karate is at the end of a long day of this, which gives me the whole day to fret about how I won't have any energy left if I'm not extremely careful. On most days I choose to see it as a goal rather than a problem.

For the last two weeks I have been too unwell to participate in karate. I have gone and sat on the bench for as long as I have been able to sit up, I have tried practicing a few minutes at a time and laying on the floor to rest, and napping before class is not helping. It's a heartbreaker because I love karate. It's also very lonely. Instead of discovering what my body can do in a room full of friends I'm alone on the couch wishing I could do anything to get active.

I am supposed to test for my next belt this Saturday and I don't know how I'm going to do it. I suppose I will have to go and do my best.

One of the most frustrating things in life is to be dissatisfied with the limitations of my body. Today is one of those days. Yesterday was one of those days. Tomorrow will be one of those days. It won't be like this forever, there will be better days for sure, but right now I am pretty unhappy. I just wish I could be doing karate instead of being in so much pain, both physical and emotional, that I cannot but bring myself to sleep.

Over and over: I know it won't be like this forever.

For now, it's time to take things easy. There will be a time to work, but now it is time to rest. I just hope it doesn't undo too much while this body does its sedentary thing.