Tag: martial arts

All Clear and Back At It!

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I just realized that I never wrote an update following my post-op visit with my surgeon last month!

To Recap

In May I had surgery on my hip to repair a torn labrum as well fix an impingement issue and debride a bone cyst (no arthritis! yay!). I also had scar tissue on my joint capsule that was most likely from one of the times my hip was dislocated. It was done arthroscopically and wheels in to wheels out took 90 mins. My surgeon said surgery was “unremarkable” although the scar tissue on my joint capsule was “cool”. I did a lot of research on recovery protocols and made a system for myself that centered on the “slow is smooth, smooth is fast” methodology.

My surgeon is a sports specialist (as is my PT) and I was allowed to start doing highly modified drilling work around 8 weeks post-op mark. That’s may not be typical for someone else so soon after this surgery, but my recovery team determined that with my fitness and sports experience level, it was something I could integrate safely. As I proved that I was able to safely navigate drilling moves wisely without causing myself any pain or inflammation afterwards, I was able to slowly progress.

Post Op Visit:

Getting right to the point, my surgeon gave me the all clear with no follow up appointment! He said that I did a great job graduating and moderating my activity levels properly and had one of the smoothest recoveries possible as a result. From a surgical point of view, I am completely cleared. He had to wait until the 6 month mark as the earliest possible release date to check imaging to make sure there was no calcification forming in my joint post-op (I was good). He left me with a standing PT order that I could do whatever I wanted with, so I consulted with my PT and she agreed that since I do a good job at moderating my activity and have proven good patterns of doing my own adaptations as needed, she is comfortable with cutting me loose as well but gave me her card. If I run into any issues, I can call and schedule for a check in session.

I have spent the last several weeks gradually increasing my Jiu Jitsu training intensity and frequency, while still fitting in hip mobility and strength exercises as well. I have a specific warm up routine that helps me activate and mobilize all the muscles, and then a routine in the evening to check in and address any muscle imbalances or inflammation that might be popping up. As long as I keep up with these things before and after training, I am able to slowly increase training demand.

My range of motion would be considered really good for most people, although rotationally it still is not quite where it was before surgery. Strength-wise I’ve never felt better, and my team mates have told me that they can tell a significant difference from before surgery. It’s amazing how much more efficiently a joint works when the labrum isn’t torn halfway around the socket.

As of now I have about 6 weeks to go until the European Championship tournament in Lisbon, Portugal. I’ve never been one to ease my way into anything – must go full throttle or I might psyche myself out with the small things. I’m currently floating between light weight and feather weight as far as weight classes are concerned so I’m considering dropping a couple kg to make feather for the event. I’ve decided to just wait and see what amping up training over the next few weeks will do to the scale numbers and make my decision based on that.

All told, I’m sparring normally with training partners within 30 lbs of my size. I am looking forward to competing but my main goal is still to continue recovering – the competition is for proving to myself that I am back again after this.

I have a few benchmarks for myself to work toward before I consider myself fully recovered. I’m most definitely significantly better than I was before surgery so it would be very easy to write myself off as “all better” at this point already, but I know there is room for improvement and I’m still at a critical stage for getting those improvements. I won’t settle for good enough when I know there’s better to be had!

All told, I am super happy that I had this surgery and it was worth taking the time this year to have done. I no longer feel like my hip is sliding out of the socket while I’m sitting in a chair, I can train without pain for the first time in a very long time, and actually move in ways that I didn’t even realize that I hadn’t moved in over a decade. I’m looking forward to how this will affect the years to come!

Checking in 5 months post-op – 24 weeks

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It’s been a few weeks since I have posted an update and I passed the 5 months post-op mark! I’ve been pretty busy and a lot of things are coming up, so here is what has been happening!

I’m back with my original physical therapist since she has returned from maternity leave, and she has really been amping up with more impact and dynamic movement exercises, working to emulate things I do in Jiu Jitsu class. My therapist has researched and improvised various exercises in order to make them more specific to Jiu Jitsu movement patterns. We start each session with a check in for any tweaks I’ve felt during the week while training in class, a physical assessment, and she makes any necessary adjustments to my program for the day.

I will be seeing my surgeon for a check in next week and PT agrees that he will be very pleased with my progress overall and thinks it is very possible that he will release me entirely from physical therapy sessions (10 days shy from my official 6-month post-op mark). I am scheduled to see her immediately after my appointment with him, if he says I’m free to go I can just come downstairs and bring the good news and cookies.

This past week I had a great class where I rolled as close to all out as I have since surgery. I still feel some rotational restrictions that I’m going to mention to my surgeon, but I think that will just take some more time to work through carefully. It was a good contrast to the previous week where my hip got twisted pretty abruptly in class and I yelled – that caused some inflammation that made me take a few days away from the mats and some anti-inflammatories along with extra home care. My PT checked it of course and agreed that it was just inflamed from the abrupt movement. This was the first tweak/inflammation issue I’ve had of any kind during my entire recovery process – which is pretty stinking good for this sort of surgical recovery.

The only movements still giving me discomfort are quick external hip rotation and compression across the midline. All other movements are fine with a proper warm up before training. I do need to improve comfort and stability at the end of my range of motion, and if I sit for hours without a stretch break it will start aching as well. These are all things I expect to improve in the coming months.

Here’s how training is looking right now:

  • I’m doing most moves in class, just avoiding high impact takedown drills (judo trips and such are ok)
  • Positional sparring rounds in class after drilling: if my pre-selected partners are not available when we change partners I sit a round. Otherwise I proceed like usual.
  • Sticking with familiar training partners for sparring. Since they are partners whose movements I can trust, I don’t have to guard my own self so intently and can therefore progress my own movement confidence safely.
  • I do my own specific warm ups before class which usually overlaps into the group warm up time as well. I do joint mobilization and muscle activation exercises that I use in my PT sessions before getting into strength training.
  • This past week I have started adding more evening stretching before going to bed – in addition to my red light therapy sessions. As training and impact amps up I need to increase recovery measures to make sure the load stays balanced.

Latest PT Session (mostly self-reference):

  • Started with PT check in and warm up on elliptical
  • Stretches: leg box drills adding lean forward over front leg, then back leg clamshell, heel lift, then leg lift (new); kneeling quad/flexor/psoas stretch, tabletop hip isolated rotation (new)
  • Decompress hip by using heavy band anchored to wall around bent leg while lying face up on floor. Pull knee toward chest to decompress joint
  • Activation: Free standing clamshells with band, leaning wall runs with band around feet, squat with soccer ball between knees (hold until feel burn then hold for 10 more secs), hip airplanes on wall, banded sidesteps one foot anchored to the wall at the time, Sidesteps anchored to wall by torso,
  • Strength: hold bear crawl position and slide small plate with toe forward and back 10x, single leg box bridges, 45# v-bar single leg RDL, 45# v-bar squat, Single leg shuttle squat kickback, 45# sled push/pull
  • Other exercises done in previous sessions: Back lunge with cable row at top, Heel elevated kettlebell squat, medicine ball slams (start on two feet, end on one), step off 20 inch box and catch weight on one foot lightly, hop with feet 2 to 1 off and on 20 inch box.

Coming Up

I see my surgeon next Wednesday and am compiling a list of questions for him. Most pressing is to let him know I booked the flights to compete at the European Championships and Tokyo Grand Slam in January since at our last visit he said it was a “reasonable goal”. I’ve also registered for the Europeans and am waiting for registration to open for the Tokyo event – I’ll be flying from Lisbon to Tokyo and doing both events in one big trip.

I have other planned events lining up as well for the year – at least one major event a month (2 more in Feb). The first 6 months of the year I will be competing in 7-9 countries depending on final tournament schedules. I want to be able to enjoy training and learning Jiu Jitsu for the rest of my life, and don’t want to be the stereotype of the old black belt who is too broken to do anything but sit in the corner of the mat with their broken everything. I however do want to get out there and enjoy competing as much as I can while I’m still physically capable of making the rounds at this high frequency. I know with my chronic joint/connective tissue condition I need to be extra cautious about wear and tear on my joints if I want longevity for training, so it’s always a constant game of push and “check in”.

When and if I am released from physical therapy sessions, I will have to continue a structured rehab protocol on my own in order to maximize my full recovery. It will also keep my other hip stronger and useable as my initial assessment done indicated I have the same issue in my other hip (labrum tear/impingement), it’s just not giving me as much difficulty as my right hip was so my surgeon said we would just leave it alone unless it became a functional problem for me.

The Good Kind of Sore – 19 weeks post-op

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Saturday/Sunday

I taught my usual class on Saturday morning, finishing out the week of half guard top position by working some over/under pass variations and concepts. Then I rolled a couple of rounds at open mat. I could definitely feel the progress I have made over the last nearly two weeks of letting myself rest properly after nearly overdoing it. I was moving quite well and very dynamically without too much hesitation – most of my hesitation comes into play when I am in guard and wary of my partner potentially moving my leg and putting stress on my hip. When I play top or neutral position I feel very confident/secure and much as such. After open mat ended I hung out for a little bit and waited for a private client to arrive for an hour session before heading home to relax for the rest of the evening. Sunday as always is my sloth day – I do the bare essential demands so my brain can recharge for the week. I find that this makes the rest of my week far more productive and efficient.

This update is going to cover a few days extra as I’m going to switch my update day to Sundays moving forward.

Monday

I had a surprise substitute physical therapist today, so he asked me if I wanted to change anything about my program and I told him that I didn’t know what he had planned for me and as such I couldn’t make any comments. He said he was going to do the same thing as what I had listed from last week – so I told him that the kettlebell RDLs were very easy and I could probably use an increase. So he took me to the weight room and checked my form on a landmine deadlift with a 45# plate – that became the replacement. Everything else remained the same as last week except that for my straight leg raises I used a larger cone and for my TRX pistol squat I opted to not use the squishy pad as a target behind me and just watched my depth in the mirror to make sure I was getting to the spot I needed to be.

Monday nights we have a 90 minute Jiu Jitsu class at my academy and it is one of our most popular classes of the week. I work from home on days that I have physical therapy but got a ride in from one of my team mates. We warmed up with partner movement drills, then went into our takedown sequence of the month before working on a Jiu Jitsu technique from side control bottom (position of the week). Then we had a good 30-40 minutes of live drills/rounds. I was able to go through the entire class without any modifications to techniques and felt really good in all my movements. I even was able to implement a new passing concept that I sniped our other black belt instructors studying – it wasn’t exact to the way they were practicing it, but it used the same principles in the moment and it worked.

Tuesday

I felt the deadlifts in my upper hamstrings when I work up this morning. Nothing above and beyond, and I was still able to move around like normal, but I could definitely tell I had done them the day before! My blood pressure was running on the lower side of my normal today continuing the trend from yesterday (mid 90s/60s) – so I decided to really focus on extra hydration to see if I could bring it back up a bit. The nice thing about Jiu Jitsu practice is that if my hypotension issues flare up, I’m already on the ground so I’m less likely to pass out except for in between rounds when I stand back up.

Class this morning was fun! One of our black belt instructors reviewed over the technique from the previous evening class with an additional technique that was really stupidly useful (my favorite kind). We got a good amount of live rounds in and I felt pretty solid moving around.

I did a fair amount of mobility and stretching before going into my home PT exercises during evening class as I was still a bit sore. It was just muscle soreness though and my joint felt good so it was okay to work through – I did go a bit lighter with prescribed weights however and only did one set of the single leg (shoulder elevated) hip bridges.

Wednesday

The hamstrings are a little less sore today although my hip joint started getting a little sore. I realized that I was sitting curled up like a gremlin for the majority of the day and it felt better as soon as I stretched out a bit in my big chair that I have set up in the office. I’m still not ready to be hunched over in a standard office chair all day apparently but I’m thankful to my team for setting me up with a comfortable alternative.

I taught some leg framing principles from knee shield half guard tonight (how to activate the core and not just depend on isolated muscles for stability) and then two sweep options depending on whether people are pressuring the knee shield or have their weight neutral/back: a little push/pull dance so to speak. We sparred a few rounds as well and I got to jump in and it has been a while since I did any no gi sparring rounds!

My energy levels had been pretty low this day but since I had gotten my vitamin shots right before class I had a bit of an energy boost and decided to ride it and stay for the gi class afterwards. I got introduced to a new half guard sweep series that I may have to play with a little bit and then got two more light rounds in afterwards.

Thursday

For morning Jiu Jitsu class I was pretty fuzzy headed and had to work hard to maintain my focus and not be a bumbling buffoon during drilling. It was easier during live rolls because that’s more instinctive for me and doesn’t require as much brain power as does focus repetitive technique drilling.

I did my evening PT exercises during the comp class and made it through the full set for the first time this week since the hamstring soreness had died down appropriately enough by this point. It felt pretty good!

Friday – 19 weeks post op

This was typically my work from home day but I had to go into the office after a morning appointment with my therapist as we were down an office staff member. This meant an extra day of sitting which is still a bit more uncomfortable even in the stretched out chair so I had to take extra time to walk and move around during the day.

Saturday

Our morning ladies class is slowly growing and I taught loop choke variations this morning before heading home to relax and take an afternoon nap. I went to see the opera “Carmen” at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center this evening as a special treat and wanted to be well rested for my night out – I really enjoyed the show!

Sunday

That brings us to my new update day. I spent most of Sunday morning doing a deep clean of my apartment and then made a batch of cookies to bring to my PT clinic the following day. Tomorrow will be my last PT session with my current therapist before my original therapist returns from maternity leave to resume overseeing my care – so I figured I would bring some baked goods to see her off. My chocolate chip toffee walnut cookies are always a crowd pleaser!

All in all, I was pretty sore especially toward the beginning of the week in the hamstrings from those deadlifts, but it wasn’t sore enough to cause me to cause me to not be able to move. The main trick I find is that the more choosy I am who I train with, the less guarded I have to be with my movement. In fact this week was some of my best movement thus far. I’m still doing my best to keep the reins on but I can tell I’m getting very close to being where I need to be to get the all clear soon.

Hip Surgery Post Op Visit – 8 weeks post-op

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I had my long anticipated post-op visit with my surgeon this week!

Post-Op Visit

No x-rays this visit, I just reported to the intake nurse how PT was going and that my range of motion was doing well enough that we had already changed gears to focusing mostly on stability and strength already. My surgeon popped into the office shortly after she took down the info. I told him my PT said I was on track and ahead of schedule so far and he said to hop up on the table so he could verify everything.

First, he checked my hip flexion. He flexed my hip to 90 degrees and when I told him it was all good, he took me to full flexion and agreed I was definitely ahead of schedule there. Then we went for external and internal rotation which he was happy with. Straight leg raise and then a hold there against a slight press down. He did tell me he wanted me to sit more often with my right leg in a butterfly position during the day to let my hip stretch more at that particular angle. He said I can even press down on my knee a bit at this point and that I’m not going to hurt anything in my hip at this point to do so. (Appointment notes were: progressing well for 7 weeks postop labral repair…. flexion – 120 degrees, extension – full and painless range of motion, internal rotation – 30 degrees, external rotation – 50 degrees, abduction – 70 degrees). He scheduled me to see him again in another 8 weeks, but I will call his office to get in sooner if I have concerns before then.

At this point he agreed that I am ahead of schedule for healing from the surgery and opened the floor for questions. I tried to rapid fire them since I knew he was running behind schedule already in the clinic (answers are not word for word since I just scribbled shorthand)

The Questions:

  • Where was the tear exactly? I could tell the general idea based on the incision portal locations and residual numbness where most of the action was but was curious the specifics.
    • He detailed that he used the anterolateral portal mostly for viewing, the anterior portal is where he was doing most of his actual work through, and the modified anterolateral/lower portal is where he was mostly passing sutures and such through. The tear was pretty much the entire anterior/front facing portion of my labrum (which explains why I always felt like my hip was going to dislocate forward when I was sitting)
  • Nerd question: Does the labrum stretch like all the rest of my connective tissue (I’m hypermobile)
    • No, labrum tissue does not stretch. The only part of me that he worked on that was “stretchy” was my joint capsule tissue. His primary objective was not associated with my hypermobility.
  • What sort of bone anchors does he use for his labrum repairs?
    • Suture anchors – he named the exact kind but I forgot
  • In my random reading I came across various commentary that said certain vitamin supplements shouldn’t be taken after this kind of surgery because they encouraged rapid bone regrowth after it has been shaved down – so I discontinued all mine just to be safe. What are your thoughts on that?
    • I’m okay with you resuming anything you were previously taking at this stage.
  • I only get 20 PT visits covered by my insurance, am I ok at this point to spread them out to weekly?
    • Definitely since it looks like you’re doing your at home assignments well
  • You told me at my initial assessment that my hip socket was a little deeper set than the standard model. Is that something I should think about modifying future training methods to accommodate for? Less deeper squats for example?
    • No, I took a little off the edge of the hip socket just to give you some leeway there. It also served a dual purpose to give you some extra immediate blood flow to the labrum tissue to speed initial healing. (I don’t think I officially had a pincher impingement, he has given off the impression that the bony issue was rather minor)
  • With my underlying hypermobility, I know I’m in a rather baseline level of fucked and am pretty much a chronic coper. What is the point at which you recommend getting something checked out?
    • When pain or instability reaches a point that you can no longer cope. For prevention, keep doing what you are doing as far as strength and stability training – it’s working well for you so far.

I asked about timeline. He said that at the 4 month mark he considers the labrum itself to be healed and that it’s generally 6-9 months post-op to regain full functionally of the joint itself for return to sport usage – which depends on how everything goes in recovery and what level of usage your sport requires. The main risk for me at this point now is overworking myself and causing something to flare up which could set back my recovery timetable. I asked for some specifics:

  • Is the competing at the European Championships in January a reasonable comeback event (8 months post-op)
    • Based on what I see today, it’s a very reasonable and achievable goal provided you don’t overdo anything in the early stages of rebuilding movement.
  • When can I ride an outdoor bike
    • I’m okay with you doing that now, again just keep in mind you could wear yourself out easily and get sore/inflammation easily
  • Rowing machine?
    • That’s the one most people have more difficulties with because of the range of motion causing more pinching in the hip. (I interpret that as a soft “not right now / proceed with caution”)
  • Teaching Jiu Jitsu classes?
    • I’m okay with careful controlled movements
  • Drilling in Jiu Jitsu class? (this was the biggie)
    • I’m okay with you doing careful controlled movements provided it’s movements that you know you can do safely and without pain or any pinching sensation in the hip.

He summarized everything then to tell me that any movement that I do in PT I can do outside of PT. The key things he said is that the movements I do need to be controlled, pain free (no pinching sensation) and they need to be without impact on my hip.

I baked some cinnamon walnut pound cake the night before to bring to the PT clinic that day since it was my last week with my PT (she was going on maternity leave). I brought one for my surgeon and his PA as well and they must have been running ragged all morning without a break based on the way they snatched it up quickly.

At the PT Clinic

I got to start off on the elliptical machine for the first time this week in PT. I only got 5 minutes on it and the first few mins felt a little awkward in the joint but about halfway in it started feeling really good. I think next time I may sneak in early just to get some extra time on it (or play on it afterwards while I wait for my uber home).

I gave my report to my PT from the surgeon and let her know about needing to drop to one day a week for physical therapy in order to conserve my remaining covered PT visits – which meant that was my last session with her. She sent me off with a bang adding leg box drills with a lean forward, extra height to my step ups (since I reported walking up the hospital steps one at a time that morning), and pistol box squats (TRX assisted, but I didn’t need too much help beyond minor stability). She was also very excited to receive her cinnamon walnut cake and promised to write useful notes in my file for my new PT such as “talks shit but follows instructions well”.

Re-Joining Jiu Jitsu Class

I opted to not try joining class that same day that I had a 90 minute PT session – I figured that could fall under the umbrella of “overdoing it” that my surgeon cautioned against. So for context: My post op visit was Monday morning of this week, and I went straight to PT afterwards. I elected to just watch the evening Jiu Jitsu class with plans to drill in the Tuesday morning class. (position of the week is turtle top/attacks)

Tuesday morning the techniques were back takes that I did not feel confident I could do with the allowable movements I have in my card deck, but coach said I could just walk the room and jump in on people to rep moves of things I could do safely. So, I practiced clock chokes and a few rolling finishes that involved me rolling shoulder first. Everything felt really good, and I did not feel any pressure on my hip at any of the movement angles. I waited until later in the afternoon and put myself through a light version of my PT circuit as well and then watched our evening comp class get smeared into grease spots on the mat. I did take video of the technique being taught in the morning, and then video of what I actually did so that I can show my PT next week how I was modifying in class in order to participate.

Wednesday: I had thought I might try dropping taking my daily meloxicam at this stage and see how I feel, which I did Tuesday but by mid-morning on Wednesday I was starting to feel a bit of an ache in my hip joint that I hadn’t felt at all before. I figured since I am upping my activity levels and getting started on more strength building in PT now may not be the best time to taper off it. So I decided to take my dose again the Thursday morning and stay on a bit longer.

I worked in the office for most of the day and then did my home PT exercises in the afternoon. We had an all female turnout for our 4:30 pm no gi class in the Jiu Jitsu academy next door and I decided on principle that I should jump in to get some technique reps in if possible. It’s a technique drilling class and I was able to do it the drills without any pressure on my hip. I avoided being drilled on however just because I did not want to worry about having someone’s bodyweight on me while I had my hip flexed in turtle position (next week will be difficult for drilling since we are working specifically from that bottom position, I may have to improvise).

We had a guest instructor visiting from San Diego who taught our 5:30 no gi and 6:30 gi classes for us. The drill he taught was using the underhook to escape side control and various methods of back takes to sweeps for no gi, and for Gi class going to deep half guard and working sweep options from there. I was able to do the no gi drills with skilled drilling partners who were able to position themselves to keep all pressure off me (lightly interactive grappling dummies), but I was not stupid enough to attempt any deep half guard positions in the gi class – so I just enjoyed watching!

After doing my PT exercises that day, and drilling slowly about 20 reps of exercises in one class and 10 compound movement reps in the second class (reps all spread across a 2 hr time frame), my hip felt tired in a similar way to the first time I did straight leg lifts for the first time in the clinic at PT. I considered icing when I got home, but after lying down I didn’t feel any actual discomfort, so I opted against it.

Thursday morning I woke up feeling just fine after my evening of “excess”. I had skipped taking my meloxicam for the previous two mornings and didn’t feel horrible for it but remembering the slight ache from the previous morning I opted to resume my morning dose for the time being.

Normal day at work, with a break for me to jump into the 10:30 Jiu Jitsu class. I did just a couple reps of one of the moves demonstrated. It was an armbar attack using your legs to hook the near side arm when you’re in turtle top position. I was able to safely do it on one side (surgical hip down) but I wasn’t gonna try to do it on the other side with my surgical hip doing all the hooking and pressure. The next phase was to do a back take when your partner defends by tucking their arm which I just watched since I didn’t want to pull someone’s weight over top my surgical hip.

I opted to just do the stretching portion of my PT home program this evening and even pulled out my ice machine to give myself a little extra tlc that evening. I didn’t have any pain, but I was feeling a bit tired around the joint and figured since I was considering it for the second night in a row I should go ahead and use the ice.

Friday brings me officially to the 8 week post op mark! I’m working from home today again as it’s a difficult day to get to and from the office due to everyone’s schedules.

The Grand Recap and Thoughts

Mentally and physically I have been feeling great since I have been able to participate a bit in Jiu Jitsu class again. I’m being patient because I am keeping the goal of competing at the European Championship in January on my mind. Overworking my joint will set me back in my recovery, so if my muscles start to feel tired, I stop. I modify the class technique as needed to avoid pressure points on my hip – if I can’t modify then I just observe instead. I will not run the risk that one risk that one instance of over-working or moving incorrectly could mess up my long-term goal.

The formula I used this past week for each class was as follows. For a simple movement drill: 20 reps spread out over the 1-hour long class. For a compound movement: 10 reps spread out over the 1-hour long class. That doesn’t sound like a lot of reps compared to what I was doing before surgery, but it was plenty for slow methodical movement and testing out the safe limits of what I can do.

When my PT updated my home exercise program a few weeks ago at first it was pretty tough and I could only do it every other day. Last week I was able to do it every day without feeling trashed. This week with the extra activity I felt the need to dial it back a little bit so what I did was add more rest and recovery time in between exercises which seemed to do the trick. Thursday however I skipped the exercises entirely and just did the stretches as my joint felt tired and I did not want to overwork it. My muscles feel a little bit of workout soreness as well since I have added resistance bands now to my home exercises (since we have done so in the clinic). Most of my exercises focus on core, glutes, and quads.

I’ve been training Jiu Jitsu for about 13 years and as I’ve mentioned before, I was in peak physical shape before my surgery. This has contributed to my ability to drill in a somewhat safe manner. I additionally have good, experienced teammates who are happy to help me with my recovery by positioning themselves appropriately at right time to keep pressure off my surgical hip. My 14 years of hands-on study of kinesiology and anatomy due to being a structural focused massage therapist, as well as needing the self-learning to manage my hypermobility condition has really helped give me a good baseline for this recovery process.

A big difference between my recovery for this hip surgery and recovery for my knee surgery is that this time I am not feeling isolated and unsupported by my community. Around the time of my knee injury was one of the darker times of my life and that compounded the whole issue. By comparison, this is a much smoother process knowing I’m surrounded by people who have my back – figuratively and literally!

Tokyo Recap Part 1: Departure and Competition

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Well I have been home now for about a week and a half now and the jet lag is finally fading – that 15 hour time difference hits harder on the return now in my late 30s. There were also other circumstances delaying my recap, but I’ll get into that later.

This was my first time back in Japan since before Covid in 2019 and to say I had been looking forward to it would be a massive understatement. I was caught completely off guard however by the huge wave of emotions that hit as my plane lifted off from Nashville early that morning. I was thankful to have a window seat and the cover of darkness as the waves of realization hit and became reality – of how much I had done over the last several years to make this happen again. I ugly cried for the majority of that short flight from Nashville to the Atlanta hub where I would catch the connecting flight onward to Tokyo.

The flight from Atlanta to Tokyo was rather rough as it was just over 15 hours long and I had a nausea inducing migraine for the majority of it. My weight was already good for making 62 kg getting on the flight, so dehydrating was definitely not part of the plan; but as we all know, things don’t always go according to plan.

My flight arrived in Tokyo around 2 pm so I took my time and checked my weight before going to customs, I was at that point about 60.8 kg so I started trying to sip some fluids since that was far below my intended weight at that point due to dehydration. After clearing customs I sat at the airport until about 4 pm since there was no point going to my hotel in central Tokyo to drop my bags when I would then have to immediately turn around and come back down for weigh ins right after doing so.

My official weight for the masters division was 60.1 kg (that is 134.4 lbs). After making weight I grabbed my bags and made my way to the metro station for the 30 min train ride to find my hotel.

I chose to once again stay in a capsule style hotel, this time in Akihabara (aka: electric town/anime central). I really like capsule style hotels because they tend to be centrally located near main train stations and offer great amenities such as premium hair/skin care products, spa services, and such like. This one gave me a fresh bag with my towel set and pajamas every day and I did not have to pack any toiletries since everything they provide is luxury quality. I don’t need a lot of space either, since I’m not hanging out in a hotel room all day and just need a safe comfortable place to sleep at night.

I tanked out pretty quickly after getting checked in and putting my stuff away. I was worried about having to fight first thing in the morning after flying in and weighing in the night before, but since they were running the amateur event the same day, the masters event was set to start in the early afternoon so I could have a little chill time.

As far as how my matches went, well it wasn’t my best day. I could make excuses but that’s all they would be. It doesn’t really matter what the excuses are, I either brought it that day or I didn’t – and that day I didn’t. I was feeling pretty cruddy about it since the masters division was supposed to be my actual focus for this trip and the pro division was going to be my “f*ck it I’m here, may as well” division.

This was the marquee going through my brain after those matches, while of course keeping a smile on my face of good sportsmanship: “should I not have dropped my walking weight so low and have just done the 70 kg division? Should I have not tried to do two divisions, just done one and done a more reasonable water cut for the last few lbs instead? Was it an actual injury or just me being weak? Was it the migraine aftereffects? Should I have flown in earlier? Am I just a washed-up has-been? Were they right when certain people told me a few years ago that at a certain age you just can’t expect to compete anymore? Am I too broken to make it back for real? Did I not train enough? Did I waste my training partner’s time for this?” You know, the whole doom spiral that tries to hit when you feel like you embarrass yourself spectacularly.

There was nothing else to do but keep moving forward of course. I had to hang around at the venue for a few more hours to wait for the weigh ins to open up for the professional division event (that event was the following day). I was still struggling to rehydrate and ended up weighing in for that at 61.35 kg, so that some was progress at least!

The mood the next morning on the warmup mats for the professional match was quite more serious than the day before. I won’t go into too detail about my matches but I will say I felt so much better about my performance overall in the pro division than I did in the masters division the day before. Each match was dramatically different, and they do double elimination at these big events for brown and black belt matches so I went 2:2 and took 4th place, just missing the podium (and some sweet $$).

So, the overall lesson learned from this after the spiral of the day before is that I was a dumbass and shouldn’t fly for 18 hours to the other side fo the world, weigh in the same day of arrival, and then compete the day after I arrive. I could get away with that in my 20s and early 30s: but apparently it’s a no go in my late 30s. One extra day of recovery and I was a much less embarrassing version of myself – still not perfect of course, but much improved. Yes, I should know better but I’m thickheaded and need to be reminded sometimes that I’m not invincible. When I do the Grand Slam in Abu Dhabi this May I plan to arrive several days before the event so I will have time to recover from the trip before weigh ins and competing.

Part 2 I’ll get into some of the fun exploration stuff! I went on a temple pilgrimage in Ueno Park!

Back in the Groove

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Man, it has been a crazy last few years.

There were quite a few long stretches of time where I basically quit mentally with my training and came within a hair of quitting physically as well. Between losing all my training partners due to academy drama, covid, and then my knee blowing out sideways – it was a lot.

Through it all, I gained an excessive amount of weight of course. I went from walking around comfortably around 140 lbs up to 192 lbs at my peak after surgery when I was immobilized for months. The extra weight puts pressure on my already wonky joints (I have hypermobile EDS), as well as caused an increase in overall inflammation/pain, shot up my cholesterol, and just made me feel like a washed up has-been. Having a significant amount of body dysmorphia and old history of an eating disorder did not help with that either.

March of last year is when I was able to start moving around a bit (3 months after surgery). I had a lot of limitations and twice weekly rehab since I was basically learning how to walk and use my leg all over again. There was a lot of nerve damage due to the extent of the damage to my knee and it was months before I could consciously flex my quadriceps muscle group. In summary:

2021: Awarded black belt in March, knee injury happened 3 weeks later in freak training accident. I knew it would put me down for a while but wasn’t sure how long – surgeon wanted to wait and see how much it could heal on its own before he did any surgery. It was frustrating going from 6 week appointment to 6 week appointment without a concrete recovery timetable answer – all while paying out of pocket for therapy twice a week (no insurance of course). In December the surgeon determined it had healed as much as it could on my own and did a 3 hour long reconstructive surgery.

2022: My sports orthopedic surgeon was happy with the outcome and promised me an eventual return to full usage. I’d never had a stiff joint in my life but he purposefully wanted it to heal stiff so it would be as strong as possible for all the impact I would put it though. This translated to many tears in PT when it came time to work on pushing the range of motion and I was on the watch list for a second procedure to clear out extra scar tissue. (Better that option than for it to heal too loose and have to get the whole procedure done over again.) March is when I hit that peak with my weight just as I was starting to be allowed more movement and could start working my way back down slowly. 6 months after surgery I was allowed to start moving around lightly on the mats with a special made sports impact brace to protect the healing ligament grafts. In December of 2022 I got the all clear to return to training without any restrictions – he said it would take another 6-8 months for me to feel fully recovered but I wasn’t in danger of damaging the reconstruction work he did. So I signed up to compete in January at the Europeans.

2023: So far I’ve competed at an event almost every month. It was a fight to get my weight down to make medium heavyweight (163.6 lbs) for Europeans, but it felt like a huge accomplishment to have a chance to be back on the mats and I was just tearing up in the bullpen as well as before/after all my matches. Honestly I feel pretty emotional and grateful at each event I’ve been to so far. I know I haven’t been training at my optimum in order to expect to win events, but the only way I will recover my movement and proper mindset is to just keep pushing myself and embracing the suck.

Currently:

I finally reached a place where I feel confident using my surgical leg without being on guard at all times – so that means I’m ready to get serious with my training again. I have most of my training partners back thanks to my coach opening a new academy where we can feel welcomed again, plus I’m now working a job that is a supportive environment for both jiu jitsu training/competing and my autism quirks.

I decided it was time to make the push to get back to my light weight division (141.6 lb) for the Master Worlds tournament next month. It’s a lot of hard work, but with support from my team mates I am able to keep my focus and am reaching or exceeding my weight goals each week. Self-motivation is a thing, but knowing my team and coaches have my back gives that motivation a solid foundation. Working from that foundation I feel my confidence and drive returning again, like I haven’t felt since my mid/upper purple belt days!

With a little extra push I’ll be able to make the goal of light weight early in time to compete in another event a few weeks before master worlds – then I can coast and let my system stabilize before the big event. I would just prefer to not have the first time I manage to make weight be at one of the biggest tournaments of the year.

I love seeing the camaraderie of our academy and all the new people coming in almost every day. After some dark times, the new chapters going forward are looking bright!

Building Good Training Vibes

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We are almost a month into our soft opening of the new Jiu Jitsu training academy here in Nashville, TN. We have already reached our first membership goals and are able to cover the basic expenses. Marketing and advertisement has so far just been word of mouth but every person who has come to visit has commented on the vibe of the new place and how it just draws you in. I figured now would be a good time to talk about how we go about achieving that good vibe feel amidst the sweat and hard work.

The ultimate authority in the academy is where the vibe starts, and it is not always the most obvious person. It could be an instructor, manager, owner, or even some mentor who influences others from a distance. If the base authority is healthy, the gym is healthy. In the case of my academy, it is my head professor who is the academy owner and authority figure.

So, what does healthy leadership look like? It varies stylistically from individual to individual, but the results will yield committed instructors, enthusiastic students, and a low turnover rate for staffing. I’ll just use our leadership as an example and expound on a few fictional contrasts.

Cares About Students

First and foremost, if the leadership does not care about their students – you might as well write them off right out of the gate. My professor has been accused of caring too much, to the point where his other black belt students have to pull him away from trying to coach someone at a tournament who was actively trying to undermine his business. Each student is important, as are their goals. I find it rare to meet individuals who genuinely care, and I’m thankful that my professor is one of them.

Most people go into teaching Jiu Jitsu because they love the art and passing it on – there are very few people who are able to get rich teaching BJJ or running an academy. If leadership is focused all on the numbers, the students will suffer as they become just part of an assembly line.

Of course, that is not to say you can’t be an amazing leader who cares about students AND makes money, what I’m talking about is balance. When you’re dealing with people’s health and safety, you can’t be a cold machine focused on churning out numbers. Jiu Jitsu is a very personal activity, and that warmth is needed in order to keep people invested for the long term.

Goal Focused

Everyone comes to their first Jiu Jitsu class with a goal. I myself got into training because I wanted a hard physical challenge to help me get into shape. Other common goals are

  • Self-Defense (as a result of a traumatic event, or in anticipation of one)
  • Competition
  • Confidence Building
  • Trying the Unknown

There are as many goals as there are people who walk in the door. If my professor knows someone has a goal to learn self-defense because they work at a high-risk LEO job, he will give them a different perspective than someone who is into it as a sport. For example: if you’re a purple belt with the desire to compete, he will work with you until you develop the confidence to represent your belt level at the tournament you want to enter. He wouldn’t promote you before you could develop that confidence – because he would take the time to understand your individual goals. Having more high ranked students in the academy would, at a glance, look better for him as a professor but promoting students earlier than their personal goals dictate is selfish.

Willing to Have the Hard Conversations

Strong leadership is not afraid to talk openly about an issue and then take action if needed. For example: if a male black belt has a habit of sexually harassing female students, it is oftentimes brushed under the rug with the ladies made to feel they need to either suck it up or leave and never get a chance to really feel like a real part of the community. My professor had a case like this, and he took the time to gather information, various testimonies, and gave due process… and EVERYBODY deserves due process. The women should feel free to train and know they will be safe, and the men should also feel free to train and not worry that a misspoken word might get them in the hot seat.

Jiu Jitsu brings a lot of different people together under one roof. Leadership needs to be prepared for this and ready to step in when (not if) issues of harassment, discrimination, and racism pop up. Jiu Jitsu puts you in a lot of vulnerable positions as it is, so we don’t want to be worrying about these sorts of things while we are trying to focus on learning.

Takes Care of Those Invested

We love seeing new white belts come into the gym! They are our legacy and the continuation of our Jiu Jitsu heritage – but taking care of the students who are invested for the long term is key! If the focus becomes just on getting new numbers through the door without any appreciation or care for those already present, it will lead to students feeling unappreciated. I have seen so many cases of long-term loyalty being taken for granted, and that loyalty can only be pushed so far before it finally breaks.

The invested upper rank students are necessary to help keep the quality of the room high, as well as to be good examples to the new white belts when they come in for training. In a full class the instructor can’t see all of the students at once, so the upper level belts step in to help while the professor is answering questions on the other side of the mat. They also teach by example how to treat your training partners and safely execute techniques during live sparring.

Summary:

I could continue on as this is a topic of particular personal interest to me. Over the past decade plus of training I have personally seen a lot of shitty situations. Harassment of minorities, sexual coercion, abuse of power, racism, disrespect, embezzlement, and some 9th circle of hell level betrayals. However, through all of this the BJJ community always impresses me with how it keeps shining through and working to be better. It feels so good to have a place to train where it feels like family again. My personal goal is to make the path a bit less rough for those who follow after me, that’s a big part of why I write things like this (when really I prefer all sunshine and rainbows). Talking about things is the first step to making things better – if it stays in the dark, it will continue growing unchecked until the day it destroys us all.

I’m Thankful For My Injury

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Warning: Lots of feelings here!

I’ve been down rehabbing a major injury for 18 months now. It has been difficult to be so removed from “my thing” for so long and I have gone through many phases of mourning, anger, and sadness. Now I am finally reaching “hope” since my surgeon has cleared me to ease back into training with a check in another 4 months to give me a final clear to compete once more (eye on the European Championships!)

In the midst of the process, I have been doing an assessment and re-organization of my life. My goal is to build a better foundation for myself moving forward with my return to the competitive circuit. I was running on empty for so long; mentally, physically, emotionally, and financially. I never allowed myself to get caught up in any of these things because I felt like the forward momentum was the only thing keeping me upright and focused. I knew it was unhealthy, but I was trapped in a vicious cycle.

Financially, I had been living off about $1,200 a month (pre-tax) between teaching bjj classes and doing massages in my office. I got really good at living at that level – I used a combo of bus and bicycle to get around (60-90 mins commute each way/day), rented a small bedroom, and did most of my own cooking on the cheap. I would ride an overnight greyhound bus to tournaments in order to save on airfare and hotel expenses, got exceptional at trip planning (went to Europeans on $500 airfare and lodging included), would work tournaments to offset travel costs, and somehow managed to not go into debt.

Mentally/Emotionally I was running myself into the ground. Due to issues at my long-time academy (see This Post for that story) I lost all my main training partners and was still expected to perform at peak level. I couldn’t disconnect like my teammates who had left – so I had to pretend I was okay and keep focusing on my goals. It felt like walking up a sand dune – I was still able to reach my goals, but I had no energy left to celebrate or enjoy the view since I knew I had to go right back into the pit. Competing became more about the trip/escape than the actual event itself. I was desperately hopeful that if I just stuck it out, it would circle back to the way it used to be.

One of my autism features is that I can’t read subtext – if someone says something, I believe them. So many promises were made to me that things would get better “we are working on it”, “trust us to get this done” – I went emotionally bankrupt waiting to cash in those promised checks. I saw the pattern and still chose to trust it even though I knew better logically – because I couldn’t see another viable option.

I know I allowed myself to be manipulated: I hoped that in doing so things would get better and it would pay off where I was. Foolish hope I know, when all the people who cared for me were pushing me to give up and move on. I hate that in allowing myself to be manipulated it made me complicit in a system that hurt so many people that I care about. So far no one I have spoken with has laid any blame on me, but I apologize regardless of blame – and I think it is helping the healing process for everyone.

Getting injured force stopped my hamster wheel and left me in complete disarray – I’m almost at a point where I can be truly thankful for it. I eventually would have hit a breaking point mentally, and I don’t know that I would have recovered from that – and I know I was so very close.

I just parted ways with my therapist who has helped me through this transition process to leave my old academy for good. She admitted she was rooting for me to leave but of course professionally couldn’t insert her own opinion on the matter – Her that her relief/celebration when I told her kind of gave her opinion away of course. She also guided me toward a place where I can finally have an official ASD evaluation (scheduled for next month). I’m hoping that they will be able to help me identify areas that I don’t realize I’m compensating and help me find better tools to bring me those to balance a bit.

Financially I’ve gotten set up in a much better situation. I took a job working for a teammate as a project manager. Another autistic feature of mine is that I am really good at pattern recognition and organization of complex systems – so this job is a perfect fit for me. It also pays well enough for me to get my own apartment and (slowly) pay off my surgery bills. Since the majority of the other staff members also train bjj, we have mats in the warehouse where I’ve been getting my training groove back slowly.

The lynchpin was me finally leaving my old academy and breaking the cycle, and it took my injury shaking up things to do so. I have a lot of healing to do still mentally but my coach has my back, and I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel.

People have been messaging me all kinds of different things after my writing that initial “break up” article. I had people from outside my association/region relating to it, local gym owners commiserating watching the decline in my old academy’s local reputation, students wishing me well and being sad for me. I also had people telling me that I needed to share all the good things about my old academy since it wasn’t all bad – but the bad overshadowed the good too much and made me so miserable for so long that the best I could do was try to be balanced with my initial break up article.

There are a lot of feelings flying around, and my team has a lot of healing to do. It sucks so much to see how deep a wound has been caused by just a handful of people. What I appreciate is that our coach is taking active steps to help mend the hurt – because it proves that he genuinely cares. He hates giving up on people which is why dropping my old academy from the team association was such a drastic step for him. There are still many people there who are greatly loved, and it makes it that much more tragic of a development. Not being allowed to talk about things (however ugly and uncomfortable they might be) keeps things from ever really healing and is what enables a broken system to thrive. I’m thankful to have things out in the open – it’s not pretty, but we can focus on fixing it now.

Anyhow, feelings are messy but I’m finally starting to make sense of mine – I can visualize now what it will be like next year when I return to competition, and I can’t wait to show what I can do when I’m actually healthy again!

Inspiring Loyalty

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This is a bit of a follow up to my “When the Vibe Changes” post from last month. That post circulated more than I thought it would! It opened up a dialogue for a lot of people to talk more openly about things – both locally and elsewhere. Things have changed significantly since then and needs an update!

As people began sharing more about the changes that made them leave my old academy, it was apparent that the teachings of our association head were no longer respected or taught, along with other issues. Long story short, my old academy has been dropped from the team association – our coach finally had enough of the centralized drama stemming from ongoing policies that don’t match his philosophies.

My loyalty is to my coach because he has earned it over the years of having my back and investing in me. He returns that loyalty, and it is obvious even to people outside of our association how much he cares for all of his students. Yes, even the troublemakers (you know who you are!)

When I tell people how amazing my coach is they just don’t get how he can inspire such a loyal following and assume it must be cult of personality. Then they meet him and say, “oh I get it now!” See he genuinely gives a shit about seeing people succeed and surpass his abilities. If you look at the black belts he has produced, you will notice they are all unique with different styles and methodologies. He doesn’t try to mold us in his image, he instead seeks out what makes us tick and nurtures that into its own thing. His affiliation has grown in the mid-south so much in the past several years, and that’s without him ever actively trying to coax people on to the team, in fact he wasn’t even intending to run an affiliation but the black belts under him all requested it. He inspires people to want to follow, and he is a good enough person that he understands the responsibility of that.

This is what differentiates a coach from an instructor (by my definition at least). An instructor gives you valuable knowledge for you to then implement. A coach goes deeper and develops more than just technique, they develop mindset, philosophy, and individual training plans based on a student’s strengths and weaknesses. He actively watches the trends in Jiu Jitsu and if he sees something that he thinks will work for a student, he takes the time to study it and help a student integrate it into his game – even if it’s something that is outside of his personal style. For example, spider guard was just coming onto the scene when I was a white belt. He saw it being used at worlds and brought it back to show me saying “I can’t do this with my hips, but you are gonna love it!” I remember staring at him in disbelief that I would ever use this ridiculous looking technique… But he was right, and I still actively use it to this day!

You can’t demand loyalty from people under you. Loyalty is something that is awarded to you by virtue of proving your merit and care. If you have to demand that people are loyal and respect you, all you will be is a dictator who rules by fear (which can look similar but will feel hollow upon receipt).

A major goal of mine is to one day be able to inspire people the way he does. At any rate, I look forward to the future and am allowing myself to feel true excitement and anticipation again! I see my surgeon again in 4 weeks and will find out if I need another procedure on my knee to break up scar tissue. Either way my prognosis is excellent for return to full impact with zero restrictions, it’s just gonna take a little more time.

Jiu Jitsu and Autism Pt 4

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It’s been requested over the last couple of years that I write a follow up post to my “Jiu Jitsu and Aspergers” series from back in the day. I thought I had gotten everything out with that series, and honestly it was a scary one to publish since I hadn’t disclosed my diagnosis to many people at that point. This might be a rehashing but there’ve definitely been changes since I wrote that piece 8 years ago! (Click Here to check out the article that started it all)

Two big changes:

The Aspergers diagnosis is now defunct and dated (as are the terms high/low functioning), my diagnosis is now simply “Autistic”. The other change being that I was promoted to my black belt last year.

So where does that leave me?

I’m still me. I’m learning and unlearning a lot through work with my therapist. Autism seems to have taken a recent spotlight through media representation, which is both a good thing and a bad thing. Education and awareness is good in general, but media will of course represent the extremes of something from their own vantage point, not understanding what actually goes on in a brain that is wired differently than theirs. The stereotypical autistic person they usually end up portraying is the sensationalized version that is a small fraction of the diagnosis spectrum.

Sensory Issues:

Since my last posting on this topic, I have had to stop driving a car. It is just too much input/reaction for me to safely handle. On bad/low tolerance days I could focus either on; watching my speed, staying in the lines, or driving directions. I got speeding tickets because I was having to focus so hard to keep my car going where I wanted it and safely avoiding all the other moving (and stationary) objects that I just didn’t pay attention to speed, or I would be swerving in and out of lines while watching my speedometer. It all added up to more stress than it was worth to me. I switched to a combo of bicycle and the bus. The bike is easier because I don’t have to watch a speedometer, and can stop easily if I need a focus break. It was less convenient on the surface (especially given the state of the bus system in Nashville), but a better choice overall.

More recently I have started paying closer attention to my tactile sensitivities. Can I push through the day with a jacket sleeve touching the base of my thumb or an odd feeling fabric making up my gi pants? Yes, yes I can. But these little stressors add up and if it’s something within my own control, shouldn’t I control it and make it easier for me to handle the things I have no control over? As such I’ve done a closet purge and gotten rid of items that I find uncomfortable, got myself a floofy fleece hoodie to relax in at home, and am eyeballing an oversized Totoro plushie I found online.

I recognize now that while I can’t tolerate light physical contact, firm to hard is actually soothing. I’m guessing this is another reason why Jiu Jitsu is a good activity for me!

Pattern Recognition:

I’m starting to make some realizations about how deep my penchant for pattern recognition goes. I have realized that I don’t read people’s facial expressions emotionally, but I can recognize a change in their behavior pattern that tips me off if something (positive or negative) is up. So, the better I know someone (and get the hang of their normal behavior) the better I can read their emotional changes.

It’s frustrating because I can predict to pretty good accuracy an issue down the road – but no one takes me seriously if I try to point it out. Then the crisis hits and they all scramble to address it and I just heave a sigh.

In Jiu Jitsu it has definitely been an asset! When I figured out the mechanics of a triangle choke, I was able to easily apply the same thing from all angles (inverted reverse triangle finish anyone?) Learning my training partners’ movement patterns helps make me seem like I know a lot more than I actually do.

Special Interests:

My primary special interest has remained Jiu Jitsu – I’m going on 11 years now of it! It brings me great joy that I’m surrounded by people who don’t think it’s odd if I want to talk for hours about training techniques or theory.

It has been particularly difficult for the past few years. First, we had all the gym shutdowns with the coronovirus, and then just as we were getting into the swing of training again I had a very bad injury. I’ve been recovering for over a year now and haven’t been allowed to train properly (at all in the past 5 months post-op). I had the best possible sports osteopathic surgeon piece my knee back together again – he is confident I will be back to full impact with no restrictions, it just takes time.

Not being able to participate feels like a part of me is just a dark empty space that nothing can fill. I’m back on the outside looking in again. I have tried my best to keep myself engaged through teaching and watching film, but it is a pacifier that can’t be sustained. It has reached a point where I can actually see a life for myself where I never train again, and it terrifies me. I am determined that I WILL be back!

Social Stuff:

Being around the Jiu Jitsu community has made me feel much more competent and confident in social settings. Overall, I think the sport attracts the awkward misfits who are more accepting and forgiving of the awkwardness of others.

I have never dated, and probably won’t in the future. It is so difficult for me to maintain friendships that adding deeper levels just seems an insurmountable task to me, more trouble than it would be worth. Just know that if I count you as a friend, that means something.

I find it difficult to make a good first impression without feeling like I’m putting on a show of something that isn’t who I really am. The term is “masking” where I hide my natural pattern of speech behind a mask that is more socially acceptable. Everyone has always told me to “just be yourself and people will appreciate the real you!” – but in my experience that is a well-meaning lie. The real me is awkward, makes people uncomfortable with bluntness and vocal inflections, doesn’t have a filter on facial expressions, etc. Probably the reason that, while growing up, the other kids in my peer group thought I was “creepy.”

Nine times out of ten, if I greet people with the real me, it just doesn’t begin or end well. So many of my (now) friends have said that when they first met me, they thought I hated them. If I wear my goofball mask it is a predictable role that other people know how to relate to right off the bat. It’s less stress in the moment, but more stress in the long term. Sometimes I’m so exhausted when get home that I just sit down and stare at a blank wall for a solid hour before I’m able to start to relax with a book or movie.

That said, it’s better than it was before. I’m more aware of my limitations and am getting better at regulating myself. Controlling the things in my environment that I have control over means I have more energy to deal with the ones I can’t control. Since people with Autism have to expend more mental/emotional energy to do simple daily tasks, I have to conserve my energy where possible in order to make it through the day.

Anxiety:

I had a 3-day long anxiety attack last week. I learned something new from my therapist through it. Since my brain has no filter for the world I will eventually hit “critical mass” and my brain/nervous system just says “no.”

I say it’s like boiling a pot of water. Everyone else can boil their pot uncovered but I have a pressure cooker lid firmly in place. The pressure that would normally just dissipate from the act of heating up the water (aka, functioning in society) has nowhere to go for me.

Even as I explain it, it sounds like I’m just making excuses. Especially when people try to relate by saying “I think everyone is a little autistic” – which to me sounds like a minimization of my own difficulties. I can function if I try hard enough, so I must be lying or exaggerating. The toll it takes on me though is not sustainable over the long term.

In Closing:

Not a ton has changed really. I am still me. I am just trying to learn more about myself so that I can be a better human. Achieving my black belt was a huge saga that I will one day possibly share, but I need to be a little further removed from circumstances before I do that.

As I have risen in the ranks, I have felt the responsibility to look out for my fellow students. I would spend my weekend rehearsing all possible questions and interactions that I could come up with so that I could have an answer for someone as opposed to my classic deer in headlights stare. They know I care, even if I’m still a bit rough around the edges.

I’ve been more open about my diagnosis in the past couple of years. I think it’s because I have come to accept it more and feel more confident. That said, I’m actually awaiting an official assessment through an ADA approved evaluation center. I’ve been diagnosed by several therapists but if it’s not done through the approved evaluation center it’s not considered “official”. It’s an expensive drawn-out process, which is why I haven’t done it before – but with the salary from my new job I will be able to afford it!