Getting a Grip

Today we did heavy lifting and I decided NOT to wear my gloves. I kind of feel like a wuss when we do pull-ups and I wear gloves; it's especially bad when we do a lot of pull-ups and my gloves get sweaty and there's no chance of getting a grip on the bar. So I decided to do something about it and tried the back squat and dead lift with no gloves. My hands are a little calloused. I guess I'm not used to doing actual physical labor anymore. I'll give up my dreams of hand-modeling career. The gloves are coming off for a while - but only for lifting. I can't do pull-ups without them (yet).

I've figured out that the higher the stress in my life, the higher the probability of me having a meltdown in Crossfit. That being said, I've been fairly stressed out lately. I showed up for a WOD after work on a Friday a couple weeks ago. One of the movements was handstand push-ups. I go in thinking I'll just do them from a bench, since that's what I've done before and I can't even do a stupid handstand yet. But Jeremy had different plans and said I should do the handstand push-ups from the resistance bands and he would help me get into them. Fine. I'll try anything twice. So I get into the bands and he lets go and I land on my head. The tears start welling up and I feel like an idiot. I know, it just scared me. I wasn't expecting it. But it had also been a very long week. I took a moment, composed myself, and Jeremy got some different bands. This time it worked. I did the handstand push-ups - even in the workout. I even did some GHD sit-ups in the workout and boy, did I feel that for a while. Meltdown narrowly avoided.

Last week, we had a workout called The Bear. Awesome! You may not know this, but I love bears. Really! When he posted the workout, I started thinking about what bear shirt I could wear - I have 6!

I chose the Easter Bear shirt. It's a good one. Anyway, The Bear involves moving from one lift to another - 5 moves x 7 rounds. It's confusing. But one of the moves is going from a back squat into a push press. That doesn't make a lot of sense, but I seemed to get it in the practice. Another woman and I both started with a 35 pound bar and did the first round. That was easy, right? We should move up to 45! So we put the weights on and I start the reps. For some reason, the second time through, I could not get that bar from a back squat to an overhead. I tried a couple times and I couldn't do it. Oh boy, here come the tears again. The thought of not being able to do a workout was not acceptable. It was only the second round. So I practiced that one move a few times and it started coming along. I finished that round and kept the same weight for the next. When I went to change my weights for the 4th round, I had a hard time figuring out the math in my head. That's when I realized that I wasn't lifting 45 pounds before; I had put a 10 on each side and I was lifting 55. 20 pounds was a big weight increase for that second round and I felt a lot better knowing it wasn't just me not being able to lift something, it was my inability to do simple addition.

Life has been more stressful lately because work has been more stressful. For work, I have a full-time job, a teaching gig, some freelance writing, and another company that I do projects for once in a while. That's 4 jobs. I don't do them all at the same time, but I guess I was trying to do three of them a couple weeks ago. It was a bit much. I love teaching, and unfortunately that's ending within the week. I'll teach again, but not until the fall. That will leave more time for other things and hopefully eliminate some of the stress. I don't know why I take on so much; maybe I think that if I don't, it won't be there when I need it. I know what it's like to have zero sources of income and I can't go back there. It's all about balance and handling the weight that you put on your bar. Sometimes, you miscalculate and lift more than you intend. With some practice and some focus, I'll get through my workouts confident that I can finish.