Ultimate Frisbee and I used to be best friends. I was one of the few women that played in our small college's mostly male intercollegiate team (apparently I'm not eligible for intercollegiate play anymore [alas getting old really does happen]). My living room at my old apartment was decorated with my large (and ever growing) frisbee collection. A disc is never more than an arms reach away for me, but unfortunately, I haven't been playing Ultimate in a very long while. Our friendship got strained by real life issues. Pick up games can be hard to find sometimes because of the number of people required (5+ on a team) and my schedule for the last few years has been, well, unpredictable so playing in a league has been out of the question.
After scouring the internet for hours, I found a pick up game that is fairly consistent and not too far away. Despite my fear of being wayyy to out of shape (isn't round a shape?) to handle the required running, I dusted off my cleats and walked to the park a few blocks from my house. There were many more people than I was expecting and the game was intense as always. But I survived. And felt amazing as I left.
There's something freeing to me about making a little piece of plastic fly. I forget about my diabetes. I forget about my schoolwork. I forget about my problems. It's enthralling and cathartic to run my heart out and make a Frisbee soar. I can feel the wind it feels (as crazy as it sounds). I missed it. I'm glad I didn't let a little anxiety keep me down. Or low blood sugars. Glucose tablets cure me (Thanks to my Dex for warnings!).
In addition to squeezing in an hour and a half (with breaks) of Ultimate, I managed to go rock climbing at a gym with one of my buddies from high school. He's learning for the first time, but I'm getting back into learning technique & balance so it's not a bad fit. We're trying to make it a regular thing. [In case you didn't know, my love of rock climbing is what lead to the name of the blog ;) ]
The silly thing about rock climbing and diabetes for me is that unless there's a 30 minute hike to where the climb is, I need more insulin to get my act together otherwise after one climb (aka 40-50 ft in my case), I'll be in the low 200s while I start in the low 100s. So after some experimenting (a la Ginger Vieira), I've learned that an extra bolus before I climb helps keep me in range. No lows while climbing = more fun!
Why do I love climbing? It doesn't quite make sense. I have a fear of heights, so I never look down on the view of a climb until I've done it at least once comfortably. There's something about the puzzle aspect (where do my hands and feet go exactly?) and the amount of finesse required to accomplish overcoming a giant wall that is extremely rewarding. I love the feeling of leaving all my energy on the wall. If I'm not tired by the end of a day of climbing, it wasn't fun. I forget about the D when I'm trying to solve a climb. My brain gets into the zone. Sooo much better than playing with equations all day long.
Sweatbetes 3X this week is a win. I'm trying to squeeze in some at-home stuff/school-gym stuff. Step 1: Gym bag with necessities in my car. I'll keep you all posted on how it goes.
No comments:
Post a Comment