Sunday, October 31, 2010

BJJ Surgery #2 in T minus 1 day

MRI results are in...affirmative to the hip and shoulder labral tears. Blah, blah, blah. Nothing I didn't already know.

I can FEEL that there is something really really wrong. Don't we always know, deep down? My hip has been out of whack since at least January. And the shoulder was torn in February by a kimura at the ADCC Canada Pro Trials.

What are the odds that less than 2 years after my last shoulder surgery (also caused in a BJJ tournament), I would tear both my other shoulder's labrum (plus a little partial on the rotator cuff) AND the labrum of one hip? To top if off, I discovered this less than one month after FINALLY quitting my job! Good bye 2-a-days, hello weeks and months off training. Goodbye Nogi Worlds and training with Michelle Nicolini for a week, hello Tylenol, Prednisone, ice, and frustration.

Oh don't worry, it gets better - Jake Mackenzie is here training for 2 months, we will have blue and purple belt visitors from Canada, France, and others during the next month. Jeff Glover is supposed to come visit in December, and Ana Lowry and Murilo Santana are returning at Christmas. And I am stuck on the sidelines. :(

But wait, there's more...

There is one heck of an awesome women only tournament about to run in Hamption, VA sponsored by none other than CONVERSE and US Grappling! Sure, I can take my ladies but it would have been nice to be able to compete instead of showing up in a lot of pain and a sling.

Yet despite all of this, I am actually looking forward to going to sleep a little before 4:00pm on Tuesday and waking up around 6pm with my shoulder completely fixed. Believe it or not, I can't WAIT to go into surgery. I'm tired of my arm hurting 24/7, of being unable to even sit or lay down comfortably.

I filled my post-surgery prescriptions today and helped myself to 2 of the prescription strength anti-inflammatories. I can't take Advil and ice doesn't do much. But then, it doesn't seem that these meds are helping a lot either...

Soon the pain will start improving instead of worsening practically by the day.

Soon.

Then I will have to schedule my hip surgery. Hopefully, they can fit me in a few weeks before Christmas, so I'm off crutches by New Years.

Not likely, but I need a little hope right now.

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Nogi Pan Ams & My Upcoming Surgeries

First off, my JV field hockey team won their game on Thursday against their rival team in their division and it was so exciting! The girls played so well and I was very proud of them, not only for the progress they've made technically but mostly by the way they fought hard every minute of the game. To congratulate them, they earned Friday off!

And because of that, we decided to take an earlier bus to NYC for the Nogi Pan Ams. Ryan, Seph, Quang, Rick, and I hopped on the Vamoos bus from Rosslyn, VA to Penn Station, NYC. We should have left earlier though because we didn't arrive in NYC until 6 hours later on what should have been about a 4 hour ride. Exhausted, we checked into our hotel then went out looking for food. We found a fantastic diner right around the bend and (of course) ran into BJJ people Ryan knew from Ronin Athletics (his first jiu-jitsu school).

Our hotel was cheap...with a very good reason. It was creepy as hell and a little dirty. And for some reason the bathroom was over half the size of the actual room. But for the 5 of us it sufficed for a one night stay. We woke up early because it was 30 minutes to the tournament at City College in Harlem. (Can you believe that they actually made us go through metal detectors and checked everyone's bags - so it took a little extra time getting in?)

Andy was up first, he went one and one in his division. Then it was my turn. I warmed up with Ryan in the back - I always prefer to warm up with him when possible because I feel like I absorb his efficient and smooth movements. (I'm always struggling to move more like him. Although, he actually tells me I should move like Jeff Glover whenever he's correcting me. Lol!)

My first match was up against purple belt Melissa Biscardi. I've beaten her twice before back in 2008 but we'd missed each other in the brackets since then. And I knew she would be a tough competitor because she won the Worlds at Blue Belt last year (2009). But I was ready, focused, and aggressive enough to pull it out in less than 2 1/2 minutes.

Here's video of our match...



My second match (the semi's) was against a blue belt (our division was combined blue/purple). I was attempting to pursue on the feet and started to get frustrated as she ran away for a while (should have just pulled guard as it's hard to wrestle someone who doesn't want to). Anyway, I ended up over-pursuing in my frustration and she went for a guillotine, as I was getting out of it, I stumbled over my own feet...oops! Luckily, I was able to pull out an armlock within a few seconds though.

The third match was against the only other purple belt in the division and I knew she'd be tough as well having just watched her go through her first two opponents. Unfortunately, though I must have allowed my focus to wan and wasn't moving as quickly or as aggressively as I should. She pulled guard and I made it to half guard lockdown twice but wasn't able to secure a pass due to my own stupid passivity with my guard passing. She ended up catching me with a sweep I should have been able to stop. Although I managed to get a good closed guard, she didn't seem interested to really try to pass, in an effort to hurry, I shot a really poor triangle and ended up having to scramble as she went for my back. I managed to fight off the choke and eventually recover my guard...just in time for the end of the match. Ugh. I'm very disappointed in myself for fighting that way and have promised myself and my coach to do better next time. (It was disappointing day all around because all the other guys lost in their first rounds.)

However, exactly WHEN the next time I compete will be is up in the air right now as I found out today that I will likely need surgery for a labral tear in my shoulder AND for the same thing in my hip. The shoulder injury is from February's ADCC Pro Trials in Canada (I know, I know - February). And the hip has been nagging me since the end of last year. I thought yoga was helping but my hip was hurting me so much after this weekend that when I took Ryan to the Orthopedist today, I got an appointment for myself too.

The MRI's are scheduled for next week so I'll know more then. But it looks like 5-6 months recovery before I can compete again. :(