I'm not a lifter, but I know know about it. Spent many hours eyeballing form & technique on oly lifts for some friends who didn't have anyone else. Turns out that if you breakdown a good lift for me, I'm quick study & bust you on bad form or tell you to drop the bar bc I know you'll miss and receive on you're clavicles & moan all night. I even figured out which of my friends needed more weight to force better technique. Surprised us all being as if they BPing with just me in the gym & couldn't rack it, the best I could do was watch them roll it off, or call 911. Lots of people I know are competing or working at The Arnold this weekend. And if the crossfitter gets out of hand, I can translate.
My story is the typical had then it was gone story. Except it only felt that way to me, I'd crated a nice alternate reality for myself wherein I nothing connected, I just kept plugging away, doing more, working harder, longer, and occupying my life with busy. Trust no one, take care of yourself because no one else will. Meanwhile, in the real world, the medical people knew I was in denial, but no snapping out someone living there for for years, people who needed and wanted stuff loved me because I was dependable perfectionist who do for you then for me.
Always athletic and able to hold my own in any given sport, I had the invites & sponsorships that provided me with the needed gear for elite training camps and traveling teams. But I got the genetic leftovers. The intense training as kid/young adult didn't mix well with what I later discovered was a problem with my connective tissue causing all my joints to be lax. Picture Mel Gibson reducing his should dislocated shoulder--done it enough to teach people how to do it for me.
Still, that reality was easy to dismiss--shoulder pops out, put it back on, go on about day. No big. Had the operations (11 and counting), have the hardware, drink my water through port in my chest.
But now reality sits in my lap everyday. I'd be in the gym, telling someone to switch to one of the women's bars when learning how to DL for the first time because he couldn't manage to keep a straight back...completely miserable bc everyone was doing stuff I couldn't, complaining about how they felt. Yeah, I wanted that back. I miss feeling totally spent and miserably stoked after any max effort workout. The privilege to complain is how I saw it.
It's a brain injury now that pretty well has me fighting to go after the PVC training bar--and gait training to do the 5k, hopefully to compete again (yeah, I'll always be crutching the races, but I'll never take a head start; 6 months ago I finished obstacle race with more behind than in front & finished a little more than an hour after the winner, crutches and all)). The number of concussions I've had put me on par with NFL player from back in the day in terms of cognitive and neurological side effects. Most days I can't tell you tell you my full date of birth, but I can I still easily do certain things confound friends they attempt. Meds are killers and of the kind used for treating Parkinson's and dementia, to name a few. The hardware in my neck hurts, but can't come out.
So I get a little prissy sometimes. My brain messes with my ability to think correctly, feel normally, process things typically, control my body, and sometimes from wanting to give a damn about about the relationship woes of other people. Not fair to them. But I'm incredibly loyal and will give all I can, and because of my brain, sometimes I give too much, to whatever and whomever I care about and have a passion.
My life bar is set pretty low. Pisses me off. I want more. I don't just want to surprise people, I want to stun them. In that way, I can relate to the crossfitter. Don't know if that person does WODs Rx or scaled, but everything in life is scaled for me know and I want a few things more. I want the privilege to complain about training to PR at new weights.
