This bites, but it was necessary.  I know all about doing what’s necessary…I’m a realist and in the end, if something’s bad for me, my kids, my life, I’m going to to cut it out of my life.

And I had to say goodbye to taekwondo.  Some people are probably wondering what the big deal is, but I’ve been working toward getting my black belt off and on for 12 years and more seriously for the past four years…minus the time I had to take out when the baby bratlet decided to be born and all that.

So it bites, in a big way, to admit to myself that it isn’t going to happen.   The issues with my hands and arms aren’t as bad (consistently) as they were a few months ago, before I started with modifying how I did things, cutting back or changing my exercise program, changing how I write, how I sleep, going to the chiro, wearing braces, how I sit…seems like like fricking thing.

They aren’t as bad and over the weekend, I wondered if maybe I could try easing back in.  But a brief mini-workout at home gave me the answer and it wasn’t one I liked.   It got reiterated when I woke up on Wednesday and spent the next six hours feeling pins and needles in my arms–hadn’t done a lick of work at that point and I was in agony–all frickin day.  This problem isn’t going away.  I’ll learn to manage it and I’ll learn to deal with it, but it’s not going to go away.

Unfortunately, TKD is just too high impact and that black belt I want so fricking bad is going to require things of my hands and arms, certain movements and speeds that sadly are either too hard for me to do or they put me into too much pain after.  Anything of a high impact, anything with a lot of repetition sets things off and practicing for a belt is a lot of repetition and when it comes to higher ranks?  A lot of impact.

It sucks.  It bites.  It blows.  It’s unfair to nth degree as far as I’m concerned-I’m 33 years old and I have to give up something I love, something I really, really wanted.

But on days when the classes were harder than others, the next day, the pain made it hard to work.  Then I’m stressing, and I will tell you one thing that is not at all conducive to writing.

STRESS.

Certain kinds of stress aren’t bad…the Oh, man is my agent going to like this…oh, man, my editor is waiting for this…oh, man 50 something books in and I still haven’t been able to hit the fricking best seller lists…those will push me harder.

Being pissed off doesn’t do it for me, though.  Being frustrated.  And being in pain?  Doesn’t do it one bit.

I’d be crabby, cranky and stressed and I finally decided… I can’t keep doing it.  I was ignoring all the signals my body was sending me, I was forcing my body to do things that was making the pain worse and even though I knew better, I kept trying to do it anyway, and I finally realized it had to stop.

I wanted to see that black belt.  I wanted it…TKD’s almost been the passion for me as an adult that writing was when I was a kid, but I’ve got to give it up, and without getting that belt, too.  Even though I really, really wanted it, and even though I worked for it-I can’t do it. So I’m letting it go.  Maybe in a few years, I can slow down on my writing schedule and take the time I’d need to focus on it long enough to try once more to test, and just shove the pain aside.  Maybe…maybe not.

Not getting something you want in life really sucks.  Not getting something you worked for in life sucks even more.  But that is just how life pans out sometimes.