I Quit!

I haven't been honest with anybody lately.

Everyone asks if I'm having fun at practice. I always say I am. This is an all-out bald faced lie. I am miserable every second of every practice. It's two hours of physical and mental battering.

I used to miserable for part of practice, but not the entire thing. It is hard work, and my body does protest. I'm not going to pretend that skating through foot cramps, back pain, muscle aches, and trembling legs is a party. It was, however until recently, extremely rewarding. Every practice I could feel improvement. It was happening faster than I thought it would. I could skate faster for longer. I learned new skills. Every practice ended with me feeling spent, but empowered.

That has all changed. My endurance has taken a nose dive. I can skate fewer laps than I could a month ago. I can't make it through the warm up. I can't hold a plank, even sissy style. Forget about honing my skills to retake the test. I am farther from passing it than I have ever been.

Twice a week I drive to practice all excited. I am going to push through. I will keep skating no matter how tough it gets. I am building endurance. This is a good thing. Today will be awesome.

Then practice starts. Five laps into the warm up, my legs shakes and my back aches. I breath fire. I bail out of the warm up drill, unable to complete it. I try to keep skating around the outside of the track, but it is sometimes all I can do to stand still on my skates. I fight against my desire to sit down. It's not so much that my body hurts as it is that I can't make it move. The mean girl in my head starts in. "You're never going to be able to do this. You're never going to be able to do this." The girl in my head gets louder as practice continues, as I struggle and fight and still must sit occasionally. Every practice ends with the exercise of holding back my tears until I make it to the car.

Today I admit defeat.

The new girl practice starts out promising but quickly slides southward. It consists of me and the one other new girl. You know - the one that's been skating for like two weeks and is ready to pass skills. We have the second track all to ourselves today.

Our warm up is laps. We are told to take ten laps each direction. Awesome! I really want to get some plain old fashioned skating in. I also need to work on my crossovers. This is so much better than trying to run warm up drills with the big girls.

Except it's not.

I struggle early. After the first five laps I'm already hurting. I'm not getting the hang of crossovers. By the time we switch direction, I can barely see anything except the track in front of me. Skate. Skate. Skate. Skate. I fudge the last lap, since they're waiting on me anyway.

As practice continues, I slide into despair. Everything is a haze of exhaustion and pain. Why am I putting myself through this? I'm only causing myself pain and disappointment. What's making it worse is we are running the best new girl drills ever. We take turns pushing then pulling each other around the track. This kind of thing is super fun, but all I can think of is how sick I feel. And, of course, how I'm never going to be good enough.

Finally I get to the last straw. We are to do five laps while leaning on each other. This is an awesome exercise, and it can help my stability. There's no way, however, that I can do five laps. We set out, and the other new girl, bless her heart, is encouraging me and trying to help push me along. I can barely see. I hear myself say out loud, "I can't do this anymore. I can't do it.". I repeat it over and over. She tells me we can get through it; just keep going. My feet are lead. My lungs are fire. I'm miserable. I simply will never be able to do this. Why do I continue to come here and kill myself?

Harmony yells that we need to pick up the pace. At this, 'm done. I'm out. I'm finished with the heat and the pain, with struggling to conquer something I will never master. Tears sting my eyes, blurring my vision further as I tell Harmony I'm going home and skate over to my bag. I pack my bag, openly weeping but trying not to burst into sobs. I sling my bag over my shoulder and head to the door.

I turn to take one final look back. Practice continues. Girls skate and stop, laugh and sweat. I hear their voices as they call out to each other, the rolling of wheels, the grinding of stopping, the clatter of pads hitting the floor.

This is the place where I was part of something special.

I get to my car and sob uncontrollably for a while. I am heartbroken. This place has been my place of misery, exhaustion, and defeat. I don't belong here. Why does the knowledge that I will never come back absolutely reduce me to shreds? I can't explain it. You'd think it would be a relief.

It's with a very heavy heart that I head home and end my time with Roller Derby.