Back at the beginning of September, I had an exploratory/diagnostic surgery. I'm okay. The doctors didn't find anything, but even though they didn't find anything I still had to go through a recovery process.
My body is, well, my body. Fasting and surgery are not particularly easy things for anyone to deal with, but can be particularly dangerous for me. Despite doing everything I could to look after myself and mitigate bad reactions, the first day or so after surgery were still incredibly rough for me. I always struggle to wake up out of anaesthesia, but this time I spent maybe the first twelve hours struggling to keep my eyes open. The next morning though I was in so much pain, both from the gas they'd pumped into my body to look around and from early stage muscle breakdown from not getting to eat much. Even though the doctors didn't find anything, I still had to heal the incisions. It took me maybe four weeks before I felt like I could do some actual light exercise again. My core was really tired and sore. I noticed that there was some muscle wastage happening in my legs already.
The hardest part about this entire experience was not the rebuilding of strength, but the mental toll it takes. I come up against this a lot in my climbing generally. I have an aversion to getting hurt/taking risks that's really only popped up since I wasn't allowed to exercise for a while over six years ago. When I wasn't allowed to climb or do any exercise I was in such an emotionally low point. Then when I came back to climbing there were two mental blocks, one: dealing with being weaker than I was before I got sick and two: being afraid to injury myself and have to sit out again. I've done a lot of work to deal with the first issue, but the second block still came up during this recovery process.
So what did I do?
Genuinely, the only way I know how to deal with it now is to go slowly, but push through. I've been finding the gym an increasingly overwhelming place. I feel like I have to be switched on and social. It's hard to be in a bad mood if other people are around. Not in the sense that it prevents my bad mood, but that I feel like I need to be happy and positive all of the time.
Since the surgery, I've made it back to the gym maybe once a week. There aren't any competitions to train for and my body is still struggling with other stresses. I've hardly been on the wall because everything is complaining in a way that I'm not mentally prepared for. I know how to keep my body conditioned now though, so that's what I focus on. Mostly this is making use of yoga practice, stretching, and some strength training. Doing some strength sessions with the team at Pinnacle has really been wonderful. I've had a different, non-surgery related setback recently, but I'll be getting back into a morning strength sessions soon enough.
I think it's okay to take breaks and sometimes the best thing we can do for our recovery is to really step back. I'm not rushing back onto the wall because I know it's going to do more damage than good. I am trying to find time to get outside when I can instead.
Recovery doesn't have to happen in the gym and it is just going to take the time it's going to take.
