January 2015 - In January, I chose compassion, enough, and generosity as my guiding words. I went ice climbing at Smugglers Notch in Vermont which was a new location for me. I also headed to the Catskills at the end of January.
February - did ice climbing trips to Mount Washington Valley ice fest and to the Adirondacks -annual trips for me. I also started seeking answers to why I had a uterine fibroid and why mine was affecting me as badly as it was. I had been experimenting with different diets - cutting down on foods that had estrogen or might contribute hormones from inorganic pesticides, I sought the help of a professional nutritionist. I also started examining beliefs I had. A book recommended to me by several women, including a gynecologist, emphasized how a woman's emotions and beliefs are very much connected to her health. Hidden deep within my psyche, despite being a strong, driven woman who appeared comfortable in a man's world, I had grown up and continued to secretly believe (so secretly I didn't know it) in the shame of being a woman, of being a sexual person. It was something I had to contend with and examine. This uterine fibroid, not only made being a woman very difficult for me, it also was taking away something society values, my ability to conceive a child. I wanted to treat the fibroid like it was a foreign entity but like some diseases that don't have a cure, it was my own body, seeming to betray me. Perhaps it was a physical manifestations of something I'm in denial of. Of beliefs I do not acknowledge or something I don't accept about myself. I had to start uncovering these beliefs about myself.
March - The beginning of the month I snuck in a weekend trip to Alta Utah and was rewarded with several days of powder. I went on a week long backcountry ski hut trip in the Tetons. My menstrual cycle was scheduled to start at the beginning of the trip and I was nervous about how things would go. I had changed my diet according to a nutritionist, and in a little bit of disbelief started noticing that my periods were less painful, shorter, and less heavy. This trend was to continue. I decided yes to climbing Denali in June with one of my favorite climbing partners and mentor.
April - lots of training for Denali. My symptoms seemed to keep getting better.
May - more training. I would go to the new River Gorge and instead of rockclimbing I would put on my double mountaineering boots and go up and down the stairs at Kaymoor mines. I went to Denver to pre-acclimate and then to Crested Butte to Leadville. I was extremely thankful my work was flexible and allowed me to telework so I could be well-prepared for my expedition.
June - and I was off to Alaska! What a journey. I should definitely post a trip report on this blog.
July - coming back from Alaska I was immediately thrown into a very busy time at work. Working on proposals before my trip to Alaska, I returned to find out that some of my proposals had been awarded. In a short amount of time I was tasked to build six project teams, train and coach new hires, do the client work and additional proposals. I told my bosses at work I intended to go on another expedition in September to the former Soviet states of Georgia and Armenia. For Fourth of July instead of joining my friends rockclimbing in West Virginia and Kentucky, I found a deal to go to the Mayan Riviera in Mexico. I had a wonderful time catching up on sleep, soaking up sun, and relaxing.
August - I moved out of my mother's. I am still adjusting to paying five times the rent I'm used to.
September - what a contrast to go from living with my mother to living in an apartment by myself and then to having every meal with nearly 14 people every day for 17 days. I made lots of friends and lots of memories with those friends. This trip is still having an effect on me - and those connections I made help me realize how incredibly good a shared passion is for building community.
October - A little too enthusiastic about getting back into rockclimbing I pushed myself way too hard before I was conditioned for it. I am learning how training to be a mountaineer impacts being a technical rockclimber. I learned I'll have to be careful with my choices. I'm not going be an amazing backcountry skier, technical alpine rock climber, mixed climber, mountaineer, and ice climber in the same year without being bad at most of those things - or get injured trying. Right, guiding word - compassion - for myself.
November - Felt my energy come back. I didn't realize how fatiguing two expeditions and the amount of work I had taken on affected me. A prescription for physical therapy and realizing I couldn't even run due to pain motivated me to get healthy. I took two classes with two people I admire greatly. One was a workshop with Steve House and Scott Johnston, the authors of Training for the New Alpinism. They helped me understand how to build a training plan and more importantly assess where my fitness was and give me the tools to assess where I needed to build additional strengths and capacity. I took another clinic on ice climbing for two days with Will Gadd - literally a grandmaster of modern ice climbing. He help me learn new techniques reinforce lessons I should retain and was very kind about my injury.
December - cleared to start climbing again, I started making forays to the climbing gym. Even had a couple days planned to climb outside, but El Nino in the East meant that was not to be. Otherwise, I did sort of my year-end/beginning thing. Went to Ouray! This place has so much significance for me. It was one of my first trips after deploying a second time to the Middle East - a re-acculturation to the West again. And then I chose to live in Ouray one winter (2011) while jobless and learned to ski. I came back two years ago, and it reminds me of all the changes I've been making to my life, from the path set before for 20+ years to the way I'm trying to move this large ship that has become my life .. tossing things I don't need overboard, sacrificing other things that weigh me down, and trying to be aware of all the new things I feel and think about all these changes. Ouray reminds me I don't have to live on the course I thought was set for me when I was seventeen, or twenty-four, or even twenty-eight. Interacting with all the old friends and the new ones in this little mining and adventure town, who have chosen different paths themselves, reminds me life is full of possibilities, as long as I'm open to them.
December - cleared to start climbing again, I started making forays to the climbing gym. Even had a couple days planned to climb outside, but El Nino in the East meant that was not to be. Otherwise, I did sort of my year-end/beginning thing. Went to Ouray! This place has so much significance for me. It was one of my first trips after deploying a second time to the Middle East - a re-acculturation to the West again. And then I chose to live in Ouray one winter (2011) while jobless and learned to ski. I came back two years ago, and it reminds me of all the changes I've been making to my life, from the path set before for 20+ years to the way I'm trying to move this large ship that has become my life .. tossing things I don't need overboard, sacrificing other things that weigh me down, and trying to be aware of all the new things I feel and think about all these changes. Ouray reminds me I don't have to live on the course I thought was set for me when I was seventeen, or twenty-four, or even twenty-eight. Interacting with all the old friends and the new ones in this little mining and adventure town, who have chosen different paths themselves, reminds me life is full of possibilities, as long as I'm open to them.
