Athlete?

When I was at the pain doctor last week I was telling him about the wonderful job I did when I was younger of abusing my body.  I was a ballet dancer for 14 years (ages 2-16, until I broke my knee) and I added jazz dancing in there somewhere before the teen years.  He said something, but all I heard was "blah, blah, blah.... athlete... blah, blah, blah."  An athlete?  Nobody has ever called me an athlete.  Those are people who run and throw things, or do something involving water, but me?  Well, darn it, he's right!  When I think about it, I recognize how harsh I was to my body.

I can hear you -- you're asking "but Jen, I thought you said you've struggled with weight issues your entire life?"  My answer to that is: it's true.  It also goes to show that you can exercise endlessly and still have weight problems.  I have to add in here, and my fellow band geeks will agree, marching band is not for the weak!  My band was competitive and marched at each football game all season long, as well as in parades.  By the end of a 10 minute field show, you're sweating and out of breath!  Oh, and the sweat wasn't only from heavy polyester uniforms and hats, though the show wouldn't have been the same if we weren't half covered in bright pumpkin orange.  We WORKED to pull off a field show.

I look back at my weeks during high school and have NO idea how I got anything done, let alone done half well.  Band met every morning at 7am (and this was all year long) so we ran through the field show at least once and usually more than once.  During marching season (i.e., football season for the rest of the world) we rehearsed two nights a week and had games on Friday nights (it was a blessed weekend when the game was Saturday morning!).  Two evenings a week I headed off to the dance studio - once for ballet, once for jazz.  Two nights band, two nights dance, one night football game.  There were my weeknights.  Ahhh, to be young.

So yes, I was an athlete.  Even I'm shocked to hear it!