So, here’s what’s up …

Lately, I’ve been posting video updates on my stretching journey towards the splits. However, ever since I aggravated my hip injury, I’ve had to sideline my efforts to get into the splits and just try to heal and get comfortable again.

(Note: the stretching I was doing did NOT cause my hip injury. I had the injury already and it just flared up again. Doing stretching now, though, is definitely exacerbating it.)

So, I’ve been thinking, how I can use this time instead?

I still want to do progress reports, because, well, one, it motivates me, and, two, I think it can be helpful to hear the real ups and downs of our path towards flexibility and grace and strength and all the other things we strive for in our pole dancing.

So, what I’ve come up with is to continue to use these posts to show what I’m working on and where I’m stuck, but not confine them solely to progress on stretching. I also thought I’d toss in a bit of video of my dancing, so you can see how I’m getting on.

Assuming Youtube doesn’t block it.

Where I Am Now

Bizarrely, the more my hip bothers me and the less stretching – and sitting – I can do, the more I’m enjoying dancing. This could be due to the joy of having my uterus back, or maybe I’m just responding to all the sunshine. No matter, it feels like a rediscovery, and I’ve been loving it!

I’m taking a much easier workout schedule right now. I do my physical therapy stretches a few times a day – trying to balance out my hips, so working a lot on hamstrings and adductors, doing fiendish little exercises using musculature I lack entirely. But less stretching until I get over the flare-up.

Naturally, the less I aggravate the injury, the more fun it is to move – and the more fun it is to dance.

I’ve never been one of those insanely driven types of pole dancers, the ones who pole for hours and hours each day. I admire them and love their moves, but my body isn’t built for that. So, I do a nice workout once or twice a week, with lots of dog walking and my freakish hip exercises in between, and so far, so good.

I can see myself getting stronger and it’s fun to know how much longer I can hold certain moves and how many more spins I can do before I’m wiped out – especially how many more reps I can do of my ab exercises.

(Note: This is a lie. I can’t do any more ab reps than I ever could, although they are getting easier.)

This is where I would normally post a video of myself stretching and dancing and having a lot of pole dance fun.

But that’s not going to happen today.

And not for any good reason.

I mean, I can’t say it’s because my webcam broke or because I twisted my ankle. I can’t say that I’ve been called away by NASA to help with the space station or that I’m doing top-secret work for a group of philanthropic con artists.

No, it’s all far more prosaic than that.

I’m just tired. And I ate too many cherries. And had a fight with my dog. (We made up.)

But all is not lost.

I am not leaving you sans video enticements. So, today, we step out of our pole-centric universe and witness one of the most awe-inspiring, jaw-dropping performances of our time. Prepare to be amazed!

What would your pole progress report look like this week?

P.S. (Wasn’t that dance AWESOME?!?)