New Challenges

In a perfect world I would be able to skate and train full-time and give 100% of my attention to it.  Unfortunately I don't live in that world and I have to plan for my life after skating so during the fall/winter I have to do school part-time even though it might not seem like a priority right now.  I'm very lucky that my parents support me enough that (along with my provincial funding) I don't have to work during the school year but speed skating is a very expensive sport when you factor in the equipment, the oval program fees, and the travel expenses that I am responsible for not to mention regular expenses like food, rent, and school.

My first summer in Calgary I didn't work (in Calgary I worked at home before I moved) because I moved so late in the summer, the second summer I was back and forth between home and Calgary too much to work but once I started to get even more serious about summer training I was spending all but about two weeks in Calgary so this summer I'm balancing full-time training and a part-time job.  I am well aware that this may make me seem spoiled but it is impossible to work without missing any training since training tends to take up the whole day and that stresses me out.  I need the money, I like my job (so far at least it's been a week) but I worry about missing training and ending up behind where I could be and behind my teammates.  I'm realizing more and more lately that skating is not going to be something I'm going to do forever, that I need to think about and prepare for a life after skating one day but I'm not ready to give it up yet and I want to make sure I can quit (some day, not soon) knowing that I've done everything I could have and without any regrets and right now I feel like missing important summer training could end up being a regret.

I'm hoping I can sort everything out so I can do all my training but right now I'm just feeling anxious about the whole thing because I don't want to let my coaches down, I don't want to depend on my parents for everything, I don't want to make my work angry and I don't want to skate badly next season.