New Plan

I had a plan.  It was a good plan.  It was a smart plan.  It was a good, smart plan.  I was going to become a real person, I was going to fully enter society, I was going to become self-sufficient, I was considering leaving #athletelife behind.  But then I was offered something I couldn't turn down, if I did I would always look back and wonder "what it?"  So now I sit in a new room in a new house in a new country where the dream I though was dead has been resuscitated.  It was difficult to wrap my head around at first, this new opportunity that I wasn't sure I'd earned, and yet I felt I couldn't refuse.  And so once again I commit myself to the sport I've poured so much of myself into but this time, just for a second, it seems to be giving me something back in return.

2015-2016 Season in Review

When I think back on this past season it's kind of hard to quantify since it was so different than previous years and I didn't compete in the same competitions that I normally do so I have very little to compare it to.

Andy Young SunPulse 

The first kind of 'bigger' competition I skated this season was the Inter-Continental at the Oval in Calgary.  Calgary invited a bunch of international skaters to compete and a select number of the Oval Program skaters got to compete against them.  For me this competition went spectacularly terrible.  It was a complete train wreck.  Because of where we were in the training period I felt exhausted and I was so tired that I felt physically unable to do my normal passes and strategies because I simply didn't have the energy in my legs.  I became very frustrated and very upset because I felt that I was skating so bad and I was embarrassed that people would think that was how I skated and I didn't feel like myself.  I think I only had one race that I could feel even a little bit good about that I managed to pull off through sheer will and anger but that was kind of taken away from me when I heard that someone I trusted and had depended on in the past for support and advice in skating had said something pretty hurtful during and after that race.  After that competition I was so hurt and upset and in such a bad place that I just wanted to be done.  I just didn't want to feel the way I was feeling anymore and I think that if I hadn't already booked plane tickets for later in the season I might have just packed up and gone home.

Instead of skating the Canadian circuit this season I went and trained with Great Britain's national team for three weeks, something I was able to do since I have British citizenship through my dad.  While I was there we travelled to Sweden to compete in a Star Class competition.  By that point I was feeling a lot better about my skating although it took me a long time to feel confident racing again but it was nice to compete against a field that was almost all people I didn't know and who didn't know me.  It felt like there was no pressure and no expectations of me so I was more free to try things and not be so stressed out.  In some races I feel like I could've finished higher or done better but I came out of the competition with a third place trophy and I didn't cry once so I'm putting that one in the win column.

It's the end of this season that feels the most weird for me because I really didn't have a big end of year competition like I have had in the past.  I skated Winterfest, the final competition at the oval where I had some decent results and some good races and then I was done.  I think I had some good experiences this season and some good races but it is a little difficult to tell since I don't have any results to compare to previous seasons.  This season I really wanted to get a new 500 time and unfortunately that didn't happen but I'm happy with the skating I did nonetheless because I feel that although I didn't get any faster times I got a lot better and more confident in my racing.

Thoughts On Loneliness

I've always been comfortable hanging out with myself.  I don't mind spending time alone, in fact, there are some days that I look forward to the nights when all my roommates are out and I get the house to myself.  Something I didn't fully understand until more recently is the very real difference between being alone and being lonely.

I always had a lot of friends growing up.  I made friends easily and I have a bit of a need to be liked so I got along with most people but I also always had a core group of really close friends.  In high school I could probably call any one of my close friends and within ten minutes we'd be at the movies or at one of our houses.  These are people that I felt I could go to with almost anything and they wouldn't judge me although most of the time all I needed was to sit on a couch in a basement and watch movies to make me feel better.  I still feel like I could always go to my high school friends for support but it's different now mostly because we all live in different places and have other responsibilities.

I have friends in Calgary but almost all of them I've made through skating so there are days where after spending all day training with them you don't necessarily want to keep hanging out with them since training for any sport is a very high pressure and emotional environment.  Most of the time I feel fine; I have friends here, I have family but all those people have other friends or boyfriends that they go to with the important things.

I didn't feel like I was justified to feel lonely because I do have friends, my parents are very supportive, and I live with my cousin and my little sister so I literally have built in friends that are there all the time.  What makes it hard for me is that I don't have someone I can go to in person that is there just for me that isn't already involved in almost everything I do, and anyone that I would have gone to in the past I would have to try to reach on the phone or online somehow.  I am very content until I have to start making big life decisions or something happens that I wish I had someone outside of my skating bubble to talk to and I feel silly to reach out and talk about such serious things with people who are so far away when really all I need is to sit on a couch in a basement and watch movies.