Yesterday was a recovery day. It’s so funny how when you are aware of your inner conversation, you are aware of where you have gone wrong in the past. Recovery is one of those things that I always seemed to get wrong. I thought that if I wasn’t doing something every day and sometimes multiple times a day, I was not caring about my goals. I would push until my body stopped me by getting sick or injured. I kept trying to push and push myself. I seemed to be able to push myself much more when I was younger. Now I’m just not able to push like I had before.

My body is getting stronger. I can do more push ups, hold my plank longer, and do more lunges.  I did notice that in addition to my legs getting stronger and being able to do more lunges, my knees began to hurt more. Oh the creaks, oh the creaks. It is not a fun place to be in when your formerly healthy non creaking knees start sounding like an old door. I started drinking collagen to help. It is supposed to be tasteless, it is not, not at all. I digress. When I saw the acupuncturist the other day, he worked on my knees. Sometimes the needles don’t hurt at all and other times, oh my word, I want to jump off the table. When the needle went into the spot that was hurting, I about jumped off the table. After my time was up with the needles, came the cupping. High profile athletes use cupping for recovery and that was exciting. I’m coming to a point where I get to have my knees cupped for recovery. The cups felt amazing on my knees. He only leaves them on for about 5 minutes but I could have left them on for 30 minutes it felt so good.

When I was done and on my way home, I had this feeling like my body telling me to rest. I sat with it for a while to see if it was a situation that I didn’t want to do anything or if it was truly wanting rest. My body was like, it is time to rest. I first got irritated and then I said no, “my body is giving me strength, it wants rest so I will give it rest. I just let myself be for the day yesterday and it was nice. I learned yesterday that recovery isn’t weakness, it’s giving your body what it needs.

I know my experiences are different and that’s okay. I’m learning to love what I see in the mirror and give myself permission to give my body what it needs. I also started fascia blasting again as part of my recovery which is also very exciting. Blasting breaks up bound fascia in your body and promotes healing and recovery. I’m excited to be blasting again. Being nicer to myself is feeling good, sometimes odd, but good. I’m also learning that although I’ve always wanted to see quick external changes, it’s the changes I’m seeing on the inside that is what matters.

*Part of the fascia blaster regimen is  bruising as it is bring healing to areas of your body. They don’t look good but they don’t hurt. So if you see me, I will be having bruising on my body and its completely normal. All is well at the casa. 🙂