Well winter has finally hit us. And thanks to Crossfit I’ve been able to help push a few vehicles out of the snow and do all the shoveling without injured myself (okay, my roommate did most of the shovelling). With the weather changes I’ve been dragging my feet a little. Work just seems to be getting busier and busier, and planning for my upcoming trip isn’t leaving a lot of spare time to get to the box as much as I’d like. None of this is helping to keep me motivated either. And my nutrition has been majorly affected by all of these changes in the last little while.

Today we did a WOD that I’ve seen before. It was good to see something familiar, knowing that I wouldn’t struggle as much as the last time we did it.

Today’s WOD consisted of:

5 Reps on the minute, for 5 minutes of split jerks

3 Sets of max rep hand stand push ups

3 Sets of max reps of one of the exercises that were listed. I chose to go with floor press and tricep dips on the paralette bars

3 Sets of max reps of strict pull ups

Two days ago we did work on the split jerk and my triceps have been torched ever since. So today’s workout I knew would be interesting to say the least.

The split jerks were feeling pretty good, but then we got to the hand stand pushups. But before your amazed that I’m doing handstand push-ups let me stop you, I haven’t quite gotten there yet. They incorporate something that I have never been mentally ok with – being upside down. Instead I did pike pushups off a box, which is a great scaling alternative. I’m getting more comfortable with doing the teddy bear stands against the wall and I know that my upper body strength is continually improving, I just have this massive irrational fear of doing anything head first. This is a mental fight I’ve had for as long as I can remember. As a child, I couldn’t excel in gymnastics because I refused to do a cartwheel. I failed a level in swimming lessons because I refused to dive into the pool.

I know I just need to let go and get upside down. That being said, I don’t think it will happen overnight. I’m not even sure how this fear developed. I suspect it’s a repressed memory of being dropped on my head as a child, that’s what I’m going with anyway (sorry mom). Or it could have been the tumbles I’ve taken while riding horses over the years, but who knows?! Today my excuse for not doing a handstand was “I don’t want to fall on my head before going to work!”. Which, let’s face it, is a pretty good reason for staying upright when I don’t have the confidence that my “amazing” crossfit arms will support me. Even though 2 days ago they held 2 100 lbs split jerks over my head and I wasn’t worried about dropping the barbell on myself.

This is a conundrum to me, but I will continue to try and make these hand stand pushups happen……slowly.

-Robin