It’s that time of the year again. You count your blessings, you are thankful for the wonderful people in your life, so you thank them before you start a new year of mistreating them. Just joking! But, I want to write a blog on the one thing in my life that I have been the most thankful for. That is kickboxing.

I started kickboxing when I was about 31. Joining a class was the best decision I ever took. Through the years, kickboxing has helped me become mentally and physically stronger. And then there was the one time that it saved me from being crippled.

I always loved martial arts. We did some karate at school. It was very basic and largely unmotivating. Most kids hated the class, but I remembered liking it. Fast forward.. to 31! I was a new mom of Tanya. As a new mom, I would have some strange notions and panic attacks every now and then. During one such moments, I remember getting stressed out about the fact that I was incapable of physically defending Tanya in case anyone attacked us. So, marshalling up my courage, I walked into an extremely mean looking gym called Titan fitness. They offered a free trial class in women’s kickboxing. After attending that, I never looked back. I was a proud member of Titan fitness.

I didn’t exactly fit in there. There were two reasons for that. Most of the other women were young, ranging from 13-25. The instructors made me feel a bit old (at 31!). Other than that, I was the only brown person there. Ok, no worries. I took to kickboxing like a fish takes to water. It was a blissful time. I soon felt in the peak of my health. And that was a very good thing, because dark times were around the corner.

A couple years later, I woke up one fine morning, paralyzed. My legs shook as I tried to walk to the bathroom. I was getting ready to go to work. Work was 2 hrs away and I usually left very early to make it there on time. I tried to climb into the bathtub. To my shock, I couldn’t lift my leg to get into the tub. That’s when I called in sick at work. By mid day, my condition worsened. At some moment, I got up to go to the next room, and fell down on the floor. That’s when we went to the hospital. I was wheeled in with a wheelchair.

The doctors had no clue what was wrong with me. But one doctor guessed it was Guillaine Barre syndrome. Say what?!! I just stared at her. Guillane Barre Syndrome (GBS) is an auto immune disorder where your immune system attacks your own nerves and leaves you paralyzed. One in 400,000 people get it. So I guess, I am one in 400,000! It’s not one in a million, but I’ll take it!

There is no way to diagnose GBS. But the doctor was convinced that this was what was ailing me. They airlifted me to Geisinger at Danville to continue treatment. Tanya was only three then! I remember the doctor came to see me when I was getting in to helicopter. She was gleeful about her diagnosis. I guess it was a high for her. I was also grateful to her for the diagnosis. I lay thinking, ok great! But now what?!

At Danville, they did some further tests to rule out MS. When they had ruled everything else out, they decided that they could treat me for GBS. They had a treatment called IVIG that they started. I responded to it! So they were on the right track. All I remember was laying on the bed and having hallucinations where I was floating around. Obama had just won the elections and I watched the news, trying to ignore the constant dread that I would never get up again. It would take me three or four tries to press a button on the remote, or the call button for the nurses. I do remember a kindly nurse. I was crying. He came and told me to be strong, and that I would get out of this! It’s amazing how I remember his kind words after all these years.

After nine days in the hospital, I was ready to be transported into a rehab facility. GBS had reversed, but my muscle strength was gone. However, I was definitely stronger than the time that couldn’t press remote buttons. I rolled over to the stretcher bed. The nurses were amused.

Once in rehab, the fight that I had learnt in kickboxing came back to me. The rehab was a very unmotivating place. Majority of the patients there were senior and unmotivated. The food was gross. I had to bury my head in a magazine to divert my attention from what I was eating so that I wouldn’t throw up. But I was determined to get better and ate every bite. I knew that once I got home, Tanya would come running and fling her body on my legs. I wanted to be able to stand when she did that.

The rehab was memorable. I pestered all the physical therapists to give me exercises to do in my off time spent in the room. They had rarely met a motivated patient before. But they supported me. I specifically remember one young African American physical therapist. She was new there. She and I had a bond. She understood my drive and pushed me hard. In nine days, I was able to be strong enough to leave.

A recovery from zero requires one to be tough mentally. But I knew I was in the best frame of mind to do that. After all, I had been kickboxing. Whenever I was disheartened, I would cling to my kickboxing. I vowed that I would get back to kickboxing. That became my goal. Two quotes inspired me. One was written on my gym wall at kickboxing. “Absorb what is useful — Bruce Lee”. This is my life mantra. The second was at the rehab place. “You are like a teabag. You never know how strong you are until you are in hot water.” So true.

Once home, my recovery was a lot faster. In a few months, I was back to kickboxing. Weakness persisted, but I fought it, and finally, bit by bit, overcame it. But I still feel under confident when walking on a steep hill. The weakness from that time flashes across my mind. But these are very rare. My recovery is full.

I continued kickboxing for many years. I can’t remember exactly when I stopped it. But I had Leena and had to pause it. Later in life I had an ACL tear from a fall. That was a miserable and extremely painful experience. The recovery was painful, and the doctors warned me to take it easy. I didn’t want to risk a re-tear and so I hung my gloves. I was sad to lose my best friend, kickboxing.

Fast forward to now. I am even older. At the ripe old age of 47, something interesting happened. My girls are now 18 and 12, and I wanted them to be involved in sports. I always wanted them to learn kickboxing and told them over the years to sign up. They never did. Finally I put my foot down and signed them up for a free lesson at a gym named CPAMMA. We arrived at the designated time and the girls signed in for a free lesson. I said, “what the heck. Sign me up too!”. So we took our free lesson. That was in July. This is December. We have been going to kickboxing regularly.

I love watching my girls kickboxing. They swing their legs with the grace of youth. I don’t think I have that anymore. But I have good posture and technique and can still do very well. My previous concerns of an ACL re-tear are no longer there. I realized that as long as I stick to the correct stance, it’s pretty safe. That means, not stress my knee. It works just fine. I find that I can’t raise my leg as high as my girls, but my current goal is to kick higher.

I also noticed one thing. Your instructor matters. While at my old gym, I was made to feel old at the age of 31, at the current gym, there is no such feeling. There are a couple of older women than me. But most importantly, the women instructors create a more positive space as opposed to the previous male instructors who created a more macho environment. I first thought, oh, this must not be as good as the other one, since they are not pushing harder. But I was proven wrong very elegantly by the ladies. We have been taught a range of techniques that I never learnt in all my years at the previous gym. This proves what I always knew. Women create a better environment, and gently push to get to levels that will exceed what men do with their macho techniques. It’s lovely to be a part of it.

As for my personal journey, I am thankful that kickboxing is back in my life. Older women develop osteoporosis, and I believe that staying on top of rigorous exercising combined with good diet can help avoid it. This hypothesis will be proven right or wrong with time. But, as of now, I am back to living my best life mentally and physically. Thank you kickboxing!

Kylo Ren the dog: Now, hold on mom! No signing off yet. I rarely get to blog nowadays. I will have to insist that I add to each blog from now onwards. So yes, I am aware that the ladies have been kickboxing. How? You may ask. Because, they tried some of their moves with me. ME! I guess they forgot that I am supreme leader Kylo Ren, grandson of Darth Vader, son of Leia (and Hans Solo too, though I killed him, ulp!). Anyway. So they made me sit and did their punches in the air. That was fine. But then they kicked in my direction. I wasn’t having it. I playbit them and jumped on them to air bite around their jaws. That took care of it! They haven’t been doing any of that anymore.

The other day, Tanya and Leena started grappling. My eyes popped out! Now, I don’t care who starts the fight. I intend to finish it. Since Tanya is my age and Leena is a baby, I naturally assumed that Tanya was the guilty party. So I went after her, jumping, play biting and pushing her off. Their grappling didn’t last long!

The only thing that I don’t like is that they refuse to recognize my supreme leadership, and instead dissolve into bunches of “Awww, he is so cute!”, and hugs that I then have to wrestle myself out of. Guess I am also getting good at grappling!

Crazy Cookie the chicken: Yee haw. (Comes flying from across the room, one leg pointed out, and the other curved, wings tight, kungfu style). Heh heh. I landed a paw on Kylo Ren’s cheek. He tried to go after me, but then got scolded by the girls and they have taken him away!

To begin my story for the day, brr, it’s cold out. We poor ladies have had to negotiate the snow. Luckily Leena has been supplying us with hot water ever so often. That keeps us going. But it’s definitely a cold winter.

Today there was a cat in our backyard. We were a bit worried about our safety but Kylo Ren took care of it. He chased the cat hard. The cat ran, and the bunny ran, and we ran. Kylo was a bit confused at all the sudden action, but the end result was that the cat is gone, hopefully for good!

In other yard news, Leena filled the bird feeders with bird feed. As usual, the squirrels started eating everything. But these days the humans have come up with a new technique. They open the window and squirt water on the squirrels with a water gun. The squirrels would jump off and drop bunches of bird feed on the ground as they did so. Wow, a dinner and a show! The girls and I have been getting some fun out of that.

Have a merry Christmas my dear friends.