I'M NOT A SUPERHERO (and other middle-of-the-night ramblings)

I had to make a difficult decision today. As much as I wanted to compete in NY, I don't think it's a good idea. COULD I do it? Yes. SHOULD I do it? Probably not. As much as I like to pretend I'm superhuman and able to push myself beyond the limits of what is reasonable, deep down, I know that sometimes enough is enough.  Two shows two weeks apart is a huge drain on the body, and with a job as serious as mine, I can't afford NOT to be 'on' at work. As much as I'd like to be selfish and say, 'Heck, I'm gonna do what I want to do and I'll muddle thru the rest of my responsibilites somehow,' my conscience won't let me.
 
You see, I"ve been working nights. I HATE working nights ... for many reasons, but mostly because I don't like to be alone. At night? I'm IT. I'm the only doctor in the hospital. And, without getting into any complex medical blood-and-guts details, I've had some pretty wild stuff happen these past 2 nights.  Thankfully, even though I'm approaching the end of the diet, I still feel pretty good. I still have clarity of thought and plenty of energy.  When I got off work yesterday morning, however, I had to pause and ask myself 'what COULD have happened if I weren't 'all there' last night?' I don't even want to think about it, to be totally honest.
 
I like to sleep well when I get home from work. Sleep is one of my highest priorities in life, as a matter of fact. Maybe that sounds silly, but I freely admit it. Because, when I come home from a shift ... and I don't regret a single decision I made ... and don't have any 'should've/could've/would've' angst ... I sleep like a baby.  To me, there's very little more tortuous than tossing and turning and second-guessing myself and wondering 'if I'd only done XYZ instead of ABC, would things have been any different?'. Nope, I like to sleep.
 
I also consider myself lucky to have a job and co-workers that support my competition 'habit'. They don't understand it, to be honest, but they support it.  To them, I'm the bodybuilder who eats weird stinky food and is always dieting even though I'm 'skinny and don't need to diet'.  Shoot, these people knew I wasn't 'normal' from the time I hobbled into my job interview on crutches as a result of gymnastics-gone-bad ... yet they hired me and embraced me anyway. They have celebrated my birthdays with chicken, yellow mustard, and raw broccoli rather than cake and ice cream. They have even accomodated me when I broke my dominant hand so that not only could I continue working, but so that I could also enjoy my time off . (They  fashioned me a removeable cast so that I could go swimming in the Bahamas on vacay, then replaced it when I got back to the States ... LOL. (Shhh the orthopedic surgeon who was unfortunate enough to have me as a patient to this day STILL doesn't know about that one.)
 
So, in return to my patients and my co-workers, I feel the need to be at 100% every time I come to work. I can't work 2 days before a show, catch a catnap, then breeze into the JanTana spray room on my way to the stage. Nope, I need some time off beforehand to allow myself to be a bit fragile and scattered.  I'm not a superhero, after all.

- Sandi

Posted Mar 21, 2010 by Erik Ledin.
This entry is filed under Guest Blogs, Contest Prep, and IFBB Pros.