I've been a little quiet...World Championships

I have been a little quieter than I would have hoped to be but there are two big reasons for this.  The first has been that over September I started writing a book, so all my writing efforts seem to have been concentrated there!  I am just over half way through now with just over 30000 words written and I haven't been writing every day.  Really excited about getting it finished now, it has opened up a lot of things that I experienced before and brought a lot of memories back - some good and some not so but overall the process has been quite therapeutic for me. 

The other thing that has been dominating a lot of my time and energy has been preparing for the World Championships.  And it is nearly here!  In the early hours of Monday morning we set off for Taranto, Italy to compete.

It has been a long and intense training camp.  I have had some little set backs along the way both in terms of injury and also some Asperger's related issues.  It has been tiring.  My ability to focus on other things always seems to be greatly compromised when I am in training like this.  I don't connect as well with the people in my life and they start to feel neglected.  It is also more difficult to manage all the different roles I fulfil such as with my business, so my social media presence has also been less over this period.  I don't feel like I ever get the time to sit and talk to people either online or offline.

But I have enjoyed every second of training and felt alive.  Well aside from not having certain things in my diet but that's just part of the game.  I know for sure that when we come back from Italy I will have a big gap in my life where training was and all my team mates that I have seen practically every day for the last few months.  These training camps are something bigger, the bond between all of us grows so strong even though we compete as individuals.  We all share a common goal, a common love and passion for our sport.

We had a little run out a couple of weeks ago at the FSK British Championships where we were given itineraries and our new kit for the Worlds.  I won my category in spite of some major sensory struggles that day.  I almost thought at one point that I may not be fighting but managed to hold it together enough to compete.  It has been a long time since I have felt it that badly in a competition environment and I knew once I fought I would feel at least marginally better.  I might have felt awful off the mat but fighting I felt great, better than I have for a long time.

And now a week before we set off to Italy, I know I have done all I can.  I am as fit as I could get through my training, I'm in as good condition as possible and I am ready - mentally and physically.  It won't be easy, it never is but I have trained for this, my whole team has trained for this and now this moment is ours to enjoy, relish and look back on over years to come.  To be able to say we did it, we trained hard and loved every moment because win or lose this is what it is all about.  And no matter where we are in the world, what we do, what we achieve or whether our futures see us all together again, for this moment now we are a team, we are as one and we are experiencing this together.  Let's do this team BCKA and show the world who we are.

I have had so much help and support into getting where I am now from all kinds of different professionals in helping me prepare and also in many kind people helping me raise the funds and donating to the cause to be able to do this.  To all of you, whatever role you have played, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Busy August - Clients, Books, Award Nominations

The month of August was completely hectic for me.  I set out with good intentions to blog regularly and do so much more but life just seemed to get in the way.  For a start World Championship training with my team at the BCKA started and for me this happened to coincide with a steroid injection into the back of my ankle for retro-calcaneal bursitis.  This instantly set my training back as I was unable to do any weight bearing exercise for a week!  So while all my team mates were running, sparring and doing padwork I was sat on the floor stretching and corework and then doing some cardio on the bike when I got in.  Overall I didn't cope too badly with this period but there have been moments where I felt intensely frustrated and also paranoid about injuring my ankle further.

Over August I ran a special offer within my business and saw an increase in weekly clients, which of course took up more of my time.  I also filmed for a Red2Green project talking about Asperger's and my journey to success.

I also decided that for some reason I didn't have quite enough to do and that now would be the perfect time to start writing my book.  So I am well into my first couple of chapters writing a book about my story and experiences which have led me to this point.  

Then my instructor told me I had been nominated for a Martial Arts Illustrated Hall of Fame award!  So overall August was a pretty good month, aside from the ankle problems.

Kickboxing & the BCKA

I have been kickboxing with the BCKA since I was 13 and its fair to say it is more to me than just my passion.  Now there are plenty of people who have a passion for kickboxing and also for other things and some of these people achieve great things in whatever their chosen passion happens to be.  However for me kickboxing is what has given my life meaning, purpose and structure over the last decade.

It's widely known that people with Asperger's often have some kind of special interest - this will be a subject they have intense fascination over whether it just be factual information they collect or something they are exceptionally gifted in, whichever they are so fascinated they can acquire great levels of expertise, proficiency and even genius in the subject.  They are able to dedicate great levels of concentration and focus on just that one thing.  I have never had any interest in surfing and won't pretend to know a lot about it but someone on my massage course last year mentioned this surfer, Clay Marzo and a documentary film made about him and suggested I had a look at it.  Clay Marzo has Asperger's Syndrome and he is an amazing surfer.  The documentary tells about his surfing and his experience of Asperger's Syndrome and I have included a clip below reviewing the film.  

“This movie will inspire people to live in the moment and to always take the time to look a little deeper. People are amazing and you never know what is behind their eyes,” – Strider Wasilewski (Quiksilver Surf Team Manager)

 

In the clip above where Clay says that for him being in the water is where he feels at home, I can honestly say that for me when I am fighting is when I feel completely relaxed.  Kickboxing is like my escape from the rest of the world and without it I am totally totally lost.  You see when I am around other people I can't relax fully, to integrate with others requires a lot of work and a lot of energy on my part, I also have some concentration problems and like to do everything to a perfectionist level so when I try to get normal day to day things done this too can be a struggle.  I look at it as having to put in extra effort to get things done and this can be really draining to keep up.  Then there is also the problem with stress.  I can't always recognise when I'm getting stressed and I don't know how to deal with my stress, other than to fight.  Kickboxing takes care of my stress and comes so naturally to me that it is a relief in a world where most things don't.

I have had periods over the last couple of years where I have been injured and unable to train.  When I am unable to train fully it kills me.  That statement might seem a bit melodramatic and it is true that any athlete or sports person would be severely irritable when faced with time on the sidelines but you put that with Asperger's and the effect is multiplied by 10, at least.  I am a nightmare to live when I can't train because it hurts me not to train, more than I could ever show anyone, its not a punishment it is torture.  I like to have a purpose to everything and with not training I don't feel as though I have one.  Training is not just part of my routine, my daily routine is built around my training and to lose some routine is not good for me but to lose the foundations of my routine is disastrous.  I become highly anxious, highly stressed and this is even worse if I can't exercise in any shape or form to help me manage these feelings.  In a matter of weeks I usually transform to someone who can't sleep, is extremely irritable and basically rude to other people because I simply can't deal with them.  

BCKA team at World Championships 2012

I worry about a future with no kickboxing or training as right now I simply couldn't contemplate a life without it.  Right now kickboxing is filling up a lot of my time with preparations for 2013's World Championships in six weeks.  I'm training hard with my team mates at the BCKA, as each day goes by we are becoming a stronger and stronger unit.  And as much as I love to fight and love the physical elements of kickboxing what has also been so crucial to my development and my confidence has been being part of this team.  At the BCKA I feel I am in a place where I belong and where I am valued for who I am and in my life there have not been many places where I have been able to say that.  I am lucky to have fantastic team mates who are very understanding and supportive of me and my coach Alex Barrowman who has given me so many amazing opportunities over the years and helped to shape me into the person and fighter I am today.  Thanks in part to Alex I am a fighter in every sense, I have an attitude to not give up and the belief in myself to achieve. Alex and the BCKA are family to me.

My coach Alex giving me advice before fighting in World Championships

Friendship and Forgiveness

I've had many friendships over the years but quite often they don't always seem to last.  I guess really I am not everybody's ideal friend, I am either terribly intense which can become tiring or I 'disappear' at times.  And this disappearing tends to be when I am focused on a goal or more often than not I am in training for a competition - I become a terrible friend because my whole life becomes dominated by what I am doing and anything that is not connected to that I'm not that interested in.  Now this enables me to be very successful in the things I choose to do but can also be quite isolating as I 'neglect' friends and family, putting things off until the competition is done.

It is not always easy for me to make friends either, I have always been terrible at making small talk, keeping things light and asking people about themselves.  I find it really hard to find topics of conversation that are not based on what I am doing, kickboxing or Asperger's.  In terms of general topics I only like to talk about things I know something about and when it comes to asking people about themselves I always assume if they want to tell me stuff then they will.

But having said that I have managed to forge many friendships which at the time seemed quite strong but in the end turned out not to be.  I have lost count of the amount of friends I have had where things were great then suddenly that friend just disappeared, and by this I mean that one day they just stopped speaking to me.  In some cases it was as severe as there was no reply and in others it was a gradual distancing but in all cases I have never been able to work out why and in each case there was almost like a grieving process.

There was one example of this a friend I believed to be a close friend, who I was able to confide in and who, at first, was so helpful and supportive through the tough times I had pre-diagnosis.  We worked closely together and I really looked up to this person and admired them.  It wasn't all doom and gloom, there were some good laughs and things along the way but then one day something changed.  Whether my unexplained behaviour became too much, I don't know but I do know that it was questioned whether I 'put on' my behaviour and this was incredibly hurtful.  At this time before I was diagnosed I was really worried, really anxious and afraid about who I was and what my life was going to be like, I actually hated who I was.  I couldn't make sense of things and as hard as I had tried I struggled to keep up and fit in.  It got to the point where this friend would no longer speak to me, where they would make fun of me when they thought I didn't know and even more they would get quite frustrated with me and much more.  It went from being someone I felt so comfortable being around and could talk to, to someone who it was uncomfortable to be around and who made me feel anxious.  Looking back now I see and understand that they didn't know I had Asperger's and neither did I.  

It is questionable whether or not despite this their actions were wrong but I chose to forgive this person and all the other people who made fun of me a long time ago.  I look at it in two ways, the people who I do not know so well probably never really mattered that much to me and if they want to make fun then as long as it is not hurting me it is them wasting their energy on me rather than on their own lives.  And the people who I considered close friends...well once they meant something to me and while yes it hurt the way they chose to act I don't need to hold on to that, I choose to forgive them for what they were to me and the things they did for me and concentrate on my own life.  That is the ultimate choice to concentrate on my own life, on being successful, following my dreams and being happy as I am.  People and things don't make me happy, what I achieve and do does.  Rather than concentrate on the people from my past I want to look after the people in my life now, the people who want to be in my life who understand my need to focus or why I might be a little intense, or even if they don't accept it.  I am lucky for all the people I have met and got to know, it is overwhelming how good some people are to me and this eclipses all those who have not treated me so well.

Who's bright idea was it to run a business???

Late 2011 I decided I wanted to change jobs and become a sport and remedial massage practitioner.  I considered all the difficult social related elements involved with sport massage and felt confident I could rise to the challenge.  Since my diagnosis I have almost been like the child who has just taken the stabiliser wheels off their bike and thinks it will be easy to ride without them, I've just flung myself into all the things I wanted to do.  Being diagnosed late I'd always worried about who I was and never really pursued anything I wanted to do, my diagnosis was the figurative green light that signalled it is ok, go ahead.  So I went through a year's worth of training to qualify as a sport and remedial massage practitioner in 2012.

At the end of 2012 and beginning of 2013 I began the task of preparing to be self employed running my own business.  Why I wasn't at all fazed by this back then I have no idea!  Just over half way through 2013 I'm thinking why did I have this idea to do something like this?!  For someone who finds most of the world quite hard to work out normally entering the world of business and networking feels as though I have been tied to a spinning top.  For me social media was great...until I had to start being social!

But it is not only that world and it was not only the sport massage knowledge I had to learn, I've also had to learn how the 'system' works, I have to learn how to market and sell myself and consider how my business runs so that I am compliant with legislation and following best practice.  So now I'm thinking I should have booked myself on more courses than just the clinical sport and remedial massage diploma I did.

Fortunately for me the local NAS have been supporting me although supporting into self employment is a new things for them too.  They have been able to help me to work things out, structure my business and help give direction to my weeks by helping me to prioritise what I need to do first.  The whole process has been hard and I also recognise that I probably make things more complicated with my perfectionism.  I am also lucky that my husband has many hidden talents and has been able to assist with design and technical elements I might have struggled with.

However anything worth having in life is hard.  If it was easy we would all do it and then there would be no value in it.  But I am not one to give up or give in - as much as I would sometimes like to.  I've learnt to be incredibly resourceful throughout my life growing up undiagnosed and I'm not prepared to fail without knowing that I have put every ounce of energy into what I'm doing.  And to be honest right now I am not even thinking about the possibility of failure, I have invested time and money into the dream of a career I love and I'm not doing badly.  Things are probably taking me longer because of the additional challenges that come along with having Asperger's Syndrome and some delays with accessing support but I'm confident I have the right support now, I'm excited about the future and perhaps a little impatient for it to all really kick off.  I know there will be many more challenges and twists in the road but I will learn to deal with those and become a better, more confident person for it.  I worry about my naivety, picking up on 'bad vibes' and also of being taken advantage of.

And the good news?  Since I started doing sport and remedial massage my social skills have dramatically improved.  I have a lot more confidence when speaking to people and I'm more tolerant of small talk and chit chat seeing it as 'part of the job'.  Sometimes I feel terribly awkward and uncomfortable, I have absolutely no idea how noticeable it is but I put it to one side.  A lot of my clients know I have Asperger's, I don't hide it but nor do I drop it in when they come for their first appointment.  I'm happy to talk about it but also don't feel I need to talk about it, just like with anything else in my life it is just another thing in my life but not one that will be a barrier to the life I want. 

For more information on my business you can check out my business website www.topformremedial.com, find my Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/TopFormSportsRemedialMassage or follow me on Twitter @TopFormSRM

Pets And Their Importance

So this is my second blog post in less than a day but I feel I really need to get this out of my system.  Last week I lost my best friend, my 14 year old black labrador Becks.

 

To some people animals are just animals but to me Becks was so much more than just a pet.  There are also people who feel their pets are more than a family pet and are a full family member but again to me Becks was so much more than just that.  Becks was my truest friend, my closest ally and trusted confidante.

At 12 years old, a year or so after my family had lost Kelly the family dog, I had begged and begged my parents for another dog and was absolutely delighted when they finally relented and we visited a litter of 6 gorgeous black labrador puppies.  My two brothers and I fell in love with Becks from the start.  He was the most placid of the puppies, so easy going and patient and these qualities never changed.  

Back in those days I was a quiet young girl with a passion for football, I hadn't even started kickboxing and so Becks was named after David Beckham - my hero at the time.  I also hadn't been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome and having Becks proved to be so vital to me over my teenage years, we grew to be inseparable.  I spent hours training him and teaching him little tricks, Becks was always eager to learn and some worked out well and some not so well.  I'm sure a lot of people have had the dream of teaching their dog to fetch them the newspaper out of the door....well I taught Becks how to do this, it worked well until he decided it would be more fun to snatch the newspaper out of the door and bark at the closed door! But most of the things I taught him surprisingly worked well despite my younger brother's interference - I remember one occasion where I was trying to teach Becks 'fetch' in the garden and my little brother decided to chase him round the garden which of course Becks thought was much more fun!!

Anyone who has grown up with Asperger's Syndrome will tell you that it isn't easy but when you grow up not knowing that you have Asperger's Syndrome life can be incredibly confusing, scary and sad, not knowing why you are different - this was my experience.  In my teenage years I withdrew into myself a lot, I really struggled to connect with other people and to me it seemed that the people around me expected things of me that I could not give nor could I be.  Then there was Becks.  Becks who never expected me to be anything more than I was, who chose my company and completely adored me.  So many people loved Becks and to so many children he was almost like their puppy too, they all wanted him but he was mine and for someone who had often felt 'bottom of the pile' that acceptance and unconditional love was so so important even if it came from a dog.

Becks always knew when I was upset or something was wrong.  He was an incredibly affectionate and intuitive dog.  I remember going through school I would just want to get home and see him because I knew when I did I would feel calm again.  When there were bad days I would sit with Becks in the dark and somehow it all just felt better, he always stayed by my side and never left.  One particular occasion that I remember vividly is when as an adult I had an occupational therapist visit me at home, again this was pre-diagnosis and at that time I suffered a lot of anxiety brought on through the worry of not knowing why some things didn't make sense to me.  These visits were incredibly anxiety provoking for me and Becks must have sensed this.  Normally when someone came to visit he would fuss around at the start but then get bored and either sleep or play with a toy somewhere else but on this occasion he sat by my side, eventually jumping up onto the sofa by me and resting his head on my leg.  It was as though he knew I needed him.

Then came the day where I left home to make my own home with my husband.  I missed Becks so much and we regularly had him come to visit and stay over night until he became too old.  Despite the fact that I no longer lived at the family home Becks didn't forget me and everytime we were together it was just as it had always been.

Over this year Becks began to show signs of old age, physically he began to deteriorate and had difficulty walking.  It has been heartbreaking to see him slowly stop running around, climbing stairs, jumping over things and playing.  All year I have been dreading the day that I would lose him until I realised that I could never lose him.  Whether Becks is still here or not he has helped to shape my life and played a role I wouldn't have had anyone else fill.  So last Thursday when Becks suddenly became very ill I put everything to one side to make sure he was as comfortable as he could possibly be until we were able to have him put to sleep.  As sad and awful that day was I will always treasure those hours I spent with Becks in my arms hoping that what I was doing could in some way repay him for everything he gave me and I was glad to hold him in my arms as he shut his eyes for the final time.  One amazing, legend of a dog that I will miss terribly.  RIP Becks, my best friend.

"Nothing is nicer than having someone who appreciates you in the smallest things.. Accepts you in times of hardships. Comforts you when you're troubled. Loves you no matter what and is simply happy for having you in their life." - Ritu Ghatourey

Autism Show, House of Commons & Becoming a Patron for Anna Kennedy Online!

I have been up to so much recently that it has been difficult to keep up with blog posts, I thought I might as well combine all of these into one post - if I can manage to contain my excitement!  And it truly has been an exciting time for me, exciting and a complete whirlwind, so much so that I'm wondering how I am managing to keep up with everything and this crazy juggling act I feel I'm doing.  In truth I'm probably not keeping up too well hence the lack of blog posts BUT I am still learning...

The Autism Show - Excel Arena, London - 14th June 2013

There I was one day just minding my own business, still incredibly overwhelmed at the response from Autism's Got Talent when my mobile phone rang and who could it be other than Anna Kennedy!  I think I answered it, can't quite remember (I'm not the best at answering my mobile, depends whether I feel I can cope with a conversation) but the message was simple, "please can you come and do a talk at the Autism Show as part of Autism's Got Talent..." ended with the usual I need to know by yesterday!  Of course my answer was an emphatic yes, I always feel it is an honour to be asked to share my story.  

Next came the working out of the logistics...who can help me get to London?  I am terrible at working out where I have got to go - signs, timetables, directions, it is all confusion to me and you'd think I'd be able to pinpoint all the relevant information with my attention to detail but somehow it doesn't seem to quite work like that.  Normally Adam my husband has the unenviable task of dragging me through train stations and airports and to new, big, busy places however unfortunately on this occasion he was unable to take time off work due to the fact we were on holiday the following week!  Luckily I managed to find a friend to come along with me, Amy who was more than happy to come along given her profession as a speech and language therapist. she was quite looking forward to having a look around at the event.

Being the perfectionist crazy person that I am, I decided that instead of doing the same word for word talk I did for Autism's Got Talent that I would change it slightly.  I think that I had been doing a lot of work for my business that I had begun to realise how much of a challenge and achievement it was for me to be doing that as well as my more obvious achievements in kickboxing and I decided I wanted to balance that out a little bit.

I am still very new to speaking to larger audiences, I am used to big audiences of small people in schools or small groups of adults - so speaking to all these grown ups who also have some experience of autism is quite daunting.  I have always struggled with confidence and have never been the kind of person to speak up in groups and previously I would have done anything to avoid this kind of activity which my friend Amy reflected on having known me from my school years.  What has changed since then in me is a defiant belief that I can do anything I want to do and that I have a right to be heard and understood for who I am.

I really enjoyed doing the talk and after I had finished Anna Kennedy made the announcement that she would like me to become a patron for her charity.  It was an amazing feeling and honour to be asked to fill a role that I personally thinks carries so much responsibility.  Growing up as I have done and often feeling 'bottom of the pile' to others it was such a great feeling to know that Anna thinks that I can be a good role model to other people.  I really hope that I am able to live up to that and want to do as much as I can to help others and bring awareness to the challenges but also positive stories about Asperger's and autism.

House of Commons - Positive Image Celebrating Women in Sport

So there I was a week after the Autism Show on holiday and again Anna Kennedy calls.  'Jo, do you want to come to the House of Commons on Tuesday?'  Completely taken by surprise I thought why not.  Anna had been invited to an event by one her Tesco Mum of the Year friends Kate Hardcastle, it was an event as part of Kate's Positive Image Inspiring Confidence campaign with this event in particular celebrating women in sport.  Anna thought as I was a woman and heavily involved in sport that this would be a great opportunity for me.  I, of course, agreed!

So on Tuesday 25th June, my husband and I travelled down to London once again to the House of Commons.  Here we went on a tour and met Victoria Pendleton.  Anna said some really nice things about how great I was to Victoria.  My experience at the House of Commons was brilliant - I met some fantastic, inspiring women including Tina Boden who has since been in contact with me trying to help me to raise the funds I need to be able to compete in this year's World Championships.  Anna was great to me again in bringing my challenges in getting the funding to be able to compete to the attention of various people.

If anyone is able to help me out, however big or small, with getting to World Championships please go to this address http://www.gofundme.com/2kvedw - I really appreciate any help or support given.