Mdgwrites Challenges, Mental Health, My Guest Posts

My Guest Post: The Loneliness of Martial Arts and Eating Disorders

I’m pleased to share my article in Martial Journal for the month of November: The Loneliness of Martial Arts and Eating Disorders.

Part of my journey to authenticity has been to share my mental health struggles in the hope of lightening my burden and lifting up others who feel lonely and lost. Eating disorders are taboo in both the athletic world and elsewhere. I often wonder if there are other people like me who have had an active eating disorder while practicing martial arts or if, like me now, are in active recovery. Does the expectation of a strong martial arts spirit hurt those who are struggling mentally?

This article shares my exploration into this topic and some tips on what to do if you are a martial artist and athlete dealing with this terrible mental illness.

To read, click here.

Mdgwrites Challenges, Inspiration, The Poomsae Series

Little Black Belt is FOUR!

number 4

My blog turns four today! Thank you for reading and commenting on my posts. I’m glad I could reach people all over the world and share my love of the life changing martial art taekwondo. During the past year I went through a major change at work, learned the mystery of  a lingering health problem, and passed my second Dan test. To celebrate my blog’s birthday I’m sharing my favorite posts from the past year. Enjoy!
Continue reading “Little Black Belt is FOUR!” →

Mdgwrites Challenges, Confidence

Saying Goodbye to the Parasites in Our Lives

This is Plankton. He’s my intestinal parasite.

plankton_by_retroneb-d98dyec

…it’s not REALLY Plankton from Spongebob Squarepants, but this is how I picture the recently diagnosed parasitic infection in my digestive system–a tiny little bastard who’s always scheming to pull one over on everybody. He’s a dick, and I’m tired of the way he’s been treating me, but I’m also a little afraid to say goodbye to him.
Continue reading “Saying Goodbye to the Parasites in Our Lives” →

Mdgwrites Challenges, Confidence

So I’m Eating Meat Again: A Cautionary Tale of the Rules We Place on Ourselves

Jail-Bars-and-Hands

So I was vegetarian for a while. And for a while it worked…until it didn’t, or rather, I didn’t. This isn’t going to be one of those posts that tries to debunk the value of a vegetarian diet (sorry, carnivores, I know you love to find those stories online). I think they’re great and work quite well. I was the issue, not the tenets of a vegetarian diet.
Continue reading “So I’m Eating Meat Again: A Cautionary Tale of the Rules We Place on Ourselves” →

Mdgwrites Challenges, Confidence

Black Belts Can’t Have Eating Disorders, Right? I Mean, That’s Just Silly…

black belt cinch.jpg
Maybe I can cinch this belt just a little bit tighter…

114.8

That was the number blinking up at me from my digital scale at 8:57 PM a week or so ago after three hours of taekwondo training. I smiled. It was exactly one pound less than it was at 5:21 AM that morning. Ahh. At least I had that.

Then I ate a small meal, sat on my bed and cried for a while, and took some medicine to help me sleep. That’s been happening more often lately. My weight had nothing to do with my mood (other than giving me a little boost), but I’ll get to that later.
Continue reading “Black Belts Can’t Have Eating Disorders, Right? I Mean, That’s Just Silly…” →

Mdgwrites Challenges, Confidence

How Eating a Bunch of Carbs Helped Me Stop Hating My Body

carbs-bread-rice-pasta
Foundation of the old school food pyramid, yo! But really, who ever got 6-11 servings in a day? Eleven servings??

After twenty-five years of disordered eating and a poor body image I think I can finally, ultimately, safely say…I’m over it…for the most part, anyway. I’ve had a few false starts before, but something would trigger me, and I’d go right back to restricting or overeating, obsessively weighing myself, and glaring at my reflection with dismay as I pawed at my flabbier (and much despised) body parts and somehow hoping something had changed overnight.
Continue reading “How Eating a Bunch of Carbs Helped Me Stop Hating My Body” →

Mdgwrites Confidence

Embracing the Squishy: Body Confidence One Day at a Time

Quote-be-confident-No-matter-what

There are parts of me that are bony. There are parts of me that are muscular. There are parts of me that are squishy. Often these parts are right up next to each other, which I think gives me an odd appearance (big sculpted and kinda bony shoulder, delicate wrist, soft batwing tricep hanging from a hard bicep), but it’s probably a lot closer to being “normal” than my perfectionist tendencies allow me to believe.

I tend to isolate my body parts. I thank genetics for the bony parts, take pride in the muscular parts, and admonish the squishy parts. I forget that these bony, muscular, and squishy parts all work in harmony to help me do really cool stuff like chop an onion, drive a car, swim laps, and beat other people up. Unfortunately it can be a little more difficult in today’s society to appreciate the squishy alongside the bony and the muscular.
Continue reading “Embracing the Squishy: Body Confidence One Day at a Time” →

Mdgwrites Confidence, Inspiration

Getting Fat Shamed as a Size Four

liar
I love you…just kidding.

“I liked you better skinnier.”

It was a bright spring morning, and my boyfriend and I were relaxing at home before I had to go to a work event. I jumped off the couch and stared slack-jawed at him.

“You’ve changed so much since we started dating. You’ve gained weight,” he whined as he stretched out like a sleepy lion. Then he tilted his head, widened his dark brown eyes with a look of betrayal and said in what I had come to secretly call his Snob Voice:
“I feel deceived. Did you…sell me a bill of goods?”
Continue reading “Getting Fat Shamed as a Size Four” →

Mdgwrites Challenges, Confidence, Taekwondo Training Tips

Tae Kwon Dough

cartman karate
This is karate, but you get my point. Cartman still kicks ass even with all that pie in his belly.

You know what the best part about taekwondo is?

Your training pants double as your fat pants.

I spent the week of Thanksgiving eating my weight in food at my parents’ house. It all started with a pumpkin donut at the airport Dunkin Donuts the Saturday before Thanksgiving, plus a free drink coupon from Southwest Airlines, and it went downhill from there. I spent the week before that convalescing (i.e., pouting at home) due to a severe back injury. I’m feeling a little more like Steven Segal than Bruce Lee these days.
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Mdgwrites Challenges

Body Image

body image

For the last few days I have done absolutely nothing. The pain that I’ve been experiencing during and after taekwondo classes will not let up and even flares up with gentler physical activities such as swimming and yoga. In fact, in last Sunday’s yoga class I ended up going to my knee for every Warrior I, crescent lunge, and even Warrior II. Somewhere between Sun Salutation B and savasana I decided that I needed to rest.
Continue reading “Body Image” →