I'm Halfway Home

This Wednesday was our official halfway point. It has also been my darkest thus far. I have cried and struggled with my mind, my emotions, my physical strength (or lack there of), my uterus (I'm sure some ladies out there can sympathize with the tiredness and unbearable pain that graces us once a month. Try dealing with it through 990 minutes of yoga in a week.) I have prayed for death several times with the utmost sincerity. Bikram often says something like "Don't worry, you're not going to die. You're not so lucky to die so soon." I challenge that statement. He also says if you die doing yoga you go straight to heaven. We'll see.

They've turned up the heat in the room and people are dropping like flies. It's almost funny. I said almost. It's like a giant game of Whack-a-Mole, one second someone is standing there, the next second...they're gone. I've been one of them…I've had to sit down quite often in the last few days, I'm not sure I have the words to explain what exactly happens while I lose my mind. Fatigue takes over, my brain feels like it's yanked itself out of my head - through my ear - and is crawling toward the nearest exit to get a single breath of air and I just sit there and watch it like a bad acid trip because I'm too exhausted to do anything else. The scary thing is, I've felt pretty good and have been taking care to eat and drink well, and I'm a pretty healthy person. I'm blaming the extra difficulty in coping on Aunt Flo's bad timing. Back home, when I was feeling the effects of PMS, I simply wouldn't go to class, because that was the logical, intelligent choice. Here, there is no choice. You go to class. Period. Pardon the horrible pun. You have a sucky class, but you go to class nonetheless. You also do not leave the room. Even if you have to lay down on your mat the whole time because you just don't have the strength, you lay there, sweating, crying, cursing, wimpering. You don't leave the room. (Two acceptable excuses for leaving the room: puking and pooping.)

I suffered the effects of loss of minerals and/or dehydration this morning (Thursday), my body began cramping up in the middle of the night. My feet, my calves, the muscles around my ribs and torso. Every time I moved, another cramp would try to paralyze me. I didn't sleep a wink. I decided in the morning that I didn't want to end up in the hospital, so I chose to speak to one of the instructors and we decided that I would not attend the morning class. Sometimes you just have to heed the red flags that go up. Another woman in our class was taken to the hospital earlier in the week for dehydration, she stays in the room next to ours, I wasn't around when the ambulance came to get her, but my roommate said it was pretty gnarly…she was severely cramped up from head to toe, almost unable to function. It was because of her that I paid a little more attention to my own symptoms and decided to err on the side of caution.

By next week, the heat is supposed to be near unbearable temperature, I hope that I am back to full strength before then. I pray.

Physically and mentally, this is the most difficult thing I've ever done. Some people seemed to be less fazed by it, some more. There is quite a variety of roller coasters rides here at the torture chamber, with only one theme in common – you have no fucking clue which one you've just sat your ass down on. It might be bumper cars, it might be spinning tea cups or it might be that one that flips you around and loop-d-loop, while you're sitting upside down and backwards and doesn't stop until you throw up at least four times.

I thought I could do anything after I jumped out of an airplane a few months ago. After I get through this, I will be able to reclaim that statement for real.

I've noticed more and more over this past week that people are starting to miss/crave human contact. Although we are just inches away from each of our 305 other classmates (yes, we lost a few) most of the day, many of us are away from loved ones, husbands, wives, kids, cats and are missing healing and compassionate human touch. This week in our final savasana it wasn't a surprise at all that you would be laying there with your eyes closed and the person next to you would just grab your hand and hold it. It happened to me twice and I initiated it once. Our posture clinics are becoming a triage of sorts, sorting victims, providing the necessary attention – foot and hand massages – to relieve the cramping and soreness and pain. And just to feel someone's empathetic hands on your pathetic feeling body.

Although this is our halfway point, week six is supposed to be the pinnacle of this whole training…I can't even think about it right now. I've found myself saying things like "one day at a time"…12 step program.

This Sunday brings a well deserved break, scuba diving and surfing…and not one single thought about yoga. Right.


(By the way, if you ever find yourself in New York, go to John Salvatore's Bikram yoga class. Even if you hate yoga and you never plan on doing it again…it is worth the experience to be in the same room as this man. He is by far the most hilarious person I have ever had the pleasure of meeting and such an incredible teacher.)