06/06/11: First night back after some strange weeks of transition and confusion

(WARNING: THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION IS MEANT FOR ENTERTAINMENT ONLY AND ONE SHOULD NEVER ATTEMPT THESE TECHNIQUES WITHOUT PROPER TRAINING AND SUPERVISION. THEY ARE POTENTIALLY DEADLY. THIS IS A VERY SERIOUS AND HEARTFELT WARNING, READER. PLEASE DO NOT TAKE IT LIGHTLY.)

For those of you who know me, then you already know how important martial arts has become to me in the past few years--especially the Krav Maga self defense system. I won't go into great detail on the history of this comparatively modern system (for that, please feel free to read up on a fairly concise and correct history here
), but it was developed in the early 1930's by Imi Lichtenfeld, a very bad ass man who later went on to teach whole populations of everyday frightened citizens terrorized by Nazis and anti-semitics in Jewish ghettoes, and then later an official, armed military how to defend themselves against people intent on their deaths.
The system is meant to be simple--so simple that anyone of any age and sex can learn the basic, yet very deadly, techniques to disarm, disable and destroy your opponent.

Back in 2008, when I first started this system, I had been diagnosed as diabetic type-II, and was on my way to being in deep shit health-wise. I had already changed my diet, had been doing what I thought was some pretty heavy duty exercising--i.e., weightlifting--on a daily basis. You'd think that was keeping me healthy, but it did not. My cholesterol levels were through the roof, my blood pressure was terrible, and lest we forget, I was still diabetic. It wasn't doing much to keep me from backsliding and quickly.

One day, I happened to catch an episode of the now defunct reality show on The History Channel, "Human Weapon", in which the two hosts trek across the world to learn new martial arts disciplines every week. I just happened to catch the one on Krav Maga that day, as I said, and something clicked with me. These grim faced men in black, with no sense of humor, proceeded to basically beat the living crap out of these two men to show them how serious the system is. But it wasn't the fact that what they did was so devastating and so simple, it was the fact that every one of the men who were teaching and learning the system were in top shape, with real street fighting muscle--not mirror muscle, as we used to refer to the meatheads that hung around the weight rooms, staring themselves in the mirrors in different poses, flexing their rippling biceps and quads. No, these guys were pure real-world muscle and ready to tear anyone dumb enough to tangle with them a new asshole. They meant business.

.

But there was another side to the system that maybe I missed in others I'd sen and studied: these practitioners saw themselves as wardens of the defenseless, especially those who they loved. They were willing to kill or be killed to protect those they loved and those whom could not protect themselves.

I'd be lying to myself if I didn't admit that such an ethos played into my long held belief in the knightly ethics and the superhero morals which I had grown up on in my reading of comics and classic literature.

But maybe the most powerful pull for me was how much work these guys put into getting into the kind of shape needed to do the drills and techniques used in their extreme, physically, mentally demanding workouts.

That same week I found a martial arts studio right down the street from me (which was a hell of a piece of luck, since back then it wasn't like Krav Maga schools were everywhere; in fact, only a handful in the whole state of Arizona existed) that had official/certified trainers in Krav Maga. I joined up after watching one class and haven't regretted it since. ULTIMA SELF DEFENSE.

They pared me down to a lean, mean fighting machine. I felt great. Mhy confidence level was through the roof. My body and mind were sharp andat one; I felt at peace for the first time in a long time.

Then, in February of 09, something really bad happened to me: the Achilles Tendon on my right leg snapped off the bone, ruptured 100%. POP!

Now, the injury is common enough that surgery can and does take care of it fairly well. But if you're a pro athlete, or someone who is working out like one, such as myself, who was at the time supplementing my Krav Maga classes with Crossfit and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu as well, four or five nights a week. At that time I was just under 40, and in the best shape of my life---except for the diabetes, which I had gotten under control with diet and my exreme exercising and some preventive medicines. Within six months I had gone from being in danger of having to go to insulin shots, to having the disease almost under control without the drugs. My docs were astounded and amazed and wanted details on how I had done it.

And then the injury happened, like I said.

I had an operation to reattach the tendon, which meant I would be okay to workout in a few months, but never at my full capacity again. If I had been a pro athlete, my career would have been done for the rest of my life. I should have been okay in no time, at least as good as I was going to get after such a tramatic injury. If all had gone as it should have, I should have been able to continue with my life, limited a bit more, but still fairly well off and happy.

But weeks after the surgery, I developed severe pain and open wounds. The wounds got worse and weren't going away. The surgeon kept telling me they were my diabetes' fault. Which to me seemed strange after all my research online, because according to said research, there shouldn't have been an issue if my gluscose levels were under control. Which they were. The whole time, barely going out of healthy range at any time. See, I was still working out--one legged--as best I could, to keep the glucose under control. Still, the doc continued to blame the diabetes. and as for the continuing pain, he told me that was in my head.

This went on for months and I finally had to see one of my doc's golf buddies, a supposed infectious wound specialist, who also blamed the diabetes, despite my continuing dispute that my gluscose was under control and that I was still exercising to keep it under control.

Eight months went by and the wounds would not heal, I developed abcesses, which had to be lanced several times, drained, and then they also turned into open supperating wounds.

So, here I was, now with three open wounds on my foot. The docs keep saying its the diabetes, although I keep trying to tell them it's not.

Finally, I decided to take a drastic, life altering step: I had a gastric bypass to get rid of the diabetes. My research online had found that the procedure was 85-90% effective in putting the disease into terminal remission.

Within two weeks, it worked.

I was no longer diabetic. No more drugs. No more blood sugar problems.

Two weeks later, with no improvement on the open wound issues, and now everyone is getting really concerned that I might lose my foot soon, I was taking a shower when I saw a blue snakelike thing sticking out of one of the supperating abcess wounds. I pulled on it and more of it came out: a neatly tied loop of medical suture.

I rushed to the wound doc and he snipped it off as far down into my foot as he could stick the scissors into the wound (very painful, let me tell you). At that point, he advised that it hadn't been my diabetes that was causing the open wounds the whole time, but the NON-DISSOVABLE SUTURES that the ortho-surgeon never told us about.

We went back to the ortho doc and asked how to get the sutures out, he said there was no way and I was stuck with them and we'd just have to wait to see what would happen. Meaning, the infections weren't going to go away, no matter what antibiotics we used, and I was probably going to lose my foot because of the ongoing aggressive infection. When I told the doc that was not an acceptable answer, he told me we didn't need to see one another again.

He fired me as a patient.

Stunned, we found another surgeon, one which was top of her profession at The University of Arizona Orthopedic Surgery department and she immediately scheduled surgery to remove the sutures, for fear that I was soon going to lose the foot.

What she found when she got inside the foot was life altering as the gastric bypass. The infection had eaten away 70% of my tendon, some of my heel bone, and about a 3X3 inch area of my ankle where the open wounds had gone necrotic, rotting the flesh from the inside. All of that had to be removed immediately, leaving me with a foot that was about as useless as a stick on the end of my leg. I had to have more surgery to cover the rotted area: a very painful, disgusting procedure called skin flapping, followed by a skin graft, followed by months more of physical therapy.

Now, after each one of these surgeries over the year and half in which they all had to be done, including the gastric bypass, I had to re-learn how to walk again, over and over again. During which, I continued to keep exercising to help build up balance and strength in my ruined leg.

It has been an uphill battle physically and mentally and emotionally for the past two and a half years now. There are no words to convey what has happened to me inside because of this terrible injury and the aftermath of it, the continuing effects of it.

Tonight, after a few weeks of feeling as if it was all for nothing, that I am now less than I was, I went back to Krav Maga to test myself again.

Tonight, I felt something like the old me again after all this time. I felt the joy of sweating and aching as i pushed myself as best I could with my limited mobility. I felt something awaken in me again, something that the Krav Maga gave me in those first days: The Dragon; The Fire: The desire to beat the fears and terrors which live inside me now, the doubts which still plague me these days after all that's happened to me.

I decided there will me more nights from now on. I will keep fighting as I was taught by the people who I admire and love in Krav Maga. I will not lose that fire, that dragon, that tiger. I am all of those things still; this injury, this limitation, will not kill those things in me.

Wish me luck.