New chapter and a positive step forward

Good morrow every body!

Popping in to update y'all on where my training is standing at the moment.  I recently stepped back on the platform in a push pull competition and walked away with two PB's that I'm very happy with - 160kg deadlift and a 60kg bench press.  My next competition is pencilled in for April 2016 to qualify for the British Championship again in September 2016, which means it's my off season time and time to concentrate of building some unquestionable strength.

I have some pretty heavy goals for competition next year and would like to see a 160kg+ squat, 80kg+ bench press, and 190kg+ deadlift.  With regards to diet I am doing a little cut to get down to about 99kg so I can spend as much of the year in a maintenance/surplus as possible.  At the moment I've only dropped carbs by 10g and lost 2 pounds on average over a number of weeks.  Our aim is to keep calories as high as possible while slowly losing about 1/2 a pound a week.

I have had to make a sad decision about roller derby.  For the foreseeable future I will not be playing roller derby competitively or recreationally.  This breaks my heart, but I needed to listen to myself about it.  When I was told I broke my leg, and I was told I had damaged the ligaments quite badly, the only thing I thought about was power lifting, not if I was going to be able to skate again.

I struggle with the prospect of being seen as a quitter or someone who gives up.  I pride myself on being someone who never gives up, so this was difficult.  But I'm not quitting anything, I'm choosing me.  I'm choosing to be happy, to follow *new* dreams, aspirations, chase new goals, fill my thoughts with new thoughts of barbells made of happiness and rainbows instead of roller skates.

Roller derby has made me who I am today and it has brought me up from a shy not confident young woman to someone who is confident, excited to live life, meet new people, and stand in front of them and say "This is me, and I am great".  I'll never forget roller derby for what it has done for me, but it's time to move on to another chapter and take the skills it's taught me to help a whole new group of people.  I can't say I won't be back, and I'm always ALWAYS going to be involved with ARRG, but for now I'm hanging up my skates.