Thinking with busy minds and loving with empty hearts,
they peek through self imposed blinds, and arrive but never depart.
Their tall walls fall into the sea, as their words float in the waves,
but the world goes on merrily, whether they are standing or in their graves.

Like a Child

I feel like a child who built her sand castle too close to the ocean.

It keeps sinking, but she's driven by her blinding, childish devotion.

Getting frazzled enough to relocate, she moves away from the shore. 

After finishing the structure, she sees her move was a worthwhile chore,

and as she looks back towards the ocean, wonders what her enfrazzlement was good for. 

Finally proud of what she had made, she scurries off to show her parents.

But as clouds begin to blot out the sun, their intentions of leaving become apparent.

Droplets of rain begin to fall, drizzling down at first, but then escalating to a torrential downpour. 

The girl's father scoops her up as she looks back at her fallen structure and wonders what her work was good for. 

Sixty years later, the girl, now a middle aged woman, finds out that she has skin cancer, stage three. 

She endures the treatment for five years, but the care proves no match for her one too many days at sea. 

Before she knows it, she keeps sinking into her bed, but she clings onto her life with the same devotion as before. 

Looking out her window at the ocean's shore, she fades away wondering what gripping at her painful existence was good for.

Secret Seasons of my Mind

My mind fluctuates like the weather.
I'm always trying to find, a way to put the puzzle pieces together.
At times, my thoughts are sunny, my cheeks red like delicate roses,
my words, sappy and sweet like honey.
But ominous clouds are cast, and slapping beads of rain come fast.
It feels like I'm sitting alone, chained to the bottom of a mountain.
Down I'm counting, waiting for the end to come.
Pushing my problems to the back of my mind, to them, I wish to remain numb.
But they only snowball, and into a quiet hole of solitude, I wish to crawl.
I push the tears to the back of my head, and hope people are mislead.
I am plagued by a heavy feeling, that engulfs my entire being.
I drown in an ocean of insecurities, and slowly sink in quick sand not seeing,
a way to escape myself.
It's winter in my soul, and in my bed, I'm left to toss, and my thoughts to dole.
Into the playground that is my head, until my pulse stops, and I drop dead.
When will I be free, from the prison that is my mind?
Untouchable seems the key, for I have yet to define,
what to do, where to go, where happiness I will find.
If ignorance is bliss, then my truth, I shall dismiss,
into the never ending abyss, leaving nothing but memories,
to one day reminisce.

Under Pressure... My Exertional Compartment Syndrome Story

     "Okay Cygnets, one more time from the top," said Loipa Araujo, a world renowned Cuban ballet coach, sternly, as she gestured to the piano player to repeat the same sequence of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake. Managing a fake, polite smile, I gripped at every fiber of my being to not collapse on the floor and shake my legs. I had been experiencing daily calf spasms for more than a year that grew progressively worse and seemed to have no cure. Exasperated by the hard floors I was dancing on, the nine to five rehearsal schedule, and the disturbingly cold temperature inside the theatre, my calves showed no mercy as I was doing my best to showcase my art at the Carreño Dance Festival. Despite the state I was in, I had been chosen from more than fifty girls to be one of the four little swans, a soloist role in the excerpt of Swan Lake in the end of festival production which featured principle dancers from top companies around the world such as Sarah Lane and Jose Manuel Carreño. Arriving to class an hour early to warm up, memorizing every combination while attempting to apply all of the corrections given by the coaches, and performing every combination as if I was dancing the lead role in a company production, I was still forced to hobble over to the wings of the stage between every exercise to lay on my back like a flipped turtle and rest my legs. As soon as I was back on my feet, the pain would resume. I felt horribly embarrassed that I had shown weakness, and was frustrated that I could not manage the pain other dancers seem to cope with. Feeling like a problematic sissy, I could just imagine audience members watching me, whispering to each other, "What is wrong with her? If she can't handle a thirty second exercise, she definitely can't dance professionally." Nobody understood what was going on in my legs, not even me.

     Ever since the pain began, my parents and I made every effort to cure it. Little did we know, it was not a simple case of shin splints assigned by both an orthopedist and a chiropractor, a hydration problem as suggested by an endocrinologist, something treatable by vasodilators as prescribed by a cardiologist, a bout of panic attack related muscle tensions as stated by a psychiatrist, nor even spoiled laziness as accused by my Cuban, private coach. It was not until I took it upon myself to research "Daily anterior and lateral calf spasms" that I found the true cause, chronic compartment syndrome. As I nodded along reading all of the symptoms, a deluge of happiness poured out of me as I realized that I was not alone, and my afflicted state without reason. This abruptly ended when I read that the only cure was surgery, or amputation if went untreated long enough. "No, no, that is ridiculous," I chuckled to myself, scoffing off the importance of the situation, attempting to convince myself that I was a hypochondriac. All the doctors I went to agreed that the symptoms were text book of compartment syndrome, but could not believe it could happen to a ballet dancer. They shooed me away because I was not a football or soccer player. What I trained in was not considered a "real" sport. All doctors that is, except Alejandro Posada, an Orthopedic Surgeon and Sports Doctor.

     Within five minutes of me describing the pain, he diagnosed it as compartment syndrome, and recommended pressure testing. He went on to say that I would need bilateral fasciotomies, where a cut down the fascia would be made in both the anterior and lateral compartments of both my calves. My mother was shocked, and proclaimed that he was a money hungry psycho. She could not come to grips with such an intense situation so quickly. Instead of jumping to the more invasive option, I decided to take a month off of ballet to see if the pain would go away. It never did. Even after a month of absolutely no dancing or exercising, my calves were as hard as stone, as if they had seen Medusa herself. All out of hope, I returned to Dr. Posada's office, where he agreed that my time off had no effect on alleviating my condition. He proposed that I have a compartment test done, to measure the pressure in the compartments.

     The night before I was scheduled to have the testing done, I walked into my parent's room to find my mother teary eyed. Having read up on the procedure and seen a video, she was completely petrified, not wanting I, her daughter, to experience such an event. I tried to ignore it, and push the worries to the back of my mind, but curiosity got the best of me. I searched on the internet for a video of the testing and stumbled upon a video with the title "Here we go again! Chronic Exertional Compartment Syndrome Test with Pressure Gauge". It showed a man's calf, ventral side up, about to  be punctured by a 14 gauge needle, which looked more like a straw to stir your coffee than something to inject yourself with. As the needle entered the skin at a perfectly perpendicular angle, it appeared to be pushing downward with great force, sliding inwards swiftly after the initial entrance stab, as if the man's calf was a balloon that was being popped by a pen. To make things worse, the doctor kept the needle in for more than thirty seconds, moving it slightly in and out, and squeezing the muscle occasionally. He then repeated the process a few more times. Watching the video in awed terror, my palms began to sweat and my stomach churned. Comments on the video of people who had experienced it made it worse. The general consensus was that it made big men cry like little girls because it was done sans anesthesia. However, I knew that no amount of pain from this 20 minute procedure would be enough to make me not want to end the physical and mental hell I had been living for the past year that turned my love for dancing into dread. 

     Accompanied by my "support group" which consisted of my parents, sister, best friend and her husband, I arrived at the doctor's office at 7 am, right on time. I sat there and did what one normally does in a waiting room, nervously skim over magazines. I prepared myself as the doctor prepared the testing station. He then called me in and instructed that only one person could accompany me. I chose my father because of his logical, calm demeanor and his medical knowledge, thanks to his profession as a psychiatric doctor (which yes, does come in handy often in my household). The doctor lead me into a cold, yet oddly inviting room and I sat down on the patient's table. I gripped at my father's hand as if I was once again a five year old girl going to see the circus. He then went on to explain how the procedure would be executed and informed me that if the pressure in my calves was above 15 mmHg at rest, above 30 mmHg after exercise, or above 15 mmHg five minutes after exercise, I had compartment syndrome. Sterilizing my skin with an orange liquid called betadine and ensuring me that everything was going to be ok, he pulled out the infamous pressure testing monitor. Its needle seemed to be even larger in person, but I laid on my back and closed my eyes, still holding onto my father's hand. "This is it," I told myself. The needle entered my skin, making a clicking noise as it broke through the top layers of epidermis and slid into the muscle. It was painful, but not nearly as terrible as I had imagined, likely due to the adrenaline pumping through my veins. He held it there for thirty seconds, moving the needle and squeezing my muscle occasionally, just as I had seen in the video online. He explained to me that he did this to ensure that he got an appropriate average of the pressure. I then moved my ankle around until my muscle was in a burning spasm, and he inserted the needle for another thirty seconds. I waited five minutes, and he inserted the needle once again. This was done in both the lateral and anterior compartments of my left calf. The results showed that in my anterior compartment, I had a pressure of 14 at rest, a whopping 42 after exercise, and 37 after five minutes. In the lateral compartment, I had 29 at rest, 35 after exercise, and 27 after five minutes. My diagnosis of compartment syndrome was finally confirmed.

     With my diagnosis determined, I was practically given three options: quit dancing, keep dancing and increase the necrosis in my calves until I need my legs amputated, or have surgery. From the first instance, my mind was made up, I was going under the knife. "Here goes nothing," I thought. The procedure took place on October 13th, 2011. Although I exited the hospital that day in a very fashionable manner (drugged and passed out in a wheelchair), it was not long until my wannabe Hoveround was put out of commission and replaced by a cane, and I was off of the pain killers prescribed by my surgeon. After I regained the strength to walk, and had my stitches removed, I began to frequent the gym daily, for hours on end. By early January, I was back to ballet, and by May, I had regained all my strength, along with more mental maturity, and a clear goal in my mind. That same month, I performed an excerpt of Coppelia as "Swanilda", the principle role in the ballet, Spectre de la Rose, a pas de deux, and the "Jardin Animado" scene of Le Corsaire. The following week, I attended World Ballet Competition, was a third round finalist, and was offered a traineeship with Festival Ballet of Providence. Needless to say, I did not, and still to this day do not, regret my decision to take the risk of surgery, and am proud to say that I both recovered from it, and came back stronger, emotionally, and physically.