Mind games and other Blockers - part two.

Warning: Unless you read mind-games-and-other-blockers-part-one this post probably won't make much sense.
Warning 2: If you are already sick of me posting about roller derby you probably should stop reading now.

Blocker 2

Well to put it simply this blocker is Chronic Atrophy of the Vastus Medialis Obliquus Muscle.  
Google it if you want to. 
Say it fast five times in a row if you can. 
Basically it means that since surgery a long long time ago my left thigh muscle is pretty stuffed.  It shouldn't be.  I should have done all the exercises the physio gave me at the time and got it back up to strength.  In fact if I'd done all the right exercises to begin with it's highly likely I would have avoided surgery all together. 
Instead I took the 'easier' option - I adapted my everyday life to accommodate my weak muscle so that I didn't notice it's weakness.  Let me explain - when I go up stairs I lead with my strong leg and put all my weight on that.  When I get up off of the couch I use my hands to push me up and so on.  So over the years the weak muscle has actually gotten weaker, or 'wasted' to use the proper term.
I cannot possibly continue to do roller derby with a weak thigh muscle, I have to strengthen it or I will never get good enough to take part in a bout.  
Thinking more about this I realised that I take this approach to a lot of things in my life.  And that's probably okay for awhile, until I do something where I have to use the weak part.
For example, dealing with depression.  For so many years I just ignored any weakness in my mental health and adapted my life accordingly.  When it all got a little too much I would hide away for a few days to rest and recover.  
Then I had children.  Technically I was diagnosed with postnatal depression but I know it had been there for awhile.  It was just that there was no way to adapt being a mum around this particular weakness so I had to face up to it and start getting better, stronger.  
I worry about other areas of my life where I could be tempted to sweep any weaknesses under the carpet.   
Like my relationship with my children.  I can probably wing it for quite a few years and not really connect with them or spend quality time with them but I can guarantee that any weakness here will show up when they become teenagers!   
Or what about my relationship with my husband?  With three young kids it's pretty easy to ignore any weaknesses here and push them to the side.  But do I really want to discover a few years from now when we hit a rough patch in life that our marriage muscle has wasted away?  
Pretty sobering thoughts really.  
So tonight I am going to do my leg lift exercises, then I am going to take the time to read my children a bedtime story and then I might actually talk to my husband.  
Man this training for roller derby sure is hard work!