Marilia’s Powerlifting Blog

As soon as it got here, Gilson said: “too big”. It was my first Titan Fury and it was 36. He said: “I told you… I told you it was 34, you insisted in that sissy conversation with them, giving them your measures and all…now it’s big”. I felt embarrassed, but I actually couldn’t totally believe him. The shirt felt really wonderful. Finally, he looked at me and said: “ah… well… good to start getting used to shirts, anyway. Let’s go.” With that “big” shirt, I lifted 72,5kg officially and did a 75kg lift that went invalid in the South American Championship – but it did go up with power. A 82,5kg lift almost did so too, but I couldn’t finalize it. So: it WAS BIG, but it helped. 

With time, however, it became too big and loose. In my last three championships, this was very clear: first, it fits wonderfully in my friend Erica, who is bigger than I am about 3 or 4kg – maybe not arms, but certainly chest. Second, it became too easy to fit and it “looked” big. Third, I noticed my carry-over plummeting: my raw lifts were getting better and nothing happened to my equipped lifts. Then, in my last championship, the one I was really sick and small from diarrhea, I noticed I was doing raw lifts with the shirt. My love story with that shirt was over: time to let go. I said good-bye to it, sadly (it was a very good companion), and gave it to my friend Edilanio. I had already ordered a 34 shirt and my sister would be receiving it soon, and then sending it to me in Brazil. 

It arrived last week and I was really happy: finally, I would be doing equipped lifts again! When I got to the gym and exhibited my new toy, everybody looked suspicious: “will this little thing fit you, monster?” My god! Did I get too big in the last week?? Another friend looked and said: “I think they are manufacturing smaller 34s”. No: I will resist these comments. I remember well the first times I used any shirt – it felt weird. I remember fainting at the National Deadlift Championship because of a bad fit with my suit. Which I dress alone today. And I remember seeing male friends squeezing each other into unbelievably small shirts – they DO FIT, always. And this one would. 

It did. The question was: will the bar go down? I did a couple of sets with lighter weights and loaded the bar with a still light, but hopefully “lowable” weight of 65kg. I pumped it a few times half-way and started finding the chest point to lower it. No way: I felt like I was doing up-side-down rows and couldn’t manage to get the bar right. I was not going to lose it though: I think I insisted with that weight, “watered” the seams and asked the guys to fit my deltoid better about 10 sets until I finally did it. Got the right chest point. So I started adding weight: 70kg, pumped a few half-lifts and then 2 or 3 sets of about 3 or 4. Then Gilson said: “enough with the pumping business: get down to it. Full lifts or nothing.” 

I did one with 72,5kg – easy as hell. Another one with 75kg: up as a rocket. Gilson said he expected our work to finish at about 85kg. However, I suddenly felt VERY sleepy and tired. I looked at the couch and all I wanted was to curl up there and rest. When I went for the 80kg, it went up, but I didn’t finalize it. There was no energy left to fuel it. I did curl up at the couch until Renatinho, my workout-buddy, finished his part and then we left. I never slept so well in my life as I did that night. 

Great shirt! 

Richard reminded me that I have been absent from this blog for two weeks already. It has been a while – I had lost count of the time. Strange times, these have been. 

My last post was an account of a dehydration episode. I had an incubated virus infection and the doctor had warned me that it could still develop into a full blown infection, and it did so. Two weeks ago, on a Thursday (5^th of April), I woke up feeling miserable, with a terrible headache. Soon I started feeling chills and weakness. I had a temperature and my pressure was falling fast. My brother took me to the Emergency Room, where I was examined and medicated. In the following days, the virus infection evolved. I developed diarrhea and lost about 6 pounds. I had one week to recover for the State Powerlifting Championship, qualifying for the Brazilian Champs. I couldn’t write, couldn’t work, couldn’t eat and couldn’t train. My head was bursting with pain and all I could do was lay in my bed and moan. For days, I tried to convince myself that performance was made of actual strength – made of good training and feeding – and mental strength, and that the latter counted more. I knew, however, that I had lost a lot of power. 

I did win the open and master State Championship, and certificates for the best movements. I won my place at the State team. The marks, nevertheless, were mediocre – the worst in months. I had lost so much weight and water that my Bench Shirt felt like a T-shirt. Or a pajamas. Totally useless. 

That was the Championship where I really felt like a winner: at each movement, I thought I wouldn’t make it, but I did. I went to the bathroom eight times before the first squat. I got to the third deadlift and celebrated. With my classification, I helped my team win the team trophy. I am really proud of what I did. 

I am a woman and I am small, so I lifted first thing Saturday. Sunday was basically eating and helping day. It always feels so good to be among our friends – we are a very close community, Brazilian powerlifters. Leaving Guaíra, that small town in the country, was depressing. We arrived in São Paulo at 4AM, tired and worn. 

Monday, when I opened my e-mail, I saw it before I read the newspapers. Friends sending links of the horrors in Blacksburg. Most of them knew I had done my post-doc at Virginia Tech and had friends there. Some knew how important it had been in my career. It was from Blacksburg that I became the first Latin American social scientist to be nominated as a director of an International society in my field. 

Still somewhat stoned from exhaustion and sleep deprivation, I looked at the pictures in the digital version of all the newspapers. There it was: Lane Hall, the building where I studied and worked. My office window. Right beside the site of the biggest mass murder in American modern history. 

It still doesn’t feel quite real. I remember that bucolic rural environment, the silent and calm days when I walked my daughter to the school bus and went back to run between fields and pastures. The small bat I touched in one of these tracks, the wildlife and the PPL Therapeutics transgenic cows lazily grazing around. Hyper high technology and wild Nature in the Appalachians. 

My friends and I met at weekends to bake a duck and drink home-made beer. In the Summer, Blacksburg smelled of fermented prunes and apples. 

I was happy there. I lived in a place called Foxridge Apartments. There was a weight-room near my apartment. It was an old and basic Nautilus multi-station. That is where I learned the basics of weight training. Alone. I bought two books about “strength training for women”. For some reason, I thought there were significant differences I should know about. Somewhere in this computer I should be able to find the drawings I did to remind me of the order the exercises should be executed. There was also a weight-room at the women’s locker room, at the University Gym. I could never figure out why it was there (at the locker room). I saw it when I changed to swim – in the Winter, I swam and in the Summer, I ran. 

I moved to Blacksburg in 1996 with a seven year old daughter, alone, leaving an ex-husband and a life with pre-established plans. Blacksburg was the beginning of the unplanned, unknown and dangerous paths I would track for a decade. And also my earliest thoughts into what became my salvation: strength training, bodybuilding and powerlifting. 

Today I am not an academic anymore: my work is basically related to physical activity and nutrition. My daughter is a College student herself. She studies here, in São Paulo. Everyday, we have breakfast and she goes to school. I feel safe, feeling that she is comfortably sitting at her desk, having calculus or atmospheric science classes. As all the parents of the dead kids in Blacksburg probably felt. 

Today, my heart is with them. 

It has been a week since I’ve been to the Emergency Room and was diagnosed with an underlying virus infection. According to the doctor, it was enough to drive me into dehydration (together with an unacceptable and irresponsible behavior on my part by not drinking enough water or eating enough carbs) and other annoying symptoms, but not a full blown infection. It could either develop into that or go away. 

Wednesday, I had two significant sources of professional stress. One really, really bothering. More than bothering: I lost control, I wanted to kill the mediocre b* (the editor) that blocked my story in an interesting magazine here, out of sheer enviousness and a stupid power play. 

This same day I had my last heavy training day before the State Championship. Because of one of the meetings, I did it in two sessions: one Bench Press and the other Deadlift. 

Tuesday I woke up feeling like s*. It got worse along the day and by noon, with a recalcitrant headache, I decided I had to eat. Went to the diner near by and I felt so miserable that I went into my friend’s drugstore and asked her to measure my temperature and blood pressure. I had a fever and the blood pressure was already falling: 90 by 50. I had blurred vision and was dizzy as hell. Got home – I don’t know how, driving – and called my brother, who took me to the hospital. They were wonderful and confirmed I had a virus infection and had to stay home for a couple of days, but will be able to take part on my competition. 

I feel embarrassed to admit I thought I was dying. I called my coach (and brother, and best friend, and partner) and said funny things to him. Called my boyfriend and said something like last words. Tried to get hold of my daughter to tell her I love her. Really – no joke. 

My resistance to pain is exceptional. My physicians always make fun of me, saying that if I show up out of regular visits, they know they have hard work ahead. I don’t cry, I don’t whine. However, it has been 10 years since I had a fever. Five years since I had a headache, and it was nothing compared with this. When I feel dizzy, it is because I s* up with carbs and all I have to do is get some dextrose and K+. This time I watched my body dissolving into something unknown, and I really didn’t know where it was going. 

I found out my worst nightmare is WEAKNESS. Internal… External… Whatever. I have a real hard time coping with things and aggressions out of my range of reaction. Food for thought…