CTS and some general questions

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[mrmookid]

Hi all. I'm new to Aikido. Studied Karate around 10 years ago for 3.5 - 4 years. Then managed to work myself in to horrible shape. I've always regretted leaving martial arts and thought about starting again for years. Finally I had enough 'regrets' and joined an Aikido dojo. I've been to class 5 times so far.

One of my biggest problems is my memory and lack of coordination. I always seem to mix up which foot goes forward, which side to get up from after a fall. When my Sensei performs the moves in front of class I try hard to pay careful attention. By the time it's my turn to perform I forget the entire thing. Fellow students are patient and friendly but I wonder if I'll ever get some of these things down. I don't think I can properly perform a single move that was shown to me. I'm just wondering if this is normal. I'm patient and stubborn so I'm going to keep coming back, even if I end up holding the record for the slowest advancement!! :)

My other issue is that I have Carpal Tunnel Syndrome (I've been working with computers all my life). In Feb of this year I had surgery on my right hand. I still have issues with pain in both hands but I think I'm going to skip the surgery on my left hand. I'm wondering if anyone else here has had surgery for CTS and if they study Aikido. I've been taking it slow and haven't had much difficulty with pains but I'm just concerned that a few years from now I may still have the symptoms and that it will hinder my training.

Many thanks and best wishes to you!

[aikidoc]

I have CTS as well and the stretching helps my wrist. I try to keep people from cranking on my wrists (stiff joints anyway).

Don't be too hard on yourself after 5 lessons. In the beginning we have to train ourselves to move from unconsciously incompetent to consciously competent to eventually unconsciously competent. It takes time. We've all been there.

[Janet Rosen]

One of my biggest problems is my memory and lack of coordination. I always seem to mix up which foot goes forward, which side to get up from after a fall. When my Sensei performs the moves in front of class I try hard to pay careful attention. By the time it's my turn to perform I forget the entire thing.
Heck, after 8 yrs I still have classes like that!
Consider that aikido is a language. There are phonemes, words, sentences, paragraphs, poems and essays, and there are structural rules (syntax, grammar) that interrelate them.
As a beginner in a new language, not only don't you know the rules, you may not even know what represents a phoneme vs. a sentence, what is structural and what isn't, AND you are trying to figure this out both with eye/brain and with muscles--no wonder we get confused!
Be patient with yourself, don't stress about memorizing stuff, take each technique and each class as it comes.
And you always have the fallback line "Oh, you mean my OTHER left foot!"

[GaiaM]

Keith,
You will definitely get your feet mixed up for many years to come but your body WILL start to learn many of the movements and they will start to "flow" more with time.
I've been training for five years or so. Tonight Sensei called me up at the end of class so he could demonstrate the ukemi for the last technique we had practiced. He asked me to do the technique and all of a sudden I had absolutely no idea what i'd been doing for the last ten or fifteen minutes. Oh well!
Don't be hard on yourself and just try to get your body to do the basic movements. Eventually they'll become a part of you...
Best!
Gaia