Author: polepegasus

If I were having as much trouble in the pursuit of physical triumphs as I have been having trying to sit down and create some content for this site, I would really have to ask myself what I have been doing with my life. Thankfully I’m actually seeing constant progress as I have been diligent about just taking a little bit of time out of each day to invert. Today was the first day in a really long time that I have actually done a timed handstand with nose to wall, ensuring my shoulders are completely open, my joints are stacked and I am eliminating as much (if not all) of the round from my back. I’m not going to lie, it was a rough 60+ seconds.

Mostly I have just been inverting everywhere and focusing specifically on the free-standing handstand. In early June I joined a Facebook inversion group: 86 Days of Summer Handstands, and in doing so committed to doing a handstand a day for the duration of the challenge. While I may have skipped 1 or 2 days max since the challenge began nearly 60+ days ago, I have made up for it by increasing my number of daily attempts. Now it’s handstands at lunch, handstands at work, handstands walking in the door at home, handstands in the hallway, handstands in the bedroom just before bed, all the handstands! I listen to my body and stop when I’m tired and while my initial goal has just been to achieve a 30 second freestanding handstand, ultimately my goal is just to practice consistently and see what that yields.

So far I am seeing exciting progress! 2 days ago my husband demanded an impromptu handstand for his Twitch.tv stream: Waifu does the handstand and magically made 17 solid seconds, while shifting from a stag to a pencil which is also new. It isn’t something you can necessarily see but I have also noticed that I am finally able to breathe a bit in my handstand without falling. Crazy how a little rise and fall through the chest always used to take me down. If I can just keep practicing who knows what I might accomplish before the year is out.

My final first this week was achieving the supported handstand dead lift. There is a micro-bend in the legs, but they are straight enough for a first success and there is no jumping so I will definitely take it. I will continue to practice and really work the negatives and control my toes descent towards the floor. I was able to do about 2 press lifts sequentially and toes stopped inches from the floor so lots of conditioning to do there. All the same, I feel like it has been 2-3 years I’ve been running around, hitting the occasional practice handstand and spending the rest of the time thinking out it. I’ve managed to achieve more stability in just two months of minimal regular practice than in the previous 2 years. Crazy!

I’ve only been staring at this computer screen for half an hour, only created this site WEEKS ago, only have a million things inside my head and yet trying to figure out what to say and where to start is seeming so terribly difficult. Though I guess it makes the most sense to simply take a logical approach and try to start by introducing myself and sharing a little bit about my life thus far.

While it’s probably not necessary to share all the specific details of my origin story, what I feel is important to tell you is that I have never been very successful or happy in life unless I was devoted to something about which I was truly passionate. Somewhere in my early teens I found horses and that became my ultimate reason for being. If I got good grades or cared about school, it was because that provided me with opportunities to ride and be around horses. If I had free time I spent it at the barn, offering my grooming and hacking skills to anyone with money to spend, just so I could invest in clinics and horse shows and all things equine.

When I wasn’t with the horses, I was thinking about, researching and dreaming about riding. Friends and I frequently spent evenings in the green room of our prep school creating jumping courses with the furniture or running dressage routines. In short, horses were all consuming in the best possible way. Then graduation came…

It wasn’t immediate, the change really forced itself upon me slowly. I tried to get involved with the intercollegiate team at my school but it just wasn’t fitting as neatly into my academic life as it had before. Then after school was no longer a factor, I continued working in equine spaces, even bought and bred a mare. Once baby reached 6 months however, rent on their living space doubled and it became increasingly more obvious that my horses were eating through what little money I had and since I had to work, I wasn’t able to spend nearly enough time with them. I was forced to say goodbye and it took a very long time before I could even look at a horse without bursting into tears.

Now I’m okay with the fact that I’m not riding anymore and though I hope that some day maybe I can have a horse again, I’m happy enough knowing I will never be a member of the U.S. Equestrian Team. At the very least I can say say I have a friend now who has been on the team and continues to ride professionally to this day and I didn’t even meet her through horse related activities. We met because of POLE!

Once upon a time I could not have imagined a life without horses and without them, for a moment, I was lost. The amazing thing was to have found the much needed replacement in such an unlikely place with pole dance. Surrounded by stigmas, personally discovered in strip clubs; even when I finally started taking pole classes in 2012 there is no way I would have imagined people, let alone I, could get so invested, could teach and turn a dollar without taking clothes off (not that there’s anything wrong with that!) What’s more, I certainly could not have expected the friendships, the love and support of pole community; a thing, I again, had no idea even existed.

Now, just 5 years into my official pole journey, pole has taken over my life as horses once did and so you see, Pole Pegasus is born. Though I still maintain “regular” employment because: safety and insurance… it’s pretty amazing that sometimes I can almost see this being my only gig. Bottom line, I had no idea I was going to end up here when the journey began so I am just going to keep doing things and see what happens. I am simply grateful to have something in my life about which I am passionate, which keeps me moving and dreaming and sharing space with the most amazing people.