Hi everyone,

Since it's been awhile since I've written I'll take you back to September when I won Middle Atlantics. It was kind of a weird experience because there were a lot of firsts for me there. I actually drove into the city by myself because my mom had to work and it was the first time she couldn't make it to a competition my whole career. I definately missed her presence at the rink because she always claps for all the little things. So anyway, the short was not too good and I left before the event was over. My coach Steven called and told me I was 5th and I couldn't believe I finished that well. For the long, my mom was there which made me feel a lot better. So much of me wanted to win, but I never skate my program for the gold, I skate to do my best, besides I didn't really think it was possible to pull up so much. Once the event was over I had a feeling I won the long, but everyone else's marks were so close I didn't know where I would finish overall. I think I was in just as much shock as everyone was that it worked out so that I won. This was a real confident booster for me because I would be competing against almost all these girls again at Norths in two weeks.

I put in a lot of extra work between Middle Atlantics and Norths and felt so good. We added two more triples to my program and they were working out fine. I had kind of a shaky qualifying round, but I placed first and figured that it was god to get the bad performance out of the way. I practiced at home on the day off because Norths was so close to home. It went horribly, I pulled the sacriatic joint in my lower back and couldn't stand up straight let alone balance on both feet. So I only made it through some of my elements and went straight to the chiropractor. It felt better on the day of the short. I had a great practice and a pretty solid warm up, but unfortunately I left everything behind when it came time to skate to my music. I was so worried that I wasn't even going to be in the top six. Instead of posting the marks and then doing the draw, they announced the placements as they were drawing for the long. I was so nervous, I felt the biggest relief when I heard I was 4th and then I drew last to skate, which I love! The practice the next day went well, but my back wasn't feeling to well. We talked about applying for a bye, but I was set on competing and felt I was more than capapble of doing what I needed to get through and since I skated last I was going to know what I needed to make Easterns. So we decided to scale the program back. I don't know what happened, but once the music started and I went to jump my body would just freeze in the air. It was a complete disaster. My worst days in practice were better than the performance.

To this day people ask me what happened and I honestly don't know. I have a couple good guesses at things. Being the psychology major, I like to think it was something with my unconscious and I'll uncover before I compete again so this doesn't happen again. Maybe I was too far ahead of myself because I thought at the rate I was going I was going to have a good shot at making Nationals. I just know that some things happen for a reason and maybe this happened so that my back can make a full recovery or I can put some focus on school for a little while and dedicate a little more time to teaching. Hopefully, I can learn from this experience and I'll be stronger from it next year. So, I took a week and a half off and I'm back on the ice again. I'm skating one or two sessions a day right now and taking it easy. I plan on transferring to Monmouth University in either the Spring or for next fall, so I have things that I have the time to take care of now. I will be competing next year and although we haven't sat down and talked about it, I'm pretty sure my first competition will be Cherry Blossoms in April. I really want to keep my programs from this year, I only got to use the dresses twice and I really loved the music. It's not often I feel this way about music and I get such good feedback. So, unless something else comes along, you'll be seeing Spiderman and Samson and Delilah again, but I'll probably rechoreograph a bit so the jumps are arranged better. Even though it's premature, I'm already looking forward to Norths next year because I've never been to Jamestown, NY and I love traveling. Hope everyone is enjoying the fall and I'll write again soon.

Love,
Stephanie