Recovery Behind Bars: Handle Bars That Is

Gathering for Group Ride #2

As I start living life as it happens after turning the corner, my ongoing recovery from workplace abuse continues to just get better and better.

A significant part of my journey of recovery post workplace abuse has been regaining pieces of my life which were an integral part of me before all the junk in the workplace happened.

Writing, knitting, reading, cycling.  They have all been a part of the whole process of recovery.

Today I'm focusing on the part of recovery which involves cycling.  Something I wanted to do but thought I couldn't after the debilitating chronic/physical affects kicked in in the Fall of 2011.  Balance being the most critical challenge but, but by no means the only one.

After falling off my two-wheeled, Raleigh Grande Prix in the middle of a busy road, I realized that I would have to say good-bye to something I loved.  Something that made me feel free and whole again.

But then ... me  being me ... I began to think of ways to make cycling happen again.  Me being me, I researched things on the net.  I already knew that there are adult trikes both upright and recumbent.  I also learned that there are both stabilizer and adult training wheels.  Stabilizer wheels being fitted close to the rear wheel and about the same diameter as the rear wheel.  Adult training wheels being ... well ... adult training wheels.  Just like the ones on children's bikes only bigger.

Armed with this research and a good idea of what I wanted to do on a bike and what I needed to do that, I went into several local bike shops.  Only one paid me any attention.  I owe all that's happening now to them.

I've written and posted pictures about my adapted bike which I have now named Freedom Hope because that's what she gives me.

I discovered though that having a bike I can now safely ride was only the beginning.  Learning how to ride a bike again was also a beginning.

However, there are challenges in the area I live in:  traffic, hills, one way streets just to name a few.  I wasn't able to fulfill my ambition of taking a nice ride into Uptown Waterloo which is only about 5-6 km or riding in the country due to some of these constraints.

Sigh.

Gathering for my first group ride ever
at the Cataract Trail in Ontario

This is where the Great Cycle Challenge comes in.

 I discovered it in 2016 on my Facebook feed.  It is a self-directed ride to raise funds for research for pediatric cancer at Sick Kids in Toronto.

By self directed, I  that the individual rider chooses his/her own routes, challenge distance and challenge sponsorship.

One thing that has always held me back on these kinds of things is that with my "altered abilities" especially the fatigue, I could never guarantee I could be at a certain place, at a certain time, on a given day and ride a set route consisting of a set number of kilometres.  This challenge gave me the flexibility and the control that I needed.

So with fear and trembling I signed up for my first Great Cycle Challenge in 2016.  My goals:  50 km/$50.  Both of which I wasn't sure I could meet.  Both of which I not only met but surpassed ... which surprised the heck out of me.

It was good.  Very good.

I signed up again last year and this year with slightly higher goals.

Each year I've seen significant gains in my progress both in my overall journey towards recovery and in my comfort as a cyclist on the road.

This challenge has challenged me to cycle both inside and outside the box.  To find alternate routes to get in kilometers around the area in which I live.  It has challenged me to set what I call "goals within the goal".  Personal goals I hope to meet at some point while cycling.  At this point, some I've met; some I've yet to meet.

This year, the challenge has added something new.  Group rides.  As the Great Cycle Challenge is usually a solitary thing unless you're part of a team or whatever, they decided to instigate these group rides so that if people chose they could meet each other and develop a sense of camaraderie.

This year for the first time in seven years, I was able to commit to being at a certain time, at a certain place to ride a certain route - on an adapted bike no less.

I did it.

Note: a group ride has never been on my list of goals for the simple reason that I never thought I could do one.

Group ride #1 was on a bike route which created from where railroad tracks used to be.  It's relatively flat and something I not only can do but have done. As I expected, I was the cow's tail, but that was OK.  I challenged myself and rode 26 km on a set route - a multi use trail part of which goes around Bellwood Lake near Fergus, Ontario.  My longest bike ride ever - even when I was young and healthy.

I was happy.  My only wish was that someone would have waited for me to arrive at the "finish" line to celebrate my victory.

Freedom Hope and the "gang"

So I geared up again for group ride #2, a road ride starting at a car pool parking lot.  Something I had wanted to do these last years and thought I would never do.

Challenging hills, hills and more hills.

 I did it.

But not without a lot of support and encouragement from the rest of the team.

Introducing myself as the "challenged" rider, they seemed to accept me as a bona fide, valued member of the team.  Not a handicap.

I was never left alone to ride by myself this time as I had been on the first ride.

Someone was always either ahead, aside or behind me.  Encouraging me up those hills.  One lady even biked beside me up a hill and when I started breathing heavily coached me on breathing - which helped a lot.

At another point, these incredibly supportive people even let me be in the lead.  I felt protected.  I also felt accepted.

I even heard a comment behind me when I was in the lead about hills being easier when you go slower.  Wow!  That blew my mind.  And made me feel appreciated.

Allan, a grandfather from the first ride in Fergus, Ontario with his grandson
(group ride #1)

It's also been neat meeting those people I've read about on GCCCanada posts or on threads.  One man on a thread said he was riding his grandfather's 40 year old bike.  He and his bike were there on group ride #2.  Last week on group ride #1, I met a man who wrote a jingle for the GCCCanada last year and had been featured on one of their posts last year - which just happened to pop up on my Facebook feed this past week.

And so I leave you dear reader at this point to enjoy these photos, to savor the victory.

Victory "high five" with another rider
- the man riding his grandfather's bike

The long and short of it
- or "short and sassy" meets "lean and mean"

I came, I met, I cycled

I am woman.  Hear me roar.