OK, so a funny (funny "huh?", not funny "ha ha") thing happened to me on the way to becoming a better kayaker: I got worse.
Not worse as in my skills have diminished, but I've lost two very important things to a kayaker (not my boat and my paddle): my confidence in my ability to run a rapid successfully, and confidence in my ability to roll back up if I DON'T run a rapid successfully.
I can't really explain why this has happened. It happened once before, back when my roll wasn't nearly as consistent as it has been (until recently, of course). I had two successive bad days on an easy river I had always enjoyed, swimming several times. I got some bumps and bruises, but more importantly, I got a really bad feeling of being out of control and not being able to do anything to help myself. For some reason, it really had an effect on my kayaking. I spent about a full year paddling very timidly, not willing to push myself or to try any moves or skills that might up my risk of flipping. If I did flip, I might try a halfhearted roll attempt, but it was pretty much a guarantee that I would swim. It wasn't until a weekend the next summer where we went back to the same river with a group of beginners that I suddenly snapped out of my malaise. Instead of worrying about my own paddling abilities and the likelihood I had of flipping over, I had a bunch of "newbies" who were swimming left and right or frantically paddling down the small rapids like baby ducklings behind me as I led them to safety down the easiest line possible. A we went along on that river and on another familiar river the next day, I realized that the newbies who were clinging to my stern down the rapids were NOT swimming. That more than anything gave me some confidence in my line-picking abilities. My new river running confidence and some roll practice on very small rivers with current helped tremendously, and I finally got enough courage in my abilities back to start trying the class III Ocoee.
From then until my spring paddling experiences this year, I haven't had any problems. Until about two months ago I hadn't had any swims in, gosh, maybe a about a year? And I hadn't had any real trouble with my roll--I've never had a flip-free run on the Ocoee, but it's never really surprised or shaken me when I've flipped. Then came a trip on the Locust Fork of the Warrior River in Alabama, about two months ago. This was the third time I've paddled that river, and I've always had a great time. I felt good, but I had a surprise swim in the middle of a class II rapid. I flipped and then tried three times to roll back up. The first time, I hit a rock that sent me back over when I was about three-quarters up out of the water. When I tried the second time, I brought my head up early, a cardinal sin in eskimo rolling that is guaranteed to drop you back in the water. The third attempt brought me up just as a curling wave slapped me in the face and prevented my getting any air. I abandoned the attempt and bailed out. I was shocked and a bit disappointed in myself. Later in the day, I had two more combat rolls. Neither was in a particularly rough place, but neither time did I successfully right myself on the first try. I left the river puzzled about my sudden difficulties.
About two weeks later we went up to the Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee for an annual event called Creek Week. There are numerous rivers and creeks in the area, giving paddlers of just about every ability level (except perhaps people who've never been on moving water before) choices to go run. The first day I went with a large group on a class II-III river with more technical rapids (meaning they required more moves back and forth to avoid hazards) than any river I had previously run. I had a pretty good day overall, but I found myself not enjoying the river as much as I normally would. I started doubting my abilities to navigate the rapids successfully. I began viewing each new rock as an opportunity to flip over and find out how shallow and rocky the bottom really was. I stopped looking all the way down the rapids for the best possible route and started only looking at the water immediately in front of me for obstacles to avoid. I got intimidated, and started wondering how much it was going to suck to take a swim. So I pretty much set myself up to do just that, which I did, about halfway through the trip. I tried a few roll attempts, shanked them all (there were a few obstacles that affected the attempts, but that still isn't a particularly good excuse), and punched out. I'm probably lucky I only had one swim. The next day we went to a different, easier river, and I ended up not even running the whole thing because we had a newbie who had multiple swims and required hiking out back to the put-in. I won't lie; one of the reasons I volunteered to escort her rather than continue down the river was because I was nervous about a new river and wondering if I would swim that river as well. The third day I actually opted not to paddle at all, partly out of soreness from my long demanding hike of the day before, and partly out of that same intimidation. I had proven to myself that I couldn't handle creeking and technical water. Therefore I should not try any more of it.
We hadn't paddled since then, despite a few opportunities, and most telling of my new fears of failure, it didn't bother me that we didn't get out there. My husband was angling to run some new rivers, creeks of course since it was spring and the rain-dependent stuff was running, and I was terrified of the thought of running something new. I occasionally suggested some old standbys we'd done before, but they didn't tempt him. So we didn't paddle, and I was secretly glad when the opportunities passed by. Somehow I'd gone from enjoying my hobby to fearing it. Not good, especially for something we've spent so much money and time on.
This past week a group finally committed to going into the Ozarks and running a class II-III creek. I "playfully" voiced as many oppositions as I could: it's too far away, we have to get up too early, it'll be too cold, can't we run something closer, how hard will I have to try, etc. I didn't get my way, and I found myself reluctantly riding along on a trip into banjo country. The trip ended up taking way too long (over 6 hours instead of 4, due to some interesting navigational choices, a small gas tank, and a driver who got lost), and when a few people voiced concerns over whether we had time to run shuttle (get a vehicle down to the take-out so we had a way to get back to our cars after the river), I mentally crossed some fingers. Maybe we'd just give up and go home! I was a little carsick from the windy roads, a lot tired from the early morning wake-up time, and more than a little scared to put on the river. Again, I was already anticipating the beat down I was expecting to get and wondering how many times I was going to flip over. Sure enough, I made it probably less than 300 yards (only into the top part of the second rapid) before disaster struck in the form of one of my fellow boaters suddenly coming out of an eddy right in front of me. I panicked--I'm sure I could've prevented a flip if I'd thought my actions through, but I flinched away from him, which dropped my upstream edge and gave the river the edge of my kayak to grip. It flipped me, right in front of a big rock I had already identified as a major hazard (the current can push you against a large enough rock and pin you there). I made probably the worst roll attempts I've made in a long, long time, and bailed out. As soon as I got to the side of the river, I made up my mind that I wasn't going any further. I was close enough to the cars, and I had a key to our truck, and that was it. I was not going to spend the next ten miles of river swimming every rapid and dragging down the group. Hell with it. So I walked away.
I know everyone I was with was probably really disappointed in me. You know, get back on that horse again, and all that crap. If at first you don't succeed, yadda yadda yadda. I felt justified: it was cold, it was windy, I wasn't "feeling it", and I was ultimately sparing the group from having to shepherd me down the river. The truth is, I hadn't wanted to get on the river in the first place, and I was more than happy to get off it.
So, here's the position I find myself in. I have lost confidence in myself and my abilities. I have started fearing and dreading every kayaking trip. I have ceased having fun. I do NOT want to quit kayaking. This is a hobby I started doing with my husband, and I really like doing this together (well, except for the whole not liking it so much any more). I have made a lot of friends through kayaking that I do not really have much other cause to see and spend time with. I love the scenery and the outdoors. So the question is, what do I do now? How do I get back my confidence? How do I stop focusing on failure? How do I get the fun back?
One friend asked if identifying the causes might help. I really don't know what the causes are. There are been a few things about winter paddling that are different from the summer paddling that I so much enjoy. All the gear that one must wear to stay warm and protected makes me feel claustrophobic and smothered. I had some trouble with this in the depths of my last paddling crisis. I was about 75 lbs overweight back then. It helped to lose weight--my best paddling was after I had lost about 45 lbs. Unfortunately, since then I've put back on 20 of those lbs. Perhaps ramping back up the weight loss attempts will help. Also, summer is just around the corner, and maybe I'll start feeling better about my paddling when I don't have to wear so much gear. I have been wearing hand coverings called pogies to keep my hands warm; they're kind of like mittens that attach around the shaft of the paddle, so your hands are actually on your paddle but covered by something that keeps the wind off. Not as warm as gloves or mitts might be, but you have a better contact with your paddle because you can feel it in your hand. It's possible that they are affecting my roll--I can't feel the air on my knuckles to tell if I'm in the right set up position--I've worn the pogies on the last five rivers I've paddled, and I've swum on three of the five. I bought a playboat last year, and that's the boat I've taken to roll classes to practice with. It's extremely easy to roll, while my river running boat is actually pretty hard to roll. I suppose it's possible I've gotten lazy enough with my roll techniques to "lose" my roll in my river running boat. The group I kayak with had some controversy recently over the efforts of some people to "step up" and get better so they could run more difficult rivers. I got pretty upset by the whole thing. I have this strange issue with believing that I am "required" to do something (for example, I can swim laps for hours, but as soon as someone insists that I do it, like a coach, I don't want to do it anymore). As soon as I perceived that there were people I kayaked with who felt that I NEEDED to become a better boater, I got mad. Maybe I'm regressing just to spite someone. I don't know.
In any case, another suggestion my friend made was to go back to doing stuff that I like, and maybe "step down" for a while. My husband agreed; he said that perhaps going back to rivers I was extremely comfortable on and familiar with and working on fundamentals might be the way to get confidence back in both my rolling skills on the river and my navigational skills. We're planning on heading east this weekend, to the Nantahala and the Ocoee. I don't know of any other Memphis paddlers going kayaking with us that weekend, so I won't have any "performance anxiety" in front of any other people. Hopefully I can spend some time on rivers and find the fun again. I'll let you know how it goes.
