Let's get ready to rumble

My husband and I behave like 12 year olds on a regular basis.  I subject him to mandatory cuddling and anonymous heavy breathing phone calls.  He locks me out of the house in the snow.  I host family meetings in the bathroom while he's trying to go to the bathroom.  He performs whole monologues as if it's a psychotic crotch talking.  It goes on and on.   And it's the norm.

One night recently while surfing Pinterest and seeing one too many tall skinny drinks of water doing some crazy difficult yoga pose, I got it into my head that I wanted to see if I could do the bridge pose.

Do not be fooled.  The weight of the upper half of my body is entirely supported by my giant melon sized head resting on the floor.  My legs had the lower half under control.  The wet noodles I call arms not so much.

And if there's a question of physical prowess taking place anywhere within a 1 mile radius, the Italian Stallion is on the scene to demonstrate his proficiency and crush your soul.  I took a good 2 minutes figuring out how to hold my hands and how I was going to leverage my booty upward and what limp noodle muscle was going to do it.  He just pops right up into it and all but back handsprings up out of it when he's done.  We get it.  You have muscles.  Blah blah blah.

Some people might segue directly from bridge pose to some more restful soul searching relaxation type poses.  We're insane in the membrane so naturally we got right up on the bed to get our wrestle on.  Back before we had kids, this was just the stuff of legend we'd laughingly chat about later with friends over dinner.  Now that we have our own personal paparazzi, this magic is documented in pictures while she's laughing at us. She's nine years old and can recognize the train leaving the station for crazytown and that it should be captured for eternity. 

We join our heroes in the midst of battle.  Much like our dog.   

I'd pretend he smelled food or something but truthfully we just have dogs wandering through our lives.  Why should a wrestling match be any different?

My husband is strictly forbidden from using his superior strength against me.  Unfortunately his strength has little to do with his ability to evade which is also above average. This time around he went with the classic avoidance technique employed by children everywhere that involves going limp and sliding down and off the furniture. Well played, my friend.   

I countered with the classic hold on maneuver.   That's cool.  Just enjoy the ride.  Go with the flow.

Your opponent is going to count on you to give up at this point.  But you're already on the train.  Go with it.  Why give in now?  The night is still young!  Use the opportunity to get your arms under and around and lock your hands together to solidify your position.  Because, in your head, you're winning.   And that's what counts, isn't it? 

Then you wait them out.  Eventually they will get tired of their face in the filthy carpet.  When you're standing up, your carpet never looks or smells that gross.  When your nose is literally in the middle of carpet fibers, you'll realize it's time to vacuum. 

This is also a good time to get your hand around his head.  There's a lot of vulnerable places to work with up there.  Exploit them.  Gently. Or not.  He's a man! He can take it!  Kidding.  Maybe!

You're grown adults rolling around on carpet by this points.  And if you're down there anyway, why not utilize the opportunity to get some stretching in?  I am to physical therapy what George Costanza was to Architecture. Which is to say, I like to periodically claim I know what I'm doing.

Lean in to it.  Yes, your knee is supposed to crank to the side a bit.  That's good for it.  Trust me.  I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night. 

I call this the lean into it.  It involves trying to touch his forehead with his knees.  It helps if you have a random dog come by to make out with the patient.

Your patients will appreciate that you care enough to really get into your work.

Finally, just crank the patient's butt off the ground as high as you can.  Feel free to recruit your kids to each take a foot.  This move is excellent for those hard to reach places including your upper lumbar and parts of your spine most trained professionals never think to work the kinks out of. 

The more dogs you have up in the patient's face the less likely he is to notice that you are about to shove him through a reverse somersault.

But remember, kids.  Don't try this at home.  Because you're a kid and you're not supposed to be doing that.  You are supposed to be standing over your parents laughing at what idiots they are.  Feel free to photograph it so the whole world can see while you're at it.