What is it really like being a dancer?

Every dancer knows the struggle of coming home after school, getting ready for class or practice and then making their way from home to the studio for four plus hours. It feels like there are endless hours in the day but then not enough hours in the day. This is what it is really like to be a dancer…

• You feel every ache from the day before the second you wake up the next morning.
• 10 minute naps in the car before dance are a gift sent from.
• You stare at your fridge trying to plan a healthy meal but then you think about the whole pizza you could and then burn off every calorie later at dance.
• Cleaning out your dance bag is just like looking through a plastic bottle recycling bin. I emptied about 45 plastic bottles out of my bag once…
• A drawer at home is designated for your sports bras, booty shorts, Nike socks, crop tops, tights, dance shoes, workout pants and dance bands for stretching.
• You eat about 10 meals a day.
• You are hungry ten minutes after eating breakfast, lunch or dinner.
• You have a cabinet just for first aid tools, ice packs, heating pads, ankle ad knee wraps and foot soaker.
• You watch dance videos in your free time.
• You have a Pinterest board just for dance related things.
• Laundry day is basically our moms asking, “Do you think you have enough workout gear?” The answer is always no.
• Buying a shirt and saying, “I could wear this to dance when it get older.”
• Getting the occasional, “Dance is not a sport speech, “from boys. But, have you seen my muscles?
• Knee pain, back pain, neck pain, ankle pain, wrist pain, quad spasms, hamstring pulls, ab soreness all comes with using every muscle in your body when you dance.
• We come home from dance and stretch our extensions even after six hours of rehearsal sometimes. Getting the“, Why don’t you just sit down I am trying to watch TV,” from our dads.
• We put 120 percent into everything we do.
• We seem to always be busy.
• We eat everything.
• We dance around the house and the grocery store aisles.
• We have worn more sparkles than Disney princesses.