Moving my body more with Ultimate Frisbee

If you had told me summer 2024 would mark the beginning of my Sports Girlie Era, I’m not sure I would have believed you. Nevertheless, this summer I started playing Ultimate Frisbee through the league here in Thunder Bay—and it was everything I wanted from joining up for a sport.

Earlier this year, I was meditating on turning thirty-five in September. As I age and feel more and more how my body has changed from what it was in my twenties, I’m realizing I won’t always have the capabilities I currently have. One day I won’t be able to run, or even walk, as fast. That day is hopefully far, far away—but when it comes, I don’t want to look back and regret not doing more when I could.

So my resolution for this summer was to move my body more.

This is a huge milestone in the evolution of my relationship with my body and how I approach self-care, by the way!

For many years in my late adolescence and early adulthood, I didn’t think too much about my body. The whole concept of embodiment felt rather like an inconvenience, if anything, given how much time I spent in disembodied spaces online or with my nose in a book. The intellectualist and rationalist strains of thinking inculcated in me by my early-onset autodidacticism left me with a skewed hierarchy that placed brain on top of body rather than in balance.

(I should also point out this relationship was also a result of privilege of class and ability and (perceived) gender: presenting as I did with the body of a thin, non-disabled, white and presumable man, I wasn’t the target of as many comments and messages regarding my appearance. My interests and avocation aligned with my sedentary nature too.)

Things change. I broke my left elbow in 2019, and following physiotherapy regained some but not all of my mobility in that arm and wrist. Not enough to really consider myself disabled, but enough to wake me up to the reality that we will all, one day, if we are lucky to live so long, become disabled.

A few months later, that incident and a few others crystallized into the epiphany that I had actually been feeling dysphoria for the last several years (maybe longer), and I started transition. This, of course, has dramatically altered my relationship with my body—for the better.

So here I am, thirty-five and wanting more out of my body and realizing that’s kind of hard as an adult? As kids we just naturally kind of … play. My parents put me in an organized soccer league, which was fine, but after that I didn’t do any athletics. I stopped taking gym after our compulsory Grade 9 credit, and aside from some half-hearted attempts to go to a gym a decade ago, my approach to exercise was fragmentary at best. Anyway, exercise—while a bonus—was not my goal here. Activity—and fun was.

Serendipity struck when someone alerted me to a Thunder Bay Ultimate clinic run for women and nonbinary people to try the game. I never in a million years would have thought of or considered Ultimate Frisbee prior to that, but as usual, everything comes up Kara and the universe provides for me when I need it.

The clinic was successful at getting me interested, so I dove in feet first—more huge growth on this introvert’s part—and registered for the summer league as a free agent. I was put on a team, and from there, I had the best time this summer. My experience was literally exactly what I had hoped to get out of it, and Ultimate Frisbee was every bit as good-spirited, supportive, and inclusive as it had been made out to be by its evangelists.

Prior to trying Ultimate, I had a lot of trepidation about exploring the organized sports scene in Thunder Bay as a trans woman. Our first game, with several new faces on the team, our captain had us go around in a circle and introduce ourselves, inviting us to share our pronouns as well as our names. This small act of inclusion as led by a cis person means a lot to me and instantly made me feel more welcome and set a tone that would carry consistently through this summer.

Similarly, Ultimate as a whole has been working to make its policies more gender-inclusive. The self-officiated nature of play and the sport’s Spirit of the Game philosophy all lend to a less hierarchical, less colonial, more collaborative mindset.

My teammates were all brilliant as well. I just love the energy everyone brought. The more experienced players were supportive of us newbies, offering up advice and pointers while also being encouraging. Speaking as a teacher, I know how hard it can be to give someone direction as they learn a new set of skills, and I appreciate how good everyone on my team was at helping each other.

(As an aside, joining a team sport was a stroke of brilliance on my part, for it’s easy to bail on a weekly workout or run when you are the only one doing it, but this Virgo eldest daughter is not going to let her team down by missing a game unless it’s absolutely necessary.)

When I started the summer league, I was rather adamant about not playing over the winter. I was (and remain) concerned about adding another weekly commitment after work on top of podcasting and the not-insignificant energy I usually expend shovelling, etc., during winter.

Well, tonight I just played my first indoor game, and I have every intention of continuing to participate in the indoor leagues until summer comes again.

In short, it turns out the perfect team sport for this gal does exist, and the twist is that it’s Ultimate Frisbee, and I am now hooked.

Moreover, I have succeeded in my summer goal. I moved my body more. I didn’t complicate it with aspirations to lose weight, build muscle mass, or whatever other fitness goals we often think we need serious adults. If those are your jam, more power to you. But I think as a society we need to recalibrate and remember that sometimes just moving is enough.

I’ve had a very good summer, and I am going to take all the credit for that. I made a lot of good choices designed to make me happier and healthier this summer. Playing Ultimate Frisbee, pushing myself out of that comfort zone when it comes to athletics and being part of a team, was one of the best ones.