ballet and my inner child

I have begun taking ballet again. I used to be in a class until I was 10 or so, but gave up because my coach was super mean (according to my juvenile abilities to reason). She took it upon herself to make sure all her students were designed for a Russian ballet company. At eight years old, I couldn't value that. I just wanted to hop around a play. My first class as an adult was last Wednesday. It was so much fun, albeit, very hard work. In the beginning we did stretches and warm-ups at the barre. We plie’d, we pointed, we flexed. The students and instructor were incredibly down to earth and there to have a good time and participate in healthy exercise. In the second half of the class we did pilates with a ballet twist on a mat. It was so freaking hard. I’m going to have legs of steel at the end of the quarter, no doubt. I was telling my therapist about how I restarted ballet and she thought it was interesting. She was engrossed in the fact that I am trying to recreate my childhood as an adult. For instance; taking riding lessons, getting a horse, starting ballet, finally getting my Breyer model horse collection from my folks’ along with my flute (all these being childhood yearnings, activities and hobbies). She said that because of certain things I was exposed to as a youngster, I never really got to experience my full childhood. To help me get a better idea of what she was saying, she explained that I have this little 4-7 year old Ashley inside of me that wants to play and be joyful. Apparently I am mothering and nurturing this little Ashley by putting her in ballet, getting her a horse, painting and drawing with her, basically everything I enjoyed at that age. This made me feel a little sad, but also very thankful that I am self-aware enough to realize what I need to heal and have the support of my husband to do so. If riding my horse and doing plies’ is helping me heal, then by all means, let the healing begin.