[poledanceromance]

Worth mentioning too that even if you have the adapter mounted to the ceiling, you can still take the pole itself up and down very easily. The mount will just stay up there on the ceiling when you take the pole down.

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I can’t see the pic, but if the beams themselves are super sturdy then using the adapter like veena suggested is the best option. Being bolted into a sturdy beam with the vaulted mount is a very secure way to mount the pole.

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I am having this exact problem at my new house. I'm assuming your issue is the same as mine, that you have a truss style ceiling structure where those thin 2x4s for joists are all joined using those metal plates so you don't have solid joist structure in the ceiling like you would if the "ceiling" was the floor of the floor above you. Using a larger board (idea would be to span at least 4 joists) with grip tape on it should distribute the load so you don't have to screw into the ceiling and it shouldn't exert as much upward pressure on the joists when the pole is under tension. The option of using the vaulted or permanent mount for the pole is also a good option because the pole doesn't require as much tension to stay up when you use the permanent mount, so it's mostly lateral (side to side) force you are exerting BUT doing that still puts all the force on one joist. The happy medium is to secure the permanent mount to the large board itself, and screw the large board into 4 joists. 

[poledanceromance]

After four years of pole dancing, neither of my parents had ever seen what I do. They struggled with the notion of me pole dancing and didn't really know how to take it although they tried to support me even though they had never actually seen it. When I was cast in Girl Next Door Chicago, I asked the cast whether I should invite them to the (very sexy but also very powerful) show. Everyone said I should and Natasha Wang told me "you'll regret it if you don't." So I did, on very short notice, and they came that very night. I chose not to tone down the sexy for the show and tried to really go for it…I figured, they won't be able to deny the strength and skill, so if they don't like it, whatever, it's not FOR them. 

I didn't have to worry, though. Both my parents loved it and I feel they supported me even more after than they did before. The cast went out to greet the audience after the show, still in all-black lingerie and heels. That's what I was wearing when I saw them after the show, and they barely batted an eye before embracing me in a big hug and telling me it was fabulous. 
It does depend on your relationship with your parents. If they truly love and support you, I say give them the chance to do that with pole. They may surprise you. 

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I did live in Decatur for several years and taught pole there for a while. But I moved back to Chicago last year to go back to school. I used to drive to Michelle Mynx’s studio in St. Louis as korinne said…I HIGHLY suggest you do that when you can. I also agree that champaign might be a good option, as I believe they do have some workshops/public stuff.

I don’t know any instructors in Decatur right now. But a few of my former students still live there and I might be able to connect you with them. I’m Anna May on Facebook, if you want to add me there.

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Loving the ideas! Keep em coming! Lyme did you ever write up a description of how you did your floor?

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Keeping my face dry. I don’t usually wear makeup when I pole because when I work out my face sweats a lot. Honestly the rest of me sweats a lot too lol! But I have to keep a towel around to wipe my face. If my face is sweaty it just makes me feel sweaty all over. I swear my pole sessions are shorter due to slipping when my face is sweatier, there’s some connection there. I only wipe at the sweat on my body if I feel like its dealt hindering me. But my face, constant wiping.

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I forgot to also suggest that you find out if there are any law schools nearby. Most of us have clinics where you can get legal assistance for free from upper-level law students who have a license to represent you in court. Usually these clinics specifically help those who don’t have the resources to hire an attorney for a civil issue where you won’t have the right to an attorney. That would be a great potential option for further advice on this if you have that option near your area.

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Law student here. You might not need a lease for this issue. One of the most basic protections in landlord/tenant law is the warranty of habitability, and a majority of courts have found heat to be a part of that. Moreover you wouldn’t have to have a written lease to legally qualify as a tenant for these purposes. As a month-to-month tenant the law may not require you to have a written lease because that agreement is not subject to the Statute of Frauds (a requierement that some contracts be written down). If you wanted to and had the resources, you could take him to court and have a good case. If you won, you could potentially get a court order that would force him to install working heat, as well as potentially a legal remedy I.E. money.

However taking him to court for that would probably cost you more in financial resources and time than it would take you to find someplace else to live. I know that’s not what you want to hear, but while you might win in court this really is one of those situations where it may be easier for you to find something else. If you are near any colleges, you can often find graduate or serious undergraduate students who want to share living expenses on Craigslist or other local rental websites.

Because I am a law student and not a barred attorney however, you should not take this as legal advice pertaining to your specific issue. This is just a law student’s explanation of some of the basic rights you have as a month-to-month tenant. If you want actual advice or assistance for this, definitely contact a fully barred attorney specializing in landlord-tenant law.

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Lately I have been primarily a mobile user since I don’t have Internet at my new house yet lol. So I’ve been almost exclusively browsing with my iphone on 3g. But I’d be more than happy to spend time combing through the new mobile version if that would help.

[poledanceromance]

Just to make this explicitly clear. It was mentioned that you have to turn the power off before removing the light fixture. This does NOT mean just flip the light switch off. You can be electrocuted and you CAN die. You have to find the breaker box for your house. The switches should be labeled but turn off the switch that is marked for the room your pole is in, or test turning them off until you find the one that shuts off power to that fixture. Once the power is cut so the light won’t turn on from the fixture, you can safely remove the fan and put caps on the wires. Each wire should be capped individually- DON’T wrap them together and don’t just use electrical tape. Get the end caps and screw them on each wire according to color (there will be 3 colors.)

If you search YouTube for “removing a ceiling fan” there’s a couple how-to videos that you can check out to make sure you have everything you need before you start.

[poledanceromance]

I can vouch for dirty girl poletice for excessively sweaty skin too. I have used it and I really like it. When I’m dry, a LITTLE , rubbed in, followed by a dab of dry hands seems to give me some good stick. Something about that combo feels pretty good to me when I use TINY amounts of both.

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I get this from my dad, but I am a believer in epoxy. An epoxy for plastic from the hardware store comes in what looks like two syringes stuck to each other. You squeeze it out, mix it together with a popcicle stick and slather it on then stick the pieces together. It actually bonds directly to plastic at a molecular level, essentially welding it together, meaning you won’t get the pieces apart without breaking them. It’s cheap, they make them for every possible material and it is the strongest glue I know of.

[poledanceromance]

I follow a somewhat similar schedule. I don’t usually pole more than a few days a week but often when I do it’s a long session. I agree with what others have said that as long as you’re not feeling signs of overuse or injury, and you’re not working multiple hour sessions at the top of your ability on repeated back to back days, and your health is generally good with no relevant injuries or conditions to hold you back, you can probably keep your schedule without a problem.

[poledanceromance]

Also I think it’s important to have a balanced pole diet. This is how I plan my serious pole sessions and I think it’s a good flow:

Warm up time- range of motion and muscle activation exercises. 10 minutes-1hour or more depending on how long and intense the pole session will be/what the goals are. (for me an hour+ warmup usually means back bending goals for my pole session and/or a multiple hours long pole session).

After the warmup, a very intense, upbeat cardio pole freestyle. Spins, transitions, sweat.

Pole moves. Working tricks. Practicing old tricks a few times, breaking down new tricks or executing them repeatedly to get them comfortable. Pole should be hot from the first freestyle.

Strength drills. Sometimes the lines between the tricks work and drills get blurred for me and the meat of my session is a mix of the two. Don’t tire yourself out completely on strength drills before you work new pole tricks…just tossing that out there…bad things lol.

Slower, controlled, lighter intensity cardio and flexy freestyle.

Cool down stretching. If you want to do deep stretching…now is the time.

Just a basic structure I think probably a lot of people use…

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Another personal perspective on diet. I can get to a place where I can work out enough to eat pretty much whatever I want. But I will be at the top end of my weight and rather soft looking. For me to be at the low end of my weight and lean looking, my diet has to be well under control. And for me being at the low end of my weight makes a difference in the impact I feel and the control I have in advanced inverted moves. Pole feels easier to me at 120-125 and leaner muscles than it felt at 140 and with bulkier muscles.

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Happy to report that my long, long, LONG time nemesis (talkin three dang years) move, the flag lift, is officially cracked and in the bag, where it will have to be pried from my cold, stiff fingers. Woohoo!! LOL! 😀

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Ohhhh yes now THIS is talkin my language. This is what easily 50% of my pole practice time has been devoted to for the past year or two and I’ve seen so much growth from doing it. Can’t wait to film this one…what a great way to get back to open movement after primarily using my limited pole time this summer for crafting and rehearsing my Girl Next Door choreography.

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Just updating my post to say I'm now a SECOND year law student so I guess it didn't kill me 😉

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I'm really sorry, I'm not trying to be argumentative it's just something I believe in really strongly. I apologize if I offended!

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I politely disagree. There are some basic standards that all piercers should follow. Autoclave use is the first and most important. Internally threaded jewelry is one, metal quality is another, minimal use of clamps is another as well, and any qualified piercer should also know about proper saline soaks and how to mix them. There are also some very basic safety thresholds of medical knowledge in piercers that you can look for as a client as well- for example if a piercer tells you to put neosporin/antibiotic ointments on a piercing, that would be a piercer to definitely think twice about as they literally aren't reading the instructions on the tube that say not to use it on puncture wounds. It's common medical knowledge that piercers should be expected to adhere to.

I agree that there is variety in preferences from piercer to piercer even at the forefront of the body mod industry, but in terms of best standards and practices for piercers in general there are some bases of knowledge that clients can and should use when evaluating who to choose because they are basic thresholds for the industry. If you read journals and periodicals out there written by and for industry artists, those standards are commonly discussed. I wholeheartedly agree with the "ask your piercer advice," but only where the piercer is competent. And I just try to provide some advice on what those minimum standards are so that people know what questions to ask to determine whether a piercer is competent and whether the service they received was safely provided. In sum, yes there is variety, but not on an infinite scale. I don't personally tell people to just ask their piercer if I don't know anything about the piercer. Maybe he doesn't even have an autoclave, doesn't even wear sterile gloves or keep a sterile field for piercing. If I don't know that, I won't just say ask the piercer, I try to talk about what the basic industry thresholds for a clean, safe piercer are. If they meet those standards, then the person can know they are totally safe in following that person's medical advice. 

No offense intended. I speak from a place of over a decade of involvement in and study of the body mod industry as a whole and I try to vigorously defend the position of those who fight for the base standards of the industry. There are a lot of people piercing who dangerously do not follow the most basic of common medical and industry knowledge because there is basically no standard regulation or licensing for body mod artists- the community still has to define those for itself right now. Sorry, this touches on a passion for me. 

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Congrats on your new piercing! Here’s some notes on aftercare that may help you. You should NOT use Epsom salt to soak. You SHOULD use non-iodized, sea salt to make natural saline. The proper concentration to match the salinity in your body’s cells is 1/8 of a teaspoon to one cup of warm water, preferably distilled water gently heated although tap water boiled and cooled then gently heated to body temp works too. When you soak in this manner you are promoting the exhange of fluids across the cell barrier in your body’s cells. This helps prevent infection. In addition, using warm water increases blood flow to the area which speeds healing time. You can do saline soaks throughout your piercing’s healing and it will only do it good. You can also do the soaks if a healed piercing becomes aggravated for any reason.

You should NEVER use triple antibiotic ointments like neosporin on a piercing because this can actually cause infection. The ointments say on the label they are not to be used for puncture wounds because in the deep, dark inside of a puncture wound-which is what a piercing is-the ointment creates a moist environment which actually promotes the growth of bacteria.

In addition, one of the biggest factors in properly healing a piercing is jewelr quality. Initial jewelry in a standard navel piercing should be an internally threaded, curved barbell, not a ring. You know if your jewelry is internally threaded if the post with the threads is actually coming out of the ball and screws into a hole in the end of the post. Externally threaded jewelry is threaded on the post and screws into the ball. These are inappropriate for a healing piercing because they require you to drag the threads through the healing fistula. For the same reason if you were pierced with a ring and told to turn it, you should never turn a ring in a healing piercing as it will tear the developing fistula. In addition, the big concern with jewelry is that the metal must be implant grade or many people will have reactions to the metal that can look similar to an infection but are not. This means surgical grade stainless steel or titanium. The two biggest known companies that manufacture such jewelry are anatometal and industrial strength. You can find jewelry from both of them on bodyartforms.com.

Based on what you’ve said, and if you find that these aftercare instructions differ from what you were told, you may be able to find a piercer who is more knowledgable in proper aftercare to look after you until its healed. Generally a good rule of thumb is to call up a piercer you are considering going to on the phone and ask whether they use internally threaded jewelry in new piercings. If they say yes, odds are good they keep up their studying of best aftercare practices! If they say no or don’t even know what internally threaded jewelry is, that piercer is sadly the sort who does not bother to keep up their study of the advances in the industry on piercing technique and aftercare. Another good question to ask is whether they use clamps for most piercings. A good modern piercer does not use clamps because the clamps cause trauma to the tissue that slows healing and because they have developed their free hand technique and don’t need them to get a good straight piercing.

Good luck! Feel free to message me with any questions. I have just a tiny bit of experience with this stuff lol. 🙂

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Brilliant!!

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I should add that if you go that route you’d want to get it running in your pole room about half an hour before you pole to give it a chance to do its thing.

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Does your pole room have a door so it can be completely enclosed? If so, running a dehumidifier as well as air conditioning can lower the humidity significantly.