What’s more exciting than getting married? Going on your honeymoon! In alignment with my intention to stop letting fear hold me back and to continue trying new things even though they feel like they’re way outside of my comfort zone, I agreed to honeymoon in Costa Rica. As we planned the trip, we focused on doing a bunch of outdoorsy excursions in the first half and then wrapping up the trip with more of a standard, relaxing honeymoon vibe on the beach. A number of the outdoorsy things we planned were hovering at or beyond my comfort zone, so I thought I’d share the six adventurous activities we did.

We eased into our honeymoon adventures with a guided hike around the base of a volcano in Costa Rica. And when I say “eased into”, I mean we got poured on in the middle of the hike. I was completely drenched before I could pull my rain jacket out of my backpack.  

After the hike, we went to a resort with a bunch of hot springs for some hot spring relaxation and dinner and I wore a bikini with my ostomy pouch out on display for all the other hot spring attendees to see. It was anticlimactic, no one said anything to me and I don’t even think I got many looks, I only noticed one person staring a little longer than normal.

Despite spending an hour or two in the hot springs, I enjoyed the normal amount of wear time for my pouch.  This didn’t really surprise me since I do hot yoga regularly and have spent time in hot tubs before without issues, but I was still grateful that it worked out like I’d been hoping.

It turns out that waterfall rappelling entails some hiking, getting completely soaked, rappelling down steep waterfalls, and zip lining. I was really nervous initially but once we were there and I tried the first one I put my fear behind me and had a blast. The only thing I didn’t like was that they made us cannonball into a pool of water, but my dislike and hesitation had nothing to do with my ostomy and everything to do with my preferences for how I like to enter water (slowly).

Adventure number two was canyoneering/waterfall rappelling. The attire for this was a harness, helmet and gloves, and to accompany my hernia prevention belt, I wore some spandex high waisted shorts and a long sleeve quick-dry shirt.  I wore my hernia prevention belt because I try to wear it when I’m doing activities that involve lifting and core and I wasn’t sure what waterfall rappelling entailed.

Our third adventure was class II/III rafting. At first I was excited about this, but I started feeling pretty nervous after hearing them give us the safety talk.  There was lots of talk of falling out of the raft and what to do to help yourself get saved and again, I like to enter water slowly and falling in was nowhere on my list of things I’d want to experience.  

We wore life vests and helmets, and I wore the same high-waisted spandexy shorts and a long sleeve quick-dry shirt as I wore in the waterfalls. I also wore my hernia prevention belt again since rowing uses a lot of core muscles and I suspected I would probably be so focused on not falling in that I might forget to engage my core like I know I should.  I tend to err on the side of caution when it comes to caring for my ab muscles, so I wear my hernia prevention belt for most fitness-related things I do.

For the fourth adventure, we went caving. With scorpions and tarantulas.  This was my husband’s favorite part of the whole trip though. I was a trooper, but I am not into crawling in tight spaces, in the dark, in water and mud, with bugs.  I am grateful that I’m petite, because I didn’t have to touch the walls very much when we were going through small passageways.

The fifth big adventure was ziplining. I thought I had zip-lined before, but the Fremont Street Experience in Las Vegas, NV is nothing like zip lining through a cloud forest.  I went into this one feeling a lot more confident than I had for the other adventures, but after we did the first “test” zipline I was humbled. The ziplines we went on were so long, I picked up a lot of speed and had to talk myself down as I felt myself getting scared. In the end, it was exhilarating and I would absolutely do that again.

Our last adventure was a lot more my speed, we went to two yoga classes at the beach. The last resort we stayed in offered yoga on a grassy area up against the beach every other day and provided yoga mats.  You know you picked a good mate when they’re willing to do something you like to do, especially after you’ve gone caving for them! The yoga was such a nice, relaxing way to wrap up our trip.

When we were planning our honeymoon I told my husband to book the excursions he wanted to do, even if I was nervous about doing them. I told him that having them booked and paid for would force me to push past my fears.  Each of these adventures had characteristics about them that had me wishing I could eat my words and chicken out, but by the end of each one I was so glad that I hadn’t let fear and uncertainty hold me back. Taking control of my fears like that helped me to realize and admit to myself that it’s not my ostomy that holds me back, it’s my mind.

I know that the above activities might have you question this, but I don’t really identify as a super daring person.  In fact, I’ve noticed that sometimes I try to use my ostomy as an excuse to avoid trying something new that scares me.

Do you ever use your ostomy as an excuse when it’s really something else that’s holding you back?