Dancing's Derek Hough: I'm Getting Better By the Day

Hey guys!

Thanks for your votes and messages!

I'm doing better. My toe and ankle are getting better by the day. I just gotta be careful. Sometimes I'm feeling good, like, "OK, I can put some weight on it," when that's really not a good idea. So I'm trying be patient while doing everything I can to expedite the process. I'm still doing physiotherapy and taking herbs and using topical creams. The only thing I'm not doing is taking painkillers. I just don't want anything artificial. But everything is ahead of schedule, so fingers crossed!

I was psyched to get the OK to dance (a little) this week. Once I told my doctors what I had in mind, they were like, "OK, just be careful." It wasn't about me needing to be in the dance. It was more about, how can we be creative? How can we make lemonade out of lemons? How can we make this a positive thing? The other part of it is that we had the Charleston, which is a looser, less restrictive dance, so it was easier to incorporate me and Andy Grammer into it. But the whole routine is how I view this whole situation. Sometimes when something bad happens to you, you have to go down a different path and you end up finding something new and exciting, so you should just go with it and see what's down there.

I'm not gonna lie though -- the pain of hearing a song and not being able to dance was incredibly frustrating. I choreograph to feeling -- the way it makes you feel, the momentum -- so not being able to feel it and do it was awful. It's a new muscle to get used to. It's also frustrating for Nastia because I'll say something and Sasha will say something different, so she'd be like, "Wait a minute, what should I do?" So sometimes I'll just step outside for a second because I have to know when I'm being productive and counterproductive, and not let my frustration of not being able to dance bleed into Nastia.

I was surprised and very happy we got immunity. We were not expecting that at all. I really think Willow and Mark should've gotten it though. That dance was awesome, and she would still be here. I felt so bad for her and Mark when they were eliminated, not just because Mark's my brother. I was bummed as an audience member because there was so much more potential for them. He came up with some really inventive dances for Willow and I wanted to see what he was gonna do next. I can't even begin to imagine what kind of freestyle he would've done for her.

We have the paso doble and the trio dance this week. They're both going well so far. I kind of wanna do a gladiator theme with the paso. Maybe I'll be Caesar, giving the thumbs up or thumbs down to Nastia and Sasha. I'd totally rock the haircut! I have some ideas about what we should do for the trio. The ideal situation would be for me to be fit enough to dance it with them, but the jury's still out on that right now.

Yesterday, I did something for the first time ever: I watched my first episode of Dancing with the Stars -- the anniversary special! I've only ever watched YouTube clips. I've never watched it at home. And you know what? It was really fun and entertaining! There were moments where I was like, "Is this really that cheesy?" Not in a bad way, just an amusing way, like the holograms. There were some really funny moments and it was a nice trip down memory lane. I was bummed I couldn't psychically be there for the taping. It was taped Tuesday, the day after my injury, and I couldn't really walk that day. It was funny. Someone said to me, "It was weird not having you there." And someone else said to me, "You were all over it!" And I think that's true for all of us. We've all made the show what it is now over the past 10 years. It has all of our DNA in it. Just seeing the old footage and dances, it really hit me. This has been an incredible show to be part of. I'm so amazingly grateful to have had this opportunity.

Last night was also the premiere of my and Mark's HGTV show, Mark and Derek's Excellent Flip. Believe it or not, I love that type of stuff -- cleaning and flipping houses and making them new again. One time, I went to my friend's house to meet her for dinner. And when I got there, I was like, "You know what? Let's just stay in tonight." And I ended up cleaning her place and fixing her curtain rods and all that stuff. I actually enjoy cleaning. It's the same thing with choreographing -- it's seeing something and cleaning it up and fixing it and seeing the results.

Thanks for reading!

Derek
VIDEO: How well do Derek and Nastia know each other?