I have never been an athletic person. For the first 25 years of my life, I was an absolute slug. That’s not too much of an exaggeration either; I’m not competitive, I’m afraid of the ball, sweating is the worst and I’m not throwing myself towards anything that isn’t a couch. I was the person you really, really hoped didn’t get picked for your team in school. I’ll own the heck out of that.
As I became older though, I started noticing my finely tuned machine wasn’t running as smoothly as I thought. I was pale and tired all the time. I’d be out of breath from walking up a single flight of stairs, and my heart would pump as if I’d just jogged a half mile. I could hold or carry something heavy for juuust long enough to impress the easily impressed people, and then my arms would shake like a small dog for the rest of the day. At no point was I ever overweight, and being skinny gave me a massive sense of false security. You can’t be unhealthy and skinny, right? Skinny = healthy, so don’t worry, that exercise crap is for other people. You take a load off. Enjoy that milkshake.
Around the time I started feeling this really fun sensation in my chest that I later found out was an abnormal heart murmur, I heard some ex-Navy folk at my work talking about “BJJ”. Shortly afterward, they started drilling through some of the motions they were discussing, and my immediate thought was “Man this looks gay. Is it supposed to look like this?” I told them I thought as much because I have zero common sense and a death wish, to which they politely explained what they were doing, why they were doing it, and that they could snap me like a toothpick in about eighteen different places.
They did go on to explain, however, that it’s a good sport and self-defense art for smaller people, something I had always completely discounted. I’m around 5’5″ and small framed; if you put me up against someone that isn’t a small child or a three-legged dog, I’m done. But here I was being told that wasn’t the case. They adamantly insisted that it was something I could learn, despite being sedentary, and despite feeling like a pudgy stick bug most days. I love proving people wrong, so I leapt at the opportunity to do so. They told me to look up some nearby gyms and they’d vet them for me. “Don’t go to that one, they only do no-gi and you’ll be missing a core point.” “Don’t go to that one, they never clean their mats and everyone just trades pinkeye each week.” “Don’t go to that one, I don’t like that guy’s face.” Eventually, I found Gracie Gym in Plano, we made a quick stop in at lunch to vet the place (maybe to look for excessively large roaches, weeping children, who knows) and spoke to BJ and Professor Alex. Both were very friendly and inviting, and reassured me I could totally do this.
Alright. We’ll see about that.
Flash forward about a week till I got my big-boy pants on to go in by myself. I put on my giant gi, tied my belt in a bow knot because I’m smart, and stood awkwardly off to the side until someone told me to get on the mat. As far as intro classes go, it wasn’t bad! I only had to stop and sit down twice, collapsed once and dry heaved, like, a handful of times. I was told the first few classes would be like that, especially since I’d had zero activity in my life previously. And I can assure you, I felt every single one of those milkshakes.
By the end of the class my head was firmly in the “screw this, this sucks” camp; I was sweaty, red-faced, half-dead, and everyone was bigger and better at this than me. But I also found myself annoyed that I was so exceedingly bad at it, and that my first impression was (as it is with many things) to quit. So doing the only rational thing, I stubbornly signed up for a 6-month membership, knowing full well I’d rather chew gum off a sidewalk than embarrass myself like that again. But I showed up the next intro class, and this time I had someone help me tie my belt. I smiled when someone talked to me and took the fact that I looked and felt like hammered crap in stride. I was surprised to find that everyone in the gym was hugely supportive that I was there, extremely friendly and full of smiles. By the end of the first week, I was making two classes and was dragging myself out to the car after each one. After the second week, I was still only making two classes, but I was doing less “dragging” and more “plodding angrily”. Two months in I was making three classes, was no longer out of breath and was able to train two days in a row. Now, almost a year later, I can train four days in a row. I can get a tap out of the occasional opponent. I’m no longer out of breath on stairs, my heart stopped doing the bad thing, I’m eating better to support being able to train more, and I’m, technically speaking, in the best shape of my life.
None of this would have been remotely possible without a supportive team. The moment things got hard, a lesser team would disconnect immediately and leave you to figure things out for yourself. There’d be no encouragement, no smiles, no willingness to forgive the spazzy white belt for their misplaced heels and elbows, and no patience. I can say with confidence that if I had started this venture in a different gym, with a different coach and a different team, I’d be playing video games right now and knocking back a milkshake.
…….I’m still doing that, I just also know I have to be at the gym tonight.
Oss!
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