I'm not just like any other girl — I'm a boxer. I am a normal girl outside the gym, sure. I have feelings. I like to dress up in pretty dresses. Sometimes, I even like to do my makeup.
But once I walk into the gym, all bets are off. That's when the girly girl in me goes away and the wraps and the gloves go on.
You are trained that it is, acceptable to crawl.
It is acceptable to puke.
It is acceptable to cry.
It is acceptable to take a break.
But walking away and quitting is unacceptable.
It's funny to me though that, throughout society and throughout generations, women are told and trained to talk quietly and to never forget to carry lipstick. But that stops here and now. This generation is built for raising young women to be fighters.
It's weird though — you give a girl a pair of gloves and suddenly she's "intimidating" to guys.
I never understood that.
The gym is my home and the people in it may as well be family. A dysfunctional one maybe but none the less a family, that loves one another and will do anything it takes to protect each other. It's a place where you can go and, you know you can shake any stress you have away.
Because the way you came in is not the way you will leave. You came in stressed frustrated and just pissed off at the world but you are leaving that gym and putting all of your anger and frustration on that bag, and you leave it all on the mat. When you leave, you are a completely different person.
You had an "attitude check" and now you are really you, you are leaving that gym with a smile on your face.
Boxing may not be for everyone but, that doesn't mean everyone shouldn't try it.
Even if you just try it once.