Lived Through This
Things I Learned Getting Punched in the Face
And why it took me so long to stop
I was 29 years old — old enough to know better — and I stood in the blue corner of the ring with my heart pounding and my gloves taped to my wrists. My headgear muffled the voice of my coach and the shouting crowd, though I couldn’t have heard anything over my own heartbeat. Why I had bothered taking pre-workout was beyond me — my adrenaline might as well have been rocket fuel. Fighting to slow my breathing, I clenched my jaw around my mouthguard, but I struggled to draw enough oxygen through my half-healed broken nose. I might pass out before this nightmare starts, I thought.
I’ve heard great athletes talk about that moment of clarity before a competition when their mind quiets, and they visualize their muscle memory in action. I visualized faking a seizure.
If I’d said yes to boxing because I dearly loved the sport, this might be a different kind of story. I’d always been an athlete, and my siblings each excelled at their martial arts of choice. To this day, grappling, wrestling, and ground-fighting are the love languages spoken among us all (usually while we’re standing in line at Starbucks).
I wasn’t a bad boxer. My timing was sharp, I was strong for my weight class, and my…
