[Music] foreign [Music] friends welcome back to my channel did I edit that opening segment just so I could feel cool because I mean frankly anything looks cool if you clip out the good parts then put cool music to it yes yes I absolutely did so this is a video that I have been simultaneously really anxious and ridiculously excited to share with you guys for quite a while and something that I've mentioned in passing before but I've never really done a video on is the fact that I do Jiu Jitsu without a leg and without a prostheticon there are precisely two reasons why I'm making this video primarily I am just so thrilled to be able to share this part of my life with you because it is a part that is such pure joy and freedom for me which we'll get into a little while later but secondly I really wanted to spread kind of the awareness of the sport anybody in my audience listening anyone who's ever considered it regardless if you are able-bodied or not this is a sport that just about anybody can participate in and what it is done for my life for my brain for my mental health for my body too is something I will forever be grateful for okay so a few years ago I walked into a boxing gym in a really bad part of town in Colorado Springs things to join a friend for a free class they were offering and from the moment I walked in those doors it was home now this is actually before I lost my leg and I trained an MMA boxing wrestling Jiu Jitsu Muay Thai and then you know actually fighting in MMA and that was an amazing time of my life but unfortunately my body started giving out more and more my ankle got bad the stuff that was going on with my brain wasn't great getting hit in the face not the best thing for either of those situations so I stopped doing all of that but occasionally I continued in Jiu Jitsu so in particular I practice Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and if you don't know this is a very high intensity sport it is really good for real life situations as well there are no strikes in this sport but it was all submission based so chokes arm bars wrist locks things like that and I really tried to stick with this fort because I loved it but as my ankle got worse and worse that became so incredibly painful to do so after I lost my leg it was always my intention to get back to Jujitsu I knew that you could you know roll and even compete as an amputee but to be entirely honest it did really freak me out to even like go back to my gym in the the first place previously I had some level of athleticism and knowledge of my body and now I'd be going back feeling like I knew absolutely nothing that took me a minute to get over and though I tried a couple times I didn't really begin to dive back into this fort until a couple months ago towards the beginning of the summer I realized that I needed something to do to get my brain off of everything that I was feeling to distract me and so I committed gosh darn it like it or not I was going to go back at least three days a week and now months later I really feel like I'm starting to get a grasp on my body in a fight without a leg so here is the coolest thing about Jiu Jitsu I know I'm absolutely nerding out about this but it just excites me so much this might sound cliche but it's not about what you have it's about what you do with what you do have I am an amputee meaning that there are a lot of moves that I can't do or have to be significantly modified so someone might look at me and think that's a big disadvantage in the sport right not necessarily as I've worked with my coaches and continue to learn about my body I realized really quickly that it's a disadvantage definitely in some ways but it is absolutely an advantage in other ways there are certain passes and moves that we've come up with that would not be possible if you had another foot on the end of this little oven and oh my god it feels so incredible and empowering to be like I am now going to use this as a strength against you to a consenting and willing rolling partner so in just a bit we're gonna head to open Matt you're going to watch me roll with some people kind of see how I do it and then we're going to be heading up to Denver to meet my buddy Stevie you may have seen him in some of my recent shorts but he is a left below the knee amputee and actually competes in it and I'm gonna trade with him for the first time which I'm so excited about but first before we properly dive in a quick word from our sponsor a big thank you today to our sponsor cometeer this is a completely new format of coffee that I've never tried before prior to comment here but oh goodness it is delicious their coffee is flash frozen to lock in freshness commentatorships monthly boxes are delivered straight to your door filled with delicious coffee Creations tailored of course to your flavor preferences it's super easy to make them all you need to do is keep the capsules in your freezer and simply melt into the beverage of your choice hot or cold even though it was now fall time Colorado decided to have a warm day assignment with iced coffee I love how convenient it is you can make any coffee style really easily with no mess and great flavor today was my first time trying their mocha Java flavor undertones of dark chocolate and Cherry don't mind if I do when you are ready for some coffee all you need to do is take the capsule out of the freezer run it under some warm water soften it up and then create the coffee beverage that you're looking for for a limited time you can get 20 off each of your first two boxes of comment here shipped directly to you when you use my code shown on screen at checkout if you have been wanting to try a comment here now is a great time thank you so much to comment here for some delicious coffee and again for sponsoring today's video now let's get back into it of all of the things that I've been able to do since I became an amputee this is the one thing like I don't feel like I'm held back by the physical limitation that I have yes there's a lot of additional adjustment and learning the fact that I can learn my body so intimately to know how to use it correctly for attacks and defending in the sport which is not a you know soft and gentle sport these are oftentimes really hard battles and being able to like hold my own against people in my own Division and every once in a while go up against people who are bigger than me and still be able to win though of course that's that's rare I'm very much new to this and coming back to it so you know I get beat 24 7.
Jitsu is also very good for your ego because it crashes it down to it a very thin powder because someone's always gonna know more someone's always going to be a little bit better than you now just speaking as someone who has experienced sexual assault and abuse the way that Jiu Jitsu has reconnected me with my body made me feel like it's my own again and also given me some really good real world effective tools you know heaven forbid anything ever does happen but if it did this is something that I train over and over and over again so I definitely at a minimum feel better prepared walking into any kind of self-defense situation quick note on that also as a visibly disabled woman the rate at which you are at risk for being attacked or assaulted is quite High compared to national averages like like we're just targeted more and and having history in that anyways that has always made me a little bit uncomfortable a little concerned and so continuing to train in a combat sport where you're not training a single move the same way every time but it is dynamic and based on what someone else is doing and how they're coming at you and being able to respond to that definitely provides a little bit of comfort now I always want to add the caveat here that no matter what you train no matter what you practice with martial arts or self-defense it is a Scary World out there and so when I say that like I feel better prepared in any situation I'm also aware of the fact that I am still a fairly small woman there are a ton of variables so I think it's all about increasing your chances of being able to get out of some kind of bad situation someone else has put you in enough Chit Chat let's go to the gym from a few hours ago I want to show you my time in open map how I roll what that looks like navigating the gym and the mats without a leg is this just an excuse so I can show you more Jiu Jitsu footage yeah it absolutely is let's do it when I show up on the match the first thing I'm going to do is remove my prosthetic leg oftentimes people ask me if I train with it on and honestly I can't there isn't range of motion but more than that there's metal parts and pieces that could hurt you know the people I'm training with so I take my leg off and I also switch out the liner because you sweats so much during Jiu Jitsu I don't like using the same liner I'm actually walking and I kind of keep them separate so I put on the second one and then I am ready to go so first of all I started with some drilling this is just kind of going over technique slowly when someone isn't actually trying to fight back too hard so you can get the motion down I was working on starting and then going to someone's back getting an arm bar from there and kind of rolling off something I can do actually pretty quickly I'm not even sure if my leg being out of the way helps I just know that this transition works well for me so we're working on this over and over and over again before actually doing some live rolling live rolling in Jiu Jitsu is when you are actually just going for it is a match you are trying to choke the other person out avoid getting arm barred find a wrist lock whatever it might be and this is me training with my friend finchy he is a black belt and is amazing he's a great partner because you know he'll give me some resistance but also lets me work on stuff so I've been working on some of these passes where I can get around people quickly because I don't have a leg in the way this is one of my favorite roles it's so so fun also you might see me wearing different outfits one is called ghee where you're kind of wearing the big pajamas and the other is nogi in ghee you can use the other person's clothes against them you can choke someone out with their collar things like that but honestly I would much rather do nogi in this one you can't you know grab on other people's clothing it's a much faster game it feels a lot more agile and Speedy and I honestly just absolutely love that so while I do train gee because it's a good idea too nogi will always have my whole heart after about an hour and a half of working with training Partners to drill and roll it's time to get off the mats and I go through the same process in Reverse I take off the liner that I use for jiu jitsu I take that home and clean it well get my prosthetic leg back on and head out and I will say it took me a while to get comfortable doing this change in front of people I don't love showing my residual limb uh in real life I pretty much keep it hidden at all times there's always something covering it and so to get comfortable enough in my gym to like leave it uncovered took a minute but now I'm at the place where I just don't care and no one ever cared anyways that was my day to open that but now let's head up and train with Stephen good morning it is a beautiful cold rainy Colorado day which is very rare and I'm on my way up to train with my buddy Stevie in Denver so we connected through social media and I found out that he also does Jiu Jitsu I'm a blue ball I've been doing it for like a lot of years but with a lot of breaks so I'm out of practice but I've never trained with another amputee I'm really interested not only to see how it'll go if we're going against each other but more importantly tips tricks modifications to moves how competition goes for him because I've had some questions about that because I'm thinking about competing also Steve is like an absolute Beast so I'm a little intimidated to roll with him let's see if I can get a guillotine choking but chances are I'm I'm I'm gonna lose it's good for the ego though it's good for the ego all right let's get some 2000s hip-hop popping up in this place I will never say that again [Music] so I got up here safely we did an hour-long class and then for the fun part live rolling I want to make something very clear here um I'm showing you a few Clips out of like 25 minutes of video and they're the clips when I look like I'm holding my own just to be clear I wasn't Stevie is a fantastic competitor a very strong person his pressure and passing and submissions are absolutely amazing so yeah he uh he ankle logged me like seven times I'm pretty sure he got an arm bar and choke I did get one lucky Guillotine but that was it and then I got to sit down and talk with him about his experience of Jiu Jitsu I do want to say real quick that the audio when we were in the gym was not great as there are other people around so I have put captions on screen that should help with the understanding okay so I've been up treating Denver with my buddy Stevie check out his Instagram we have something in common both ridiculously good looking fantastic humans very talented also missing legs um I've been training Jiu Jitsu for three years now just under two years now and did you started after you lost your life it's sorry I started about six and a half seven months after uh came in tried it out after the first class I fell in love with it yeah so something that I really care about making this video is I believe in Jujitsu is a killer sport for anybody but also especially if you if you are dealing with lung loss or some other kind of disability it can be modified for for your body like we both we both trained two leggers all the time but it's like it's it's a strength and a weakness like literally anything and so you just adapt your game for your style anything in particular that you've noticed like train Jiu Jitsu as like below the knee antutam thing that you feel you're better at I think you're working on kind of thing um definitely it took a a lot longer to work on my guard retention but as below the knee of tea on like a single leg um now that I practice it a lot I've noticed my guard retention's gotten a lot better it's easier to slip it in and stuff like that I mean obviously there's a ton of mood like things that I don't do that often and a lot of my moves are modified but having the like you know a shorter leg definitely becomes a can be a benefit you know in a lot of ways and that's another thing they they always say Jiu Jitsu is for everyone in that and that is so true because you can modify it to you know not even if you're like have like a permanent disability but you're dealing with injuries you can like work around it and figure out something that works for you which is just I love that about it but it's not it's not like a martial art that you just absolutely destroy your body in two years you had a good two years but then you messed up like you did too I know people who are training they're 65.
I'm competing without a leggings you guys do you have to start standing up if you get a grip on the other person is that how that works yes like you get to choose the grip you want and they have to do it even you know it's a cross color or you could cross is been great thank you very much that was an absolute riot I was absolutely destroyed well done Stevie you won this one thank you so much for joining me to hear a little bit more about Jiu Jitsu a sport that just lights my little soul on fire like I said I think it's an incredible sport for anybody to check out look into a huge thank you again to our sponsor for sponsoring today's video a big big thank you to all my patrons over on patreon for making this channel possible and most importantly to you watching this video right now thank you so much for spending a few minutes out of your day here with me today hearing me be a happy little nerd about something that I like it could be anywhere else in the world doing anything else and you chose to hang out with me for a little bit and I really appreciate that I love you guys I'm thinking about you and I will see you in the next video bye guys [Music] foreign
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