BLOG 49 RONDA ROUSEY

BLOG 49 RONDA ROUSEY

What an athlete. What a fighter both physically and mentally. After reading her book, Rousey, and seeing her recently on the Ellen DeGeneres show, I felt impelled to talk about this wonder woman. Her unrelenting passion, sheer competitive mind set, and incredible strength, have combined to produce one heck of a champion.

Her book, Rousey, wasn’t the read I was expecting. I figured this is a girl with a talent and she was blessed to win a bunch of fights. But let me tell you, her background story is pretty shocking. At one point of her life, she was living in her car. Her mother had no empathy and was brutally opinionated, her father committed suicide, and her string of terrible relationships, were not the most ideal environment to be brought up with. And what surprises me the most is that she was born in 1987, so she is young. She is a California native, close to home actually in Riverside. She began her life having speech troubles “which impeded her ability to speak an intelligible word until she was 6” (http://www.biography.com/people/ronda-rousey-21319725#childhood). Her father then committed suicide after a terrible back accident that left him in pain from countless surgeries. It was then that her mother introduced her to judo to find an outlet.

Rousey’s judo career shined. For starters, “Rousey was named to the United States Olympic team at age 15, and at 16 she became the youngest American to earn the national No. 1 ranking in the women's half-middleweight division” (http://www.biography.com/people/ronda-rousey-21319725#childhood). From here, “After defending her Pan American Judo Championship title in 2006, Rousey became the first American woman in 12 years to earn a World Championship medal by finishing second in the 2007 tournament. She then won gold at the 2007 Pan American Games, despite a torn knee meniscus. After earning the bronze medal at the 2008 Olympics, she retired from judo at age 21” (http://www.biography.com/people/ronda-rousey-21319725#childhood).

At this point of her life she wasn’t sure what to do. Her judo career hadn’t brought her the happiness she intended upon gaining from victories, she battled with bulimia to make weight classes, and her mom made her enter the real world and get a job and start paying her way. She lived in her car, bounced around various fight club gyms practicing, and worked a number odd jobs to make ends meet like bar tending, being a vet tech, and grave yard shifts at the gym.

But with a background like she had, there was no way she was going to give up. In her book, Rousey, I was drawn to the passage in which she states, “Success is the result of hard work, busting your ass every day for years on end without cutting corners or taking shortcuts. It was Michael Angelo who said, ‘If people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, it wouldn’t seem so wonderful at all’ (Rousey, 2015).

And then it happened for her. Known for beating her opponents in under a minute, “Rousey was the first woman to sign with the Ultimate Fighting Championship, the world's largest mixed martial arts league” (http://www.biography.com/people/ronda-rousey-21319725#mixed-martial-arts-fame). She had a great winning streak, until the unforgettable loss to Holly Holm. It was quite the media spark, but she has since brought even more attention to the loss by revealing her suicidal thoughts after the defeat just this last week on the Ellen Degenes show. Winning truly meant everything to her. After that fight she said, “I just feel so embarrassed. How I fought after that is such an embarrassing representation of myself” (http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/ronda-rousey-november-loss-feel-embarrassed/story?id=35645050). She is currently taking some time off and in a healthy relationship. She is a beautiful athlete who might struggle on the inside, but is ready for the re-match when the time is right. In the meantime she has enjoyed being on the cover of Maxim, being featured in movies like Entourage and the Fast and the Furious, training hard at the Glendale Fight Club, and she is a healthy relationship.

Having a hard exterior doesn’t always mean the interior is the same. Loving ourselves is a tough fight, because we are the hardest opponent to face. I would definitely recommend her book and look forward to her comeback and watching her take names again.