Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Dare I Hope?

I didn't make it to any judo or aikido lessons this past weekend...and despite my best efforts, I was not able to do a Judo/BJJ "study group" with either of my nephews. My wife went out of town, so my 14-month-old daughter and I chilled out all weekend.

Before my wife left for her trip, I asked her to let me try a triangle choke on her (I had just watched the Gracie Combatives lesson for it). I always bother her like that , haha! "Let me try this armbar..." or "Try this choke on me..." Sometimes she indulges me, sometimes not. She was packing her luggage and didn't have time, but she said "I'd like to learn that one when I get back". That was different! Normally, she will participate to help me out, or simply to humor me, but never expresses a desire to learn. Back when we trained in aikido together (at my previous dojo), she was really into it - she loved it! It was like pulling teeth to get her to try it out at first, but the more she did it, the more she liked it. Since we stopped (due to her high risk pregnancy), and especially after our daughter was born, she's had better things to do with her time, so her interest in aikido waned.

I think she's interested in learning a few things in the event she needs to defend herself, and the triangle choke has obvious applications for a woman defending herself from a rape attempt.

So do I DARE hope that this may be the beginning of a renewed interest in martial arts? I don't want to get my hopes up, but it's difficult not to. I'll definitely be nurturing her interest though.

1 comment:

  1. Heh - yeah, I've been hoping for something similar with my gf. Despite all my reservations about Gracie Combatives, they did at least motivate my gf to do some grappling with me at home. If those DVDs do nothing else but finally fire her interest in BJJ, I'll owe Rener my thanks. :)

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