Don’t let sinusitis take you off the mats

Don’t let sinusitis take you off the mats

Yep, it’s that time of year again, and no I’m not talking about the holiday season. I’m talking about the weather changing and getting sick season. Different illnesses seem to plague would be mat rats and leave them side lined frustratingly from training. One of the most common ailments that hit the guys here in Louisville and in the Ohio Valley is sinus issues.  I feel like every year between November and December our class size shrinks temporarily due to people getting deep chest coughs, congestion, sinus pressure headaches, etc.

Below is a recipe that I stumbled upon a little over a week ago. When I found the recipe I was experiencing a pressure headache and I was coughing up green and yellow junk! I looked online for natural treatments and found this. Now I am not going to say it will cure everything instantly or that it will work for everyone. What I will say is that after only drinking this concoction once, I was instantly relieved of my pressure headache. Then the following morning I found that my phlegm went from thick green to thin and clear and that deep pressure in my chest was gone. I still had a bit of congestion but I didn’t feel sick and it was no longer affecting my training. I’ve continued to drink this mixture once a day over the last week and I definitely feel much better. I’ve also given this recipe to a few of my students and it helped them out.

Anyways, if your being affected with sinusitis then give it a try!

Ok, enough talking here is the recipe. . .

Tomato Tea

2 cups of tomato / veggie juice (v8 or anything like that)

2-3 cloves of garlic

1 Lemon

Cayenne Pepper

How to make it

*Crush the cloves of garlic.

*Put the 2 cups of tomato juice into a saucepan.

*Slice the lemon and squeeze the juice into the saucepan.

*Add as much cayenne pepper to the mix as you can tolerate. . . the more the better.

*Throw in the crushed garlic.

*Heat everything up in the sauce pan till it gets close to a boil, and then pour it into a big cup or mug.

*Drink the mixture slowly being sure to let each gulp sort of sit on your tongue for a second before swallowing.

Also. . .

While researching natural treatments to the sinus related stuff I also came across the use of apple cider vinegar to help thin the mucus. When your mucus is thin it makes it easier for your body to cough it up and get it out of your system before it sits and becomes infected. I ended up taking a teaspoon a day along with the tomato tea. If you do end up buying some apple cider vinegar, be sure that it has the “mother” in it.  This can be determined by looking at the bottom of the bottle. When you look, you should see a sort of sediment lying on the bottom that moves once you shake the bottle.

Lastly

If you are not already doing so, make sure you are drinking lots and lots of water!

Hope this helps someone who is currently feeling a little crummy! It’s cheap, natural and effective.

Why I got started in Brazilian Jiu-jitsu

What got me started in Brazilian Jiu-jitsu?

In my last blog post I talked about how my students and I took a moment after training to share our reasons for taking on this sport. Well, while I was talking with my girlfriend she asked why I didn’t share my story about how I got started. I thought about it and figured it would be fun to share what actually got me started in BJJ.  Now before I can jump into Brazilian Jiu-jitsu I have to start with why I got into high school wrestling which would eventually lead into BJJ.

I was a chubby kid who got beat up

So all of this grappling and athletic stuff was sparked by an event that happened when I was in 7th grade. While it had a profoundly negative effect on my life at first, I am glad it happened because without it I am not sure if I would have been drawn to wrestling.

While walking home one day from school I was followed and eventually jumped by 3 teenagers ranging between the ages of 16-18, I was 12. They punched me in the nose and struck me with a bat which hit my arm. During the attack I suffered a broken nose and a fracture in one of the bones that runs through my forearms. I had no idea who they were or why they chose me, but the event had a huge impact on my life. First off I began to gain a considerable amount of weight because I was afraid to do simple things like go outside and walk or ride a bike. When I would go outside I couldn’t help but feel like everyone was a potential attacker. I also grew scared of confrontation because I was terrified of being attacked like that again. When I younger I had gotten into plenty of young boyhood scraps and had stood up to my bullies. This event was different though and it had absolutely drained my confidence. 

Beginning High School and starting wrestling

In high school I looked at all the upper classmen who were wrestled and played football. They all seemed strong, muscular and tough which is what I wanted to be. I loathed being fat and afraid and wanted desperately to join in on the sports. Unfortunately my confidence was lacking and I found myself too afraid to sign up because I figured I wouldn’t be good enough. One day one of the coaches asked me to come to try outs and that’s pretty much where I began my high school athletic career. I started first with football and then wrestling. When I started in high school athletics I was around 230lbs and 5’9.

I fell in love with wrestling and I was so mad at myself for waiting so long to start.  I loved everything from the grueling practices that would make the walls sweat to the brotherhood that formed with my teammates. I was also thrilled about the effect it was having on my physical appearance. After only a few weeks I had lost 15lbs and felt amazing.  My first wrestling match gave me my first nickname which was “Tugboat”. When I pinned my opponent in the 2nd period I came off the mat wheezing so hard from exhaustion that it made an almost blow horn like sound, and my coach dubbed me Tugboat.  I would go on to have a moderate amount of success wrestling as a sophomore and junior.

My Senior Year

Toward the end of my Jr season in wrestling my coaches and teammates told me I should drop to 189lbs, and that I would be a beast at that lower class. After the season was over I started hitting the weight room really hard. I had always enjoyed lifting ever since my friend’s father introduced it to me when I was younger as a way to help build some confidence. Once my summer break started I began researching how to eat properly and how to exercise with the equipment I owned. I spent the summer mornings going for runs, in the afternoon I would lift or do wrestling drills. The runs took a lot of will power because I was really nervous about being out and around by myself. I ate rice, chicken, veggies, oatmeal, eggs and choked down protein shakes for the entire summer. One of the things I remember really well was running with my mp3 player and listening to the Foo Fighters. I kept envisioning myself walking off the mat after winnings regionals with a gold medal dangling from my neck.

When I returned to school to start my senior year I was about 5’11 and weighed about 200lbs. All of my classmates were amazed at how I looked and I have to admit, the positive attention was a welcomed change to the negativity I was used to.

That year I wrestled well, winning or placing in every tournament I went to and I became incredibly confident in the process. One added benefit was that I found out my newly developed wrestling takedowns were great against would be bullies.

Regionals

Regionals rolled around as it always does and I was seeded well going into it. I ended up winning my first match easily. Then a terrible thing happened . . . as one of my teammates was close to winning a close match I quickly stood up to my feet to cheer. I had been sitting indian style and when I stood I felt a rip in my knee. My leg locked out and was giving a weird pain that is hard to describe. I kicked my leg forward and felt a pop followed by a quick shooting pain. Slowly the pain subsided but my leg was very stiff and beginning to swell and to make matters worse my teammate lost that match.

I ended up wrestling two more matches and winning regionals, and by the end of the night my leg was swelling and walking was a becoming difficult. None of that matter though, I had accomplished what I had set out to do and I was very satisfied. I had won regionals and successfully improved the musculature of my body. I had went from 230lbs at the beginning of my wrestling journey to eventually wrestle at the 189lbs weight class my senior year.

I was not fortunate enough to repeat the same success at state. A bum knee and ultra-prepared opponents don’t mix well. I ended up losing my last match at state to an opponent I had already beaten three times that year.

When I actually started BJJ

In May of 2003 while I was wrapping up my last year of high school and I had originally planned to join the military but was not allowed to because the United States was now at war. My mother told me she was not losing her only son and would not allow me to enlist. That meant I was now going to be attending college and get an education. The university I was planned to join did not have a wrestling program which was kind of depressing. I really wanted to continue to do something; I wasn’t ready to simply hang it up.

 I had always liked the UFC and was becoming really interested in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. BJJ seemed to mix with wrestling very well and in many ways, looked a lot like wrestling. I eventually began to look up different BJJ gyms that were in the area. I guess I should specify that an actual BJJ gym was either scare or non-existent at the time, and that all of my BJJ training from 2003-2006 would take place in various rooms inside weight lifting gyms. I wanted to compete just like I had done in wrestling, so I contacted an instructor who said he was competition oriented. His name was Mike Yanez and he would become my instructor from May 2003 till July of 2007. Accompanied by my two best friends (who also wrestled) I attended my first class. We went over attacks from side mount and scarfhold. Mike Yanez called them the “triple threat” series and I was during the class at the techniques. I instantly fell in love with the sport much in the same way that I had instantly taken to wrestling. I competed within two weeks of beginning my training and won a silver medal. After that first tournament I was hooked and have never looked back since.

Things to take away from this blog

  1. If you’ve never tried BJJ then you should. . . right now. .  yes right now!
  2. Life has a way of kicking the crap out of you. Sometimes figuratively and sometimes literally! Don’t let your losses define you and instead use the failures and setbacks as a catalyst for further improvement. Failures are merely the seeds of success.
  3. Desire is an amazing force and if you really want something and have the desire inside of you, then go after whatever it is you want.

 

Lastly I hope this post illustrates why I am such a fanatic about the positive aspects of BJJ and grappling, and why I believe what I am doing is more than merely teaching a martial art. The sport of wrestling and BJJ changed my life and took a terrified overweight youth and turned him into a confident man. I hope that I am able to make the same positive impact on my students and friends that my various coaches made on me.

Special thanks go to my BJJ and Wrestling coaches :

Coach Robert Vinegar

Coach Kenny Barnes

Coach Marshall Pomeroy

Instructor Mike Yanez

Professor Colin Cannon

Professor Tommy Wales

Professor Kyle Cannon

Professor Renato Tavares

 

Here is the picture of my first match in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

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BJJ . . .a vehicle for positive change

-Making a difference

Since I started teaching full time in 2010 I have been able to help build up a large BJJ program. Our gym can boast 50+ students in a class, Pan-Am and World championship titles and one of the most amazing atmospheres I’ve ever experienced in a gym. We train incredibly hard and are incredibly supportive of one another day in and day out. With this positive atmosphere and hard training we have also been able to do something just as important as winning titles and recognition, and that is making a positive difference in people’s lives.

A very cool moment as an instructor 

So the reason I decided to write this post is because at the end of our training tonight I had everyone circle up and share their story and why they started training. Each person answered the question about how they had stumbled upon the sport and they also began to share how the sport and the people they met had changed their lives. I didn’t ask them to do this but it just came out of each of them. They shared stories of how they lost weight, met new friends, became good at something, built confidence, stopped using drugs/alcohol and the list goes on. This was an incredibly uplifting moment, and the feeling to know that I get to be a part of that positive change was amazing! The whole time we were congratulating each other on our accomplishments and applauding one another, it was really awesome.

-Kids too!

I used to hate teaching kids. . . then as my kids got proficient at BJJ I was content with teaching them. I mean I loved the kids (partially because I am big one myself) but teaching them stressed me out. Then two things happened that completely flopped that feeling around. One day a student of mine who had been picked on in school came into the gym with a black eye. He was walking toward me with his mother leading the way and I started to think back to a few days before when I had told him a strategy for dealing with bullies. I was really nervous and just feared that maybe he had been hurt or perhaps his mother was mad at me for encouraging her son to fight in the necessary situation. I failed to see that he and his mother were both smiling from ear to ear. All I could see was the big bruise that seemed to swallow his eye whole. Once they were close enough they both hugged me and told him a story about how he stood up to his bully. His mother was so proud of him and my student felt liberated from the fear of the bully. Just for the record, the bully never messed with him again.

Then one day I had a student who had been on the larger side when he initially joined and had lost a considerable amount of weight, as well as getting very good at BJJ. Well, this student came up and hugged me after class was over. I asked him why he hugged me and he told me, “Thanks Mr Chewy for making me good at jiu-jitsu because I’ve never been good at anything before.” This moment really touched me.  These two moments happened very close to one another and made me realize the weight of what I was doing with the children. I wasn’t simply teaching a martial art to them, I was empowering these kids with confidence both physical and mental. I was building their physical fitness and improving their health. I was preparing them for an unfortunate reality of bullies and aggressive kids. Most importantly I was making a difference. This gave a new sense of purpose to my teaching and made me really love teaching kids BJJ.

A most fortunate side effect

When I day dreamed about teaching/coaching BJJ I would often think about building champions and a tough competition school. I was able to help facilitate that with the help of my amazing students and its only getting better. What I was also able to do in the process is help make a positive impact in the lives of so many adults and children and I am so happy about that. However, it was a slight accident. I mean I am by nature a “glass is half full” kind of guy and I think that positivity rubbed off on my students, but I never really realized the impact I would have on others. Again this only possible because of a combined effort of myself and my amazing students.

-Side note to all higher belts

If you are a ranking belt in your gym and aren’t already doing so. . . be POSITIVE!! Lift up the lower belts and help make an incredible atmosphere for yourself and everyone that comes to your gym every single day you step foot onto the mats.Image

Another wrist lock for BJJ

Wrist lock from butterfly guard