I’ll Be There Forever

I admit that I mess up a lot. Life doesn’t come with a manual on the correct ways to handle every situation and I stumble my way through most of them like a comatose patient emerging from a paralytic state. I honestly don’t know how people choose to be seen with me in public some days as I am literally just guessing at life and kind of winging it, but yet, here we are. Throw another human being into the mix and now it becomes even more complicated. Everything I do or say can have adverse reactions on the children in my life and every day I am becoming more consciously aware of the eyes I have upon me emulating my actions or impacted by my words. My boyfriend’s kids are almost grown, which means there was a large chunk of their lives I was not present for, including some pivotal childhood years and the vital transition into adolescence. I came into their lives when they were old enough to decide for themselves what or whom they liked or disliked and they both had already developed the foundation to their personalities of the types of adults they would grow to become. So, as much as I want to impact them for the better, what I do is more of a test to my character and attributes than it is to them. I can impart little inflections here and there, but I must remember that the greatest thing I can do is to be a decent role model and be there for them. Leading by example has never rang more true, and it is to this standard to which I must hold myself to when comes to how I live my life.

My family means everything to me, and yet, it is a concept I struggle with constantly. Am I being to strict? Am I being too lenient? Should I allow this? What if I forbid that? I shouldn’t have raised my voice here. I should not have let this slide etc. Basically, I always feel like I’m messing up and screwing off more than Jenna Jameson on a busy day, only with a lot less confidence and a lot more tears. Coach me from the cage and I can execute a skillset efficiently. Coach me to “parent” kids and my brain functions as effectively as a 3 legged racehorse. And of course like the masochist I am, I greedily scourge social media, admiring the posts of the parents who seem to have the picture perfect lifestyle where every decision they make is flawless and parenting is simply a breeze. Lies, I tell you. How can they be so adept at mothering, always so perky and upbeat with perfect hair and makeup while their children happily flock around them and nothing is amiss!? I generally live in a perpetual state of busyness and am lucky to not resemble the perfect reincarnation of Sloth from the Goonies as I run after the kids making sure they have everything they need and screaming “heyyy you guys” in (mock) representation. It’s a wonder how I haven’t completely messed them up but I have their wonderful father to thank for that. Apparently not only can he grow the most magestic beard imaginable, he’s a damn great father too and I am so lucky to have his help on this journey.

Winning a fight is one of the greatest feelings imaginable, but nothing, and I literally mean nothing, compares to the feeling of seeing the faces of the kids afterwards. Every time I have won a fight, my heart swelled with indescribable emotion when I saw the pride on their faces. One of my teammates managed to capture some film from the last fight in which you can see both of them sitting cageside and watching intently. When I sunk that choke in, there were screams, applause, and jubilation as they jumped in their chairs and I think I probably replayed that video a dozen times just to soak in their reactions. They got to come into the cage afterwards, and I hope they felt my love and gratitude with every fiber of my being when I hugged each of them. I hope everyone gets to experience the type of love I felt that night. Nothing will ever mean more to me than sharing that moment with Jacob and Aaliyah and I am still reveling in that emotion constantly. I thought I knew what love was before they were in my life, but I have never been more happy to be so woefully ignorant and mistaken. I’ve got the type of love tales get told about and stories are written for, and it’s all because of one family who decided I was worthy enough to be a part of.

As much as I err in life, they still love me. Because of them, I work harder every day to be a better fighter, a better coach, a better athlete, a better role model, and a better person. I will make mistakes again, but I will never stop trying to do better by them. I’ve earned their love and respect and that is by far the greatest victory I have achieved to date. In the MMA world, there are people who want me to sink to their level on the basis of trash talk and insults, but I have young eyes looking up to me and I won’t have them thinking life has to be so cruel. I let my fighting do the talking and I will let my parenting do what’s right. Try as I may, I simply might not be able to change the world, but I can effect MY world and that is about as good an impact as any. And though I haven’t been there from the beginning, I can promise I will be there until the end and every step in between. A battle in the cage is where I live my dream, but the family I have is where I live my reality, and honestly, it’s so damn good I don’t want to miss out on a moment. I’ll continue to traipse along this parenting path daily, but I’ve got the best people in the world to catch me when I inevitably stumble and fall, and to that I say nothing more than thank you from the bottom of my heart.