My Fight / Your Fight

by Ronda Rousey

  “I don’t think he cares,” my mom said. “He’s dead.”

  Mom tried not to cry in front of us kids. She would come out of her bedroom, her eyes red and puffy. Maria and I cried a lot. I cried so hard I felt like I was going to run out of tears. But Jennifer refused to cry. I looked at her and wished that I could stop. I told myself to pretend he was on a long business trip.

  The night before the funeral, we sat in the funeral home parlor. The place was nearly empty; most visitors had left for the evening and it was quiet.

  A woman I didn’t know told my sisters and me that he looked peaceful and walked out.

  I looked into the coffin. My dad was lying there, looking like my dad. His eyes were closed, but he didn’t look like he was sleeping. His mouth, under his mustache, had been set in such a smile that it looked like he were about to laugh, as though he were playing a trick and the anticipation had become too much and he was about to spring up from the coffin and burst into laughter. I waited. I watched the coffin. I prayed for that moment even after my mom took me by the hand and led me away.

  The service was a Catholic mass. The un-air-conditioned church was hot in mid-August. We sat in the front pew. I heard the priest talking at the altar, but was unable to focus on his words. A fly buzzed over the casket. It landed on my dad’s nose. I wanted to jump up and shoo it away, but my mom was holding my hand too tightly. I hated that fly.

  We rode to the cemetery in a white limousine. Stepping out of the car with its tinted windows, I shielded my eyes in the sunlight. I had never been to a funeral before, but always imagined them occurring on dark rainy days. Instead, it was muggy and the sun was beating down. I stood, sweating, in the black dress that had been bought for his funeral. I tried to fan myself with my hand, as if it would make any difference. It was the kind of day where my dad would have turned on the sprinkler for us to run through. But he was dead.

  My dad received a military burial because of his service in the Army. A soldier played taps on a trumpet and guns were fired in the traditional salute. I covered my ears at the noise. As I watched my dad’s coffin lowered slowly into the ground and out of sight, I felt empty inside. That feeling would never fully go away. The men folded the American flag that had been draped over my dad’s coffin into a perfect triangle and handed it to my mother.

  The flag stayed folded for the next thirteen years.

  TRAGEDY PRECEDES SUCCESS

  My great-grandmother always said, “God knows what he’s doing, even when you don’t.” I agree with her. There is nothing in my life that I would go back and change, even the darkest moments. All the successes and greatest joys in my life are a result of the absolute worst things. Every missed opportunity is a blessing in disguise.

  A loss leads to a victory. Being fired leads to a dream job. Death leads to a birth. I find comfort in believing that good things can grow out of tragedy.

  The first few months after my dad died, I’d wake up and be surprised that the sun was still rising in the east; that people were still playing and going to school. Nothing seemed to have changed.

  I did the best I could just to keep going. Sometimes, it felt like Dad wasn’t home from work yet. Like he would walk through the door any minute, snowflakes on his mustache, and bellow, “It is colder than a witch’s titty out there.”

  Other times, his absence was overwhelming. The sucker punch of stumbling across a half-chewed pack of his Wrigley’s spearmint gum lodged in the couch cushions or a receipt with his signature buried in a pile of papers.

  But after a while, him not being there started to seem normal. I still missed my dad. I still thought about him every day—I still think about him every day—but I knew not to expect him to walk through the door.

  The second winter after my dad died, my mom started dating again. She met Dennis online. Dennis was a rocket scientist. (If you bring that up to him, he will say he wasn’t actually a rocket scientist, but that he worked on the radar that was used with rockets—because clearly that’s a big difference.) Dennis sent my mom a pink fractal for Valentine’s Day. My mom was flattered. I didn’t even know what a fractal was.

  A few months later, Dennis asked my mom to marry him. My mom was really happy, and it made me happy. We moved back to California and in March 1998, just after my eleventh birthday, my sister Julia was born.

  When we moved to Santa Monica, my mom reconnected with some of her old judo buddies in the Los Angeles area. They were guys she had trained with back in the day when she was on the world team. She was the first American to win the world judo championships, but that had been before I was born. Now, one of those friends had started his own club and invited my mom to work out there. One day, I just asked if I could go try it out.

  The next Wednesday afternoon, I hopped in the car to head to judo. I didn’t expect it to be a life-changing moment.

  My dad’s death set off a series of events that would not have occurred had he lived. We wouldn’t have moved back to California. I wouldn’t have a younger sister. I wouldn’t have taken up judo. Who knows what I would be doing or how my life would have ended up.

  But I wouldn’t have ended up here.

  DO NOT ACCEPT LESS THAN WHAT YOU’RE CAPABLE OF

  My sister Jennifer says we grew up in a family where exceptional was considered average. If you got a report card with all A’s and an A-minus, my mom would ask why you didn’t get all A’s. If I won a tournament, my mom would ask why I didn’t win it by all ippons, judo’s version of a knockout. She never expected more from us than we were capable of, but she never accepted less.

  The very first time I stepped on the judo mat I fell in love with the sport. I was amazed by how complex judo was. How creative you had to be. There are so many little parts and so much thought that goes into every move and technique. I love the problem-solving aspect of fighting. It’s about feeling and understanding and breaking down an opponent. It’s not just “go faster.”

  I had been on a swim team for a couple of years. But after my dad died, I didn’t want to swim anymore. Swimming is very introspective. It makes you think about things, and I didn’t want to be thinking about my life. Judo was the opposite of swimming. One hundred percent of my focus had to be in the present moment. There was no time for introspection.

  We hadn’t even pulled out of the parking lot after that first judo practice before I asked my mom when I could go back.

  My first judo tournament fell on my eleventh birthday. I had been in judo for about a month at this point. I really only knew one throw and one pin, but it was just a little local tournament.

  We walked into the building where the tournament was being held. I followed my mom up to the registration table. The mats set up around the gymnasium seemed so much bigger than they did in practice. My eyes widened. I tugged nervously on the white belt that held my white gi top closed.

  My mom sensed my hesitation. After she finished checking me in, she pulled me aside. I expected a pep talk about how it wasn’t a big deal, about how it was just about doing my best, about how I should just go out and have fun. Instead she looked me straight in the eye and said three life-changing words: “You can win.”

  I won the entire tournament by all ippons (an instant win). I was euphoric. I had never really won anything before. I liked the way winning felt.

  Two weeks later, I lost my second judo tournament. I finished second, losing to a girl named Anastasia. Afterward, her coach congratulated me.

  “You did a great job. Don’t feel bad, Anastasia is a junior national champion.”

  I felt consoled for about a second, until I noticed the look of disgust on Mom’s face. I nodded at the coach and walked away.

  Once we were out of earshot she lit into me: “I hope you know better than to believe what he said. You could have won that match. You had every chance to beat that girl. The fact that she is a junior national champion doesn’t mean anything. That’s why they have tournaments, so you can see who is better. They don’t award m
edals based on what you won before. If you did your absolute best, if you were capable of doing nothing more, then that’s enough. Then you can be content with the outcome. But if you could have done better, if you could have done more, then you should be disappointed. You should be upset you didn’t win. You should go home and think about what you could have done differently and then next time do it differently. Don’t you ever let anyone tell you that not doing your absolute best is good enough. You are a skinny blonde girl who lives by the beach, and unless you absolutely force them to, no one is ever going to expect anything from you in this sport. You prove them wrong.”

  I was ashamed that I had been so ready to accept losing, to accept as fact that someone else was simply better than me. The remorse lasted only a second before it was replaced by a more intense emotion. What I felt then was a deep desire to win, a motivation to show everyone on the planet that no one should ever doubt my ability to win again.

  From that moment on, I wanted to win every time I stepped onto the mat. I expected to win. I would never accept losing again.

  JUST BECAUSE IT’S A RULE DOESN’T MEAN IT’S RIGHT

  In sports, there are rules that keep you safe. In life, there are rules that keep the world from descending into total chaos. In both, there are rules that people make up to hide behind or for their own benefit. You have to be smart enough to know the difference.

  There were four major rules in my house growing up.

  Rule No. 1: No taking things out of people’s hands.

  Rule No. 2: You are only allowed to hit someone if that person hits you first.

  Rule No. 3: No being naked at the dining room table.

  Rule No. 4: You are not allowed to eat anything bigger than your head.

  Rule No. 4 was initiated because I always wanted those super-sized lollipops at Chuck E. Cheese’s that were about four times the size of my head.

  Rules No. 1 and 2 were instituted to combat the fighting that tends to occur when you have three children within four years. Rule No. 1 was meant to prevent the hitting that would engage Rule No. 2. Moreover, because Rule No. 2 was structured so that you could only hit someone if she hit you first, you would think it would be a catch-22. It did not work out that way.

  People talk about brothers roughhousing and fighting, but the three of us girls would throw punches, kicks, and elbows and inflict chokeholds that would put the neighbor boys to shame. In addition to our bodies, we often utilized everything in reach. We would launch ourselves off the stairs or furniture in order to gain leverage, taking advantage of the laws of physics when possible.

  There was the time during a fight when—at about four years old—I threw a full can of Coke at Jennifer’s eye, leaving a large gash.

  “What do you have to say for yourself?” our mom asked me.

  “Yes,” I said, pumping my fist in victory.

  And though I hate to admit it, I did not always emerge victorious. I was the youngest, so I did not have size on my side. (Ironically, I am now the tallest of the bunch. My older sisters like to joke they are among the only women on the planet who can claim to have beaten me in a fight. They also say we are now too old and mature for me to demand a rematch.)

  There was the three-way fight between Maria, Jennifer, and I, where each of the thirty-two books of the Encyclopaedia Britannica (A through Z) was either used as a projectile or to whack another person over the head. If any one of us emerged victorious on that one, the joy of victory was quickly tempered by the rage my mom unleashed on all of us upon seeing the aftermath in the living room. After a serious yelling at, we were all grounded and assigned extensive amounts of household labor for the next several weeks.

  One of the last fights was perhaps the most memorable. It was between Jennifer and me. I can’t remember what it was over, but I am sure it was all Jennifer’s fault. I had started judo, but knew better than to use the moves I had learned on my sister. I was more scared of the wrath of Mom than I was Jennifer. We were in the narrow front hallway, which had bookshelves against one of the walls. I was on Jennifer’s back and had her in a headlock. I had the unquestionable advantage and was clearly winning.

  “I don’t want to hurt you, Jennifer,” I said, cautiously. I knew my mom would be furious if I sent my sister to the emergency room.

  “Fuck you,” Jen said, my forearm still around her neck.

  “I’m going to let you go,” I informed her.

  I slid off her back, peeling my arm away from her windpipe.

  Jen turned on me. With incredible speed and a strength I didn’t even know she possessed, she grabbed my head by the hair. Before I could fully process what was happening, she pounded my head several times into the nearest bookshelf.

  The rule about hitting someone only if they hit you first was also in play outside of the house. We were in no way obligated to walk away if some bully smacked us on the playground, but we could not just pop a jerk who was teasing us.

  I was a scrawny kid. One of my mom’s nicknames for me is “Bean,” because I was as skinny as a string bean—even after I started doing judo I didn’t look like much of a fighter.

  When I was in sixth grade, a boy named Adrian bullied me relentlessly all year. One day, he crept up behind me and reached around and grabbed my throat, squeezing me until it was hard to breathe. I didn’t bother to push his hand away; I threw him over my hip, right onto the cement. The skin on the back of his head split open.

  The kid was so embarrassed he just went to his next class without saying anything to anyone, until his teacher realized he was bleeding. He ended up having to get several stitches.

  I was sent to the office. My mom was called. I cried hysterically.

  “We’re not exactly sure what happened,” the principal told my mom when she arrived. “It seems there was some sort of altercation between the two of them. He says he tripped, but other people said she pushed him.”

  “Well, it sounds like it was an accident,” my mom said quickly.

  “It was n—” I started to protest, but Mom thrust her hand over my mouth.

  “Ronda is very sorry,” she pressed on.

  The principal seemed uncertain where to take the conversation next. Instead, he stared at his hands, then dismissed us. We walked to the car without saying a word.

  I would like to say that word spread of my kick-ass skills, and no one messed with me again, but a few weeks later, I was waiting for Mom to pick me up when an eighth-grade girl shoved me. This girl must have weighed twice as much as me and she had been taunting me constantly. She would make fun of me carrying my bassoon through the hallways. She would throw leaves or crumpled-up pieces of paper at me. She threatened to beat me up. “Bring it,” I told her.

  I guess she decided that today was the day. I had been looking at the line of cars for my mom’s minivan when I felt a shove. I turned, and was face-to-face with bully-girl. She shoved me again.

  I dropped my backpack and a few seconds later I dropped the girl as well.

  The school staff ran out to separate us, but that wasn’t necessary—I was standing; she was down on the ground. We were led to the office and told suspensions would be handed down to both of us. The school secretary was picking up the phone to call our parents when my mom burst in.

  I was already crying uncontrollably because my mom had made clear that there would be serious consequences if I got into another fight at school. I started to open my mouth to explain, but Mom shot me a silencing look. The sobs heaved out of my throat. Mom demanded to know who was in charge. The counselor came out of her office and started to explain that I and the big girl had gotten into a fight, but she did not know who she was dealing with.

  “Did you see what happened?” my mom demanded.

  The counselor opened her mouth to speak, but there was no need. It had been a rhetorical question.

  “Because I did,” my mom continued. “I was sitting in the car waiting for Ronda and saw the entire thing. Ronda was standing there when this girl�
��—my mom pointed at her—“walked up and started pushing Ronda.”

  “She will also be suspended,” the counselor said.

  “Also?” My mom was incredulous. “No, Ronda is not getting suspended.”

  “We have a very strict ‘no physical violence’ policy,” the counselor said.

  “And I have a very strict ‘no being an asshole to my kids’ policy,” my mom said. “Ronda is not getting suspended. She was protecting herself against someone who resorted to ‘physical violence’ as you called it. She will be here bright and early tomorrow morning, and she will be going to class. If anyone tries to stop her, you will have me back in here again and will have to deal with me. And what you do not understand right now is this is me being nice and polite.”

  The counselor was tongue-tied.

  “Come on,” my mom said in my general direction. “We’re out of here.”

  I grabbed my stuff and hustled out of the office.

  The next day, my mom dropped me off at school and I went to class.

  PAIN IS JUST ONE PIECE OF INFORMATION

  I have an ability to ignore all of the information coming from my body, even pain in general. I dissociate from pain, because I am not the pain that I am feeling. That’s not me. That’s not who I am. I refuse to allow pain to dictate my decision making. Pain is just one piece of information that I’m receiving. My nerves are communicating to my brain that there is something going on physically that I should be aware of. I can choose to acknowledge that information or I can choose to ignore it.

  Let the following story serve as a cautionary tale if you are considering cutting class.

  My sophomore year in high school I decided I was going to skip class. I had never ditched school before and I just wanted to try it.

  My high school had a big gate and a chain-link fence surrounding the campus, both to keep unwanted visitors out and aspiring delinquents in. The fence was scalable, but there was a drop on the other side.