Taking my shot at an mma career

Discussion in 'MMA' started by Southpaw535, Jul 15, 2012.

  1. Southpaw535

    Southpaw535 Well-Known Member Moderator Supporter

    Right I'll go into details in a sec but I'm doing this thread as its another thing that will help me not sink back into laziness and give up since the MAP community I so love will know I'm a wimp :p

    So I've liked the idea of trying to make mma a career for a while but never really thought I had a shot. Since I finished college however I haven't had much to do except train and its shown me how much I love doing this and how I'm going to regret it for ever if I don't try. On a more personal note my mum has an illness that I won't bore you with the details of now but means that she's probably only got a few years left. She's always backed me with jujitsu and has put up with me working the bare minimum so I can train during the day. I want her to get to see me in the cage before whatever happens.

    As far as the training itself goes I'm lucky enough that my gym is awesome and is probably one of the better gyms in the South with some top ten ranked European fighters. We also have one of the best up and coming shows in the UK so that makes life easier. And yes I'm a shameless promotion whore

    So that just leaves sorting me out personally. I spent work today coming up with some ideas and here's what I have. I just wrote this out to one of my friends who's taking a pop at mma too so I'll be lazy (great start I know) and paste it with some alterations:

    Anyway, diet wise I have nothing solid yet since I know nothing but I'll do some stuff on it today. At the very least I crossed muffins off mum's shopping list so there's a start (they've been my breakfast for as long as I can remember). Shall try tuna at some point too. Also going to go back to eating peanut butter. I hear its not the worst thing in the world to eat? Never been a huge fan of eating meat that I could identify so always stuck with processed crap. Will try my darndest to get over that but at the absolute worse I'll cut out sausages and look into vegetarian diets with maybe the odd nugget thrown in. I mean its some chicken even if it is outweighed by fat :p

    PT stuff, I was meant to buy a chin up bar (the mate I sent this to has just started a beast of a chin up routine and I'm seeing gains in jut a couple weeks) but left my wallet at home so I'll do that later. Not sure about an actual routine at the moment, but I think I'll just do the routine the army gave me to prepare for the ftiness exam. Its a 12 week plan which is a bit more than I would of liked and its nothing that would make the mma guys sweat but its something. Plus I need to start at the bottom with running. Will get me used to a routine though and probably better to do one I'll find easy so I'll be willing to do rather than kill myself. And I'll be at the gym too so still get beasted. The entry tests for the army require you to be average fitness so it'll give me a decent enough starting place when I move onto finding my own routines.

    Going to try and change my mental shiz too. Remember a training partner aaaages ago told me he looked at his time like money and rationed his hours into worthy investments. I shall steal that. Going to stick a bit of paper up next to my gym timetable too with something like "what are you doing today to become a fighter" or some other cheezy poop like that on it. Timetable's by my door so I'll see it everytime I wake up. Want to try and do something every day that helps. If I'm not at the gym doing a lesson then I want to be either grabbing guys from my club and doing our own thing or doing something at home. Even rest days I want to be doing something like our jujitsu warm up and throw in some traingles and stand ups and whatnot. Just something that gets me in the training mood every day. Proper rest days I'll let myself just play mass effect all day or whatever but make sure I spend half hour looking up new techniques, or new videos on stuff I know, or just looking up recipes or some crap.

    And new random idea is I might get my fight shorts on and take a pic with mum to put up on my wall too as a reminder.

    So yeah that's the foundation I've got so far. If you find out I didn't stick to this please constantly remind me of it for as long as I stay on MAP and beat me at the next map meet.

    If anyone has any critiques of that plan then I'd really appreciate it
     
  2. Killa_Gorillas

    Killa_Gorillas Banned Banned

    Good luck

    Good luck mate :star:
     
  3. El Medico

    El Medico Valued Member

    So sorry about the word on your mom.

    Thought I'd drop a word that as regards the nutritional aspect you might wish to look into Clarence Bass' recipes. Not because they're superior,just conveniently designed and arranged by mealtime.And filling. Plus he doesn't tell you to swear off ice cream/cake/pizza etc. Or muffins.

    Not to mention his famous peanut butter lunch!
     
  4. Gripfighter

    Gripfighter Sub Seeker

    kind of in a similar place right now myself mate in that iv decided after years of never being able to choose if I want to focus completely on something I enjoy and comes pretty easily to me (grappling) or if I want to have a shot at doing something that scares the crap out of me (MMA), and iv recently come to the conclusion that if I don't at least take a shot at this while im young enough, even if nothing major ever comes of it ill regret it for the rest of my days. Im going to spend the next year really concentrating on developing a striking game and getting the right mental attitude and will hopefully get matched up late next year. Best of luck.
     
  5. Frodocious

    Frodocious She who MUST be obeyed! Moderator Supporter

    Good luck with your training, sorry to hear about your mum.

    On a diet point, just be aware that a lot of peanut butter is full of sugar and crappy oils. It's not necessarily a problem if the rest of your diet is sorted but it is something you should be aware of.

    You say you don't like meat that looks like meat - can you eat mince? You can normally get a decent range of minced meat in most supermarkets or butchers or you may find that they will mince stuff for you on site. You can then use it to make your own burgers and at least you'd know that they weren't full of crap doing it that way.
     
  6. Southpaw535

    Southpaw535 Well-Known Member Moderator Supporter

    Thanks guys. Wasn't sure about putting the stuff down about mum since it felt like a sympathy thing but putting it down forces it home on me a bit more.

    ooooh. I'll have a butch!
    Feel you pain man. Only been a grappler and the striking I did recently ws just me holding pads for a mate and him jacking my elbow up for a couple days :D

    This is where diet research is really hard for me. No two places seem to agree on anything and its impossible to know who's properly reputable or not. I should of said the thing I saw about peanut butter was about some natural kind that is literally just peanuts. Think I was looking up almond butter after seeing Rener Gracie's breakfast sandwich and stumbled upon it. It makes for something yummy to eat though and a bit more filling than the crap I eat now.

    Great idea! Thanks :)
     
  7. Frodocious

    Frodocious She who MUST be obeyed! Moderator Supporter

    Yes diet stuff can be a nightmare to figure out! Natural peanut butter is the best way to go, almond butter and hazelnut butter are also good choices. Again check the 'crap' content. From my point of view the best diet advice for starting out is to eat as much unprocessed additive and preservative free stuff as you can. Obviously the term 'unprocessed' can be a bit vague because stuff like milk and whey protein is processed to a certain extent, as are things like frozen veggies and fruit, but these are actually pretty good things to include in your meal plans.
     
  8. Hapuka

    Hapuka Te Aho

    Be careful that you try not to run before you can walk.

    Professional fighting is not an easy business (you're looking at years of solid dedication) to get into and not one that promises much of an income, not only that, its high risk in terms of injuries. As much as I want to wish you luck, I can't do so without pointing these facts out. My advice would be to have a plan B (many professional fighters I have spoken in both Boxing and Muay Thai strongly recommend this), you're young and there are still allot of choices available in doing something that will insure you a stable income. Go join your local MMA club and try out amateur (as a long term goal) to begin with, learn as much as you can from your trainers and spend as much time as you can learning about the competition world from both amateur and professional fighters (on that note, there is allot of material on both youtube and amazon or your local library that will help get you going in the right direction). And while doing that, spend some time focusing on pursuing another interest that could promise you a solid career in the future.

    In terms of resources I recommend that you study Bas Ruttens videos on youtube. You can't go wrong there. For articles on MMA try this link here: http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/bbinfo.php?page=MMAFighting

    I'm interested to know what your mother is struggling with (if you would like to share that information), is it a terminal illness?
     
  9. Southpaw535

    Southpaw535 Well-Known Member Moderator Supporter

    No problem mate, its solid advice. I have other careers lined up. The army was always my plan and there's no real reason for me not to make that. I also have another year at college after which, if things have gone terribly, I have the points to get into uni. I've seen the work our pro guys put in and I have no illusions about being guaranteed a ufc title or anything like that. Something as simple as fighting on our local show would be enough for me. If it blossoms into more then awesome, and I'd rather drive for that and fall short than aim too low, but I know its a damn tough path with a lot of other peple trying to do the same. Sill, better to try and fail etc :)

    I only understand the basic myself but I'll try my best. Her condition is called FAP which basically means she gets growths (sorry I know that's vague) in her body. Originally it was her bowel which led to her having an ileostomy op. The beef with the growths is they have the risk of turning cancerous and that's already happened once but luckily it was caught quick and cut out. The big problem is the numbers. I've forgotten the specifics but if we say the average FAP sufferer has 100, then mum has 500. When she was diagnosed the doctors told her she should have died years ago. They also said that they will turn cancerous and there's a good chance they won't be able to fix it.

    That in itself sucks but the surgery has also left her with scar tissue that casues problems with her digestive system meaning she ends up in hospital every few months with blockages, jaundice and various other things. The polyps have also spread to her small bowel and her stomach. She was waiting on stomach surgery but I think they've said they won't do it now. Recently she went into hospital and they suspected something may be up with her liver asl well but nothing is certain yet. Since the surgery she's also had a much crapper immune system and has serious exhaustion problems now. A day blitzing housework while me and the step dad are out because she wants to do something leads to two or three days of constant sleep. And then there's problems with depression as well.

    Basically the info from the start sucked monkey nuts but in the last few years the number of rushes to hospital have increased and I've watched her become more and more bed ridden. It was one of the reasons I started training so much anyway because on the mats the outside world doesn't really get a look in.

    That's all I can tell you about it. I've never looked it up since I learnt ages ago not to bother googling the flu or it'll tell you it causes your eyeballs to leak out of your face so I didn't want to see what it said about this one so sadly I can't give you anymore technical info.

    And now have a video of a doggy
    [ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysKAVyXi0J4&feature=my_liked_videos&list=LLxC--oHaubxQKtS00Hune0Q"]Seeing my dog the day I got back from Afghanistan - YouTube[/ame]
     
  10. Mushroom

    Mushroom De-powered to come back better than before.

    Not much to say at the moment only best wishes mate and obviously any advice you got your team and members of MAP to help, so you got backing.

    Also keep us updated on your fights etc as some are local or at least able to travel to support (from the cheap seats)

    /thumbs-up
     
  11. Hapuka

    Hapuka Te Aho

    You have my support, I'm sorry about your mother, but somehow (or maybe its my ignorance) I have a hard time believing that your mother can't receive treatment. Has anyone tried taking her case to the DHB (district health board)? I honestly wish I could help, I don't like seeing young individuals losing their parents, not over something that could possibly be treated. I wish you luck on your MMA journey and that it will hopefully be fruitful for you and your family.
     
  12. Southpaw535

    Southpaw535 Well-Known Member Moderator Supporter

    For some reason Hapuka your message doesn't come up when I click quote

    I've never heard of a district health board and googling didn't help. There is treatment they can do, such as replacing her stomach if it turns too serious, but they were supposed to do that a few months ago and then changed their minds and said they won't. Can't for the life of me remember why. The issue is the number of growths she has and the spread throughout her body: Normally they're isolated and can be cut out, but hers are everywhere. Removing them would mean removing pretty much every organ in her digestive system. Except the kidneys. They seem to be cool. Weird. I know nothing about medicine so I can't say if that's actually possible or not (form what I remember the issue with her small bowel is that since they removed her large one they can't remove both?) but I know they said they won't do that. At least not now. Plus you throw in the other issues of more scar tissue which will make her current issues worse. Its really bugging me that I can't remember the specifics. We talked about it around April time and now I can't remember the damn conversation. I know the bit about the number of polyps and effected areas is the main issue. With other areas I think it was a case of she has problems now, and doing something would cause problems as well so it was a "devil you know" sort of situation. I'll talk to my mum when she gets home and see if I can get some better information for you

    edit: Right talked to mum. What it apparently is is that there's the stuff I said about the number of pollyps and how she has stpidly more than the docs have seen before. Organ wise its because hers are in her stomach and her juridenum. I tried googling that to get a spelling and it had no idea what I meant. They can replace her stomach but to do that they bypass the juridenum but thats the thing that's likely to turn cancerous so they can't ignore it. No idea why they can't replace that. There's a hospital in London that specialises in fap that her dad was at before he died that she's going to contact to get a second opinion on so they may know something more than our guys.
     
    Last edited: Jul 15, 2012
  13. Hapuka

    Hapuka Te Aho

    Hmm... considering you live in portsmouth its probably called something else over there. But basically the district health board is an organization that makes desiscions over matters regarding public health. I did some research and I found this, which might be your equivalent.
    http://www.vdh.state.va.us/lhd/portsmouth/index.htm

    You would have to ask whoever represents public health matters in your area, I'm not entirely sure how the system works in your country, but it might be possible to gain funding for your mothers case so she could get treatment.
     
  14. Seventh

    Seventh Super Sexy Sushi Time

    You have my support mate. You've made a resolution to do something, a solid one at that, and have already made the first steps in creating a rough plan in what you are going to do. You have made a goal, and have taken to initiative to get there, so I want to sincerely wish you good luck, and whole heartily say:

    "Go kick some ass!"
     
  15. slipthejab

    slipthejab Hark, a vagrant! Supporter

    Strange I posted in this thread just after you posted but it for some reason didn't take... at any rate it's worth repeating... no matter how trite it sounds... give 'er a go. You have nothing to lose by it and everything to gain. On top of which - you will only ever regret those things you didn't do... not those which you grabbed around the throat and had a proper go at.

    Get out there and do it!!! Best of luck and keep us updated!!!
     
  16. Southpaw535

    Southpaw535 Well-Known Member Moderator Supporter

    Damn quote button.

    Hapuka:

    That's Portsmouth Virginia, I'm in the UK :D

    Funding isn't the issue thanks to the wonders of socialism, its the opinion of surgeons that's the problem. Course I'm just a skinny twit who wears tapout shorts and finds it fun to tap people so I can't say if they're right or wrong. Hopefully this London hospital will have some other ideas. There are far too many hospitals called St Mary's by the way.
     
  17. Hapuka

    Hapuka Te Aho

    DOh! :fight3:

    Hmm... have you considered seeking the opinions of other surgeons? Surely you could through doctor referral, there has to be more than a handful of surgeons in the UK with opinions on whether or not the surgery could be done. Its worth a shot, you might want to talk to your mothers GP and see if you could get other referrals done with other hospitals, I recommend that you find whatever group is representing your area in terms of public health, your doctors will have this information. Maybe other Mappers here might have some more advice on what you could do, but that's what I would try doing if I were in your shoes. I'm glad to hear that funding isn't the issue (that's possibly one headache out of the way, unless you decide to consider private hospitalization). Find out as much as you can about what you can do and what you and your mothers rights are. You deserve to have your mother sticking around, hopefully a lot longer to see you compete in the cage.
     
  18. Dead_pool

    Dead_pool Spes mea in nihil Deus MAP 2017 Moi Award

    Sometimes its the case that further surgical treatment isnt in the patients best interest, you can normally get a second opinion, and be refered to another consultant, which is what seems to be the case here.

    Good luck southpaw, dreams are what makes life liveable.


     
  19. Hapuka

    Hapuka Te Aho

    Yes, I was thinking about that (it could be that southpaw's mother may not want to go through further treatment as well), but its still a good idea to consider all options.
     
  20. Southpaw535

    Southpaw535 Well-Known Member Moderator Supporter

    She's waiting to get more opinions before making a decision but some of the options available to her, such as trying to solve the scar tissue issue, would just cause other problems so she'd rather stick with the stuff she knows and is prepared for. The blocked bowel stuff for instance is sucky but its happened so often now none of us bat an eyelid. Easier to deal with that than have to get used to some new problem
     

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