Introduction + Doubts for Martial Arts

Hello everybody!

So, for a start, I'd like to introduce myself!

I'm a 19 year old male from Greece. I started doing sports at 13-14 ( until then I was REALLY fat ) and got hooked from the first training session.

I even started doing 6 training sessions of 2 hours per week since the first week, even though this was overkill.

The boost of physical perfomance and appearance ( plus the compliments of friends,schoolmates,girls etc) made me love working out even more that I did by myself.

Anyway, I practiced rowing for 2 years and kayaking for 2 years (competitively-got 2nd place in Greek Tournament) until I was 17-18.

Then,I had to stop kayaking to start studying to enter a good and competitive university ( we have a weird educational system ).

Anyway,at that time I started working out myself or at a gym.

Long story short, since I always liked Martial Arts, when I finally passed to a University and finished with school, at April of 2013 me and my brother signed to a (good or maybe the best of our town) Ju Jitsu / Pankration Dojo.

I had missed having a coach-teacher-sensei pushing me beyond my limits and I LOVED every aspect of our training, the conditioning, the actual martial arts training, the mental training, everything.
Until these days that I'm posting this message.
The Reason?
Diseases and Blood Borne Pathogens.

Some posts that I've read in here + some posts on a site called fightingarts.com disappointed me and made me afraid of training ( I can post the links if you want ).

Especially the writer of the latter, made me so much worried, he overcomplicates things but in fact, he speaks TRUE.

Our Dojo and as I believe and I'm pretty sure of, every dojo in my town, doesn't require blood tests - avoiding the fact of the 6-month window for blood borne pathogens, an extra worry EVEN IF blood tests were done - or even any kind of disease test to participate to the sessions.

So, to sum it up, I love the conditioning/strength training of my dojo,the martial arts training, the theories and the whole philosophy, I really do.

But from a view of chances, is it worth it?

I mean, I pay as much attention as I can to my sexual relationships and my personal hygiene to avoid diseases of any kind and I MAY end up getting one of these ( most of them lifethreating - I'm referring to the blood borne pathogens - ) by actually getting taught a Martial Art to "enhance" my life,both physically and mentally?!

I know there has been no verified case of this happening ( especially for HIV I think ) and I don't really worry about getting a skin infection but mostly for life-threating and crippling diseases.

Problem is, I really like my sensei, the enviroment, the training, the sparring, EVERYTHING!

I suppose I could speak to my sensei about my worries but there can be no way he can do something more about it, other than the usual cleaning before+after classes and the pause of the sparring ( and usually bandaging the wound ) when he sees blood. What do you think about it? What else could he do? What else could I do other than being aware of this?

Well,that's all for now!
What do you think about my situation?
Feel free to comment everything about my post!
I'd love to read your answers!
Greetings from Greece, osu!
-RaKzaroK

 

Nobody should be bleeding onmats, or training with open wounds, as long as everything is cleaned regularly there is a close to 0% risk of catching anything.

 

Just get hepatitis vaccinations. That's the real risk anyway.

 

Well, I agree, but during sparring/hard sparring one might bleed and immediately touch the other person's face or other non-covered aeras, especially during ground sparring ( we wear a gi so our body is covered by hard clothing ) or the other person's neck during takedowns/throws -which are often followed by scratches to the neck-.

 

I have done the vaccinations for Hep A and B.
I think these are the only vaccinations for Hep available while there are 5 forms of Hep, am I wrong?

 

You're asking a community of martial artists. Most of the people here have been training for at least a few years, many of them at the level of contact that you're encountering. I think most of us are going to say "Don't worry about it man." If you asked a forum of germaphobes, you'd get a very different answer.

My advice is don't worry about it man.

 

True dat.

I still haven't achieved peace in my mind though.

 

Any sort of physical contact is going to expose you to some disease. You might get it from standing on the wrong subway, hooking up with the wrong person, sharing a drink, going into the medical profession, heck, whatever. Might as well nip that thing in the bud and just say that life is not worth living without sex and fighting (while also acknowledging the risks involved and taking appropriate precautions).

 

That's true man, I also thought of this.

If any of you has a different opinion or any advice to give for prevention, please share this with me!

 

My uncle got hepatitis C at the dentist's. Go figure.

 

There operative word there is "might".
Lot's of things might happen in martial arts. But realistically they won't.
If you're that worried about catching diseases off people then martial arts, grappling in particular, probably aren't for you I'd say.

 

You'd only be at risk if someone who carries the virus is bleeding, and a quantity of that blood enters your bloodstream somehow (e.g. it enters a cut, you ingest it, or it enters other orifices that really shouldn't be out during sparring....). There's no risk if it gets on your face, hands or body as long as you wash it off.

Realistically the chances of contracting it are incredibly small, it really doesn't bear worrying about. If there was even a slight increase in risk you'd have MMA gyms and other full contact martial arts places promoting Hep Vaccinations to anyone who competes, as Hep B is by far the most contagious (about 10 times more so than Hep C, and about 100 times more than HIV) and is very preventable.

 

Hepatitis B is the one you need to worry about though. C's not great but the majority of cases can be successfully treated and isn't as dangerous as B. It's also nowhere near as infectious and can only be transmitted by blood and semen, not sweat and saliva.
Hepatitis A and E are rarely transmitted person to person (if you're catching them in training you're REALLY doing it wrong).

 

Unless you're doing a really brutal martial art, students ought not be bleeding. I've honestly never heard of serious disease transmission at a dojo/training facility. Since you do jiu-jitsu, I imagine regular cleaning of the mats/equipment happens there and is sufficient. If there's a kid's class right before yours, you can wipe down your equipment if you're paranoid/germaphobic, as those little buggers tend to be messy. Aside from that, what the others above have said is right on, in my experience.

Enjoy your training! Jiu-jitsu looks fun and I want to try it myself someday.

 

Mitch, I suppose you're right.
Actually I asked my sensei today what he does to clean the place, he told me he mops the place with a special anti-germ solution that is used at kindergartens etc.
That's a bit akward because it might not "kill" HIV or Hep ( I've read and heard from a doctor that chlorine kills them for sure ).
I told him that and he answered that moping the tatamis - the floor - with chlorine is bad for the athletes since we touch the floor, like, all the time and chlorine is harmful to our skin.
Anyone experienced with this?
Maybe a dojo owner, a MA teacher or something?

Wildlings, first of all, I'm sorry for your uncle and secondly, I didn't say that martial arts is the only way to get a disease,I'm just pointing out this specific risk/chance

PASmith,I don't really care about getting a skin infection or a physical injury from MA, I just don't want to get HIV/Hep from something that doesn't have ANYTHING to do with injected drugs or sex - the real risks -.
I know that skin infections can be REALLY annoying BUT they don't kill you or make you a timed bomb ( you have X,Y,Z years of life if you are infected with HIV).
I mean, I - or anyone else in this case - will be the real Bad Luck Brian if I get something of these via Martial Arts training.

rob0107, your second point ( I knew already about the first but thanks anyway ) is actually pretty valid. Since Hep and HIV were first found, Martial Arts were already a huge part of humanity, so I suppose that if scientists etc found that the risk was increased, something would be done for sure.

Sifu Ben, I didn't know these exact info, thanks

matveimediaarts, well, we don't bleed all the time, but sometimes, a sloppy takedown, a sloppy kick, a tight grip to the enemy's gi is all is needed to cut the skin. I'm NOT EVEN CLOSE to being germaphobic, it's just that especially blood borne pathogens are not something simple, they can actually ruin your whole life, that's why I'm a bit worried.
Enjoy your training too man!

 

Cheers guy. I was pointing out there are far too many ways to get nasty diseases and training, just like going to the dentist's, is not among the obvious one. The standard procedure at my gym when someone bleeds is cleaning the injured part and the floor and cover the cut.

 

Thanks. I'm not a jiu-jitsu guy yet, but I've never heard of anyone getting hit hard enough to bleed on these forums or elsewhere. What you describe sounds like a legitimate concern. Ganbatte! (hope I said that right...I'm new to Japanese, and Indo-European languages are my forte)

 

To be quite blunt, the chances of getting something transmitted from martial arts are so small you'd be better off playing the bareback lottery if you wanted to catch something. While some diseases can be a genuine concern, unless you are competing in a combat sport, where split eyes and bloody noses are a common occurrence, on a regular basis I wouldn't be too worried about it.

You're not going to turn into a flesh eating zombie any time soon at the slightest scratch. When you do, don't worry. I will be there with my fire axe.

 

TBF it depends where you are. A study of wrestlers in Turkey showed very high levels of Hepatitis B.