Self Defense

I took a self defense class yesterday because I'm moving downtown, and I'll coming home late at night, and that's a way more spicy place than I've lived before. I've bargained with my anxiety late at night, telling myself that I will do what I can to mitigate the situation. One of those things (one of the only things I can think of) was a self-defense class. They're offered for free at UCLA on Wednesdays. 

We learned and practiced some strikes and a few escapes. One of my biggest hurdles, though, is that I do not want to hit anyone. Being in a situation where I have to hit someone already seems traumatizing enough. I want to avoid that. I want to avoid it so badly, that I'm afraid I wouldn't hit someone even if I needed to. (And imagine owning a gun. Imagine having to shoot someone.) 

The second thing is that I can't imagine being able to fight a man (or men) off. I feel like I would need years of dedicated practice in martial arts to stand a chance. I tell myself that all I need to do is be enough of a nuisance to get them to leave me alone. The other thing I need to do is to train myself to do anything in that situation. To run, to call for help, to scream, to fight back. Every time it's come up in the past,  I do nothing. I play nice. I pretend to be asleep. 

I feel like I'm being born into a brand new and much more dangerous world. When I'm out walking on the street, strangers wouldn't know whether or not I'm married, and yet it feels like my marriage covers me somehow. I'm taken. I belong to a man. Now I belong to myself and I'm up to myself and I feel like that's a weakness that people will be able to smell on me. 

I'm athletic. I'm fairly good sized for a woman -- not the most petite person out there to be sure. But I'm so fucking nice, by training not by nature. I feel terrified of making a fuss. Horribly ashamed of calling for help in a dangerous situation. It's so hard to shake the feeling that I asked for it by being female, by being single. Here I have this perfectly good husband, and I'm letting him go to face a horribly dangerous and sad world alone. That feels crazy. 

I'm hoping it turns out to be not so bad. That I can fend for myself somehow. I won't know until I try, but my body is screaming at me.