Martial Artist Significant Others

How important is it that your romantic partner be a martial artist?

  • I'd rather they weren't -- this is my thing and I don't want it meddled with.

  • Doesn't matter, so long as they let me train.

  • My partner should at least understand and respect why I train.

  • Pretty important -- I'd rather be with a martial artist.

  • If they can't tap out, we don't go out.

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bushidomartialarts

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How crucial to the success of a relationship do you think it is that your partner is also a martial artist?

Me, I'm lucky enough to be married to a woman who was a brown belt when I met her.
 
bushidomartialarts said:
How crucial to the success of a relationship do you think it is that your partner is also a martial artist?
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All I can say is my wife and childern all do it with me and we have a great time together, whether other people can do this I do not know, it sure did not help witht he first marrasige she hated it when I was training
 
I guess I can only answer from my perspective. My husband never has done any kind of MA. Had not interest and that is okay with me. We both have our own interests outside of each other and we support each other in them.

I think you have to find what works for you in your relationship with your significant other. Some do train together, I have seen good and bad in that scenario. Some couples are great on the mat together, others, well...they aren't and it is noticible when they train together that they have some...umm...extra agression towards each other :D
 
My wife seriously outranks me! She dragged me back into martial arts after a long hiatus.
 
I've never dated a martial artist, but I think I'd prefer to be with one.

At the very minimum, my date would need to understand and respect why I train. It's too important to me to be with someone that merely "tolerates" it.
 
My wife does not train in the Martial Arts. I was training for many years before I met her, she knew this, and is supportive of what I do. As for how it effects our relationship...we've been married for 10 yrs. and it hasn't caused any tension. :) She has her hobbies and I have mine. :)

Mike
 
MJS said:
My wife does not train in the Martial Arts. I was training for many years before I met her, she knew this, and is supportive of what I do. As for how it effects our relationship...we've been married for 10 yrs. and it hasn't caused any tension. :) She has her hobbies and I have mine. :)

Mike
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Apart from a few small differences of detail (my wife and I've been married almost 20 years, and I didn't start training in MA until just a few years ago), my situation is a ditto of Mike's.
 
My ex and I started TKD together in 1987; as far as I know, he quit shortly after the divorce. He was a blue belt (4th gup) when I started as a white belt, and we tested for I Dan together; shortly before the divorce, I was told to test for 2nd, and he wasn't. Did that cause the divorce? Not at all - it was due to his inability to hold a job, and also because I grew up and he didn't - but it did influence the timing. Having your partner in your MA class can be great - but it can also be horrible; it was for me, especially the last year or so we were married.

If I could choose, I would choose to have a partner in an MA, but in a totally different MA than the one I'm in.
 
Very important to me and my wife. I met her at the school I was teaching at. I helped her and kept my eye on her. Later she needed teaching time to get her Shodan and I needed an assistant instructor. She started helping and within a month we were dating. She gave me a bloody nose on Tuesday and I asked her out on a Thursday.
 
You know...I don't think that I want my fiance learning how to kick my ***. :)

But she does understand and respect my training. Luckily when we get back to the states, she has her horses to ride and I have my Tang Soo Do.
 
It is important to me for her to ubderstand why I train and why I enjoy it. As a huge plus, she also trains now. I started training before we dated, and I knew I had to take her out when she came to check out a class and it just happened to be the night I had a brain bubble and landed after a hard throw right on the point of my shoulder breaking it and shattered my collerbone. We had been friends for a couple of years so she went with me to the hospital and while I was waiting on the Dr. to let me go I mentioned that she shouldn't let what happened color her view on the training, she looked at me and informed me while they were bundling me up she had told the instructor she really wanted to sign up. Seems seeing someone about 1/2 my size wreck me, convinced her it really wasn't muscle and strength, but body movement that made it effective. :) Now it is our 2 oldest boys and both of us who train.
 
My husband is not interested in Martial Arts, though he has always been good about supporting my interests. Personally, I'm glad he's not into it. I wouldn't discourage him if he was, but training, and class, is *my* time. A time I can get away and focus on something other than the myriad of hassles in daily life. Sometimes you just need to get away, ya know?
 
My ex-wife was very happy I was in MA because, as I later found, she was using it in attempts to intimidate others, just one of MANY reasons she is now referred to as “Ex”.

My wife, now, is from China and she sees my MA as just a hobby compared to what she is use to seeing in China. Frankly she tolerates it and allows me to train. She also is working to find me a teacher for when I am back in China. But she does not train MA and that’s fine with me. She use to as a child, and it sounds like it may have bee Shaolin Long Fist, she did it because her mother forced her to go and it did make her healthier, but she did not like it that much so after a year she stopped and focused on her academics. However she did recently say that if a good Chen stylist were closer to us she would consider training Chen. Just to explain, in translation that actually means if a member of the Chen family or one of there senior students moved into are area she would consider training.

Now she just tells her family I am Martial arts Crazy and that is ok for me, her and her family.
 
For me it is pretty important that my hubby and I be on the same page where MA is concerned. I spend a lot of time training and travelling for competition, so it is nice that he (and my children) are all training together and travelling together.

Frankly, if they didn't, I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing because my family comes first. So it is perfect that he is a Martial Artist and supportive of what I do.
 
I picked the "If they can't tap out, we don't go out" option. It's extremely important to me to be with someone who is also interested in training.

It's important because someone who doesn't train, while they may be supportive of their SO, I don't think they really "get" and fully understand training and why it can be so meaningful to someone. I've seen many relationships where the SO really interefers with the MAist's training. "Can't you be home more?" "Do you have to go to class tonight?" "What do you mean you're traveling cross country for a seminar?" For me personally, that's not something I would be able to handle.

Currently my husband and I train in the same art which I love. To me, it doesn't matter so much the art, just that each of us are doing something. At the end of the day, for me it's important to have a guy I can smack around and who can smack me around. :p
 
My wife also trains but she does it for different reasons. It helps to come home and when I explain something she knows what I am talking about. It is also something great to do as a family because both my boys train as well.
 
MJS said:
My wife does not train in the Martial Arts. I was training for many years before I met her, she knew this, and is supportive of what I do. As for how it effects our relationship...we've been married for 10 yrs. and it hasn't caused any tension. :) She has her hobbies and I have mine. :)

Mike
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Same story, difference is I've been married 29 years. I think she actually looks forward to me going to class so she can have some alone time
 
I don't think it would be a deal-killer for the relationship if she wasn't a martial artist, but at least she would need to respect my need to train.

That being said, my wife is a martial artist (we met in a capoeira school, and she had trained in Tae Kwon Do and Hapkido prior to that, when she was in high school), and I think it has enriched our relationship. It's a topic we can discuss and share in, as we both still do capoeira together.
 
My wife respects that I train, she just can't understand why I would subject myself to it. :lol:
 
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