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Cannot quote everyone but love your thoughts. My two cents are regarding the definition of addiction vs dependency. I would say I definitely have a dependency on the endorphin response of training (and get a moody, angry withdrawal if I cannot). Some people like to call this addiction, but I distinguish addiction from a more simple dependency. I ask - does it make my world better, or worse? If it makes my world worse yet despite that I do not stop, it is an addiction. If it makes my world objectively better (not temporarily high), I may depend on its help, but its definitely not an addiction in the classical sense, more like a healthy habit. Eating disorders and various body dysmorphia are pitfalls; I don't deny that. But I am lucky in that that is not part of my experience. Great thread thank you.

Today I was having a private training session and something interesting happened. It's happened once or twice before but this is the first time I've really thought about it. During the last round of pad work today I was exhausted and my power and technique was dropping and flying out the window. My trainer kept yelling at me to go harder, and as I was pushing myself there was a point where I had a burst of emotion. It was a combination of frustration at myself for not being able to strike harder, anger at myself and also anger where my body was going "I'M KICKING HARD WHY IS THIS NOT HARD ENOUGH". I also felt myself get angry at my trainer at points in the last round where I think I was just transferring my frustrations. By that point for no reason I also thought I might start crying or something. Its odd because I started off the session feeling quite good and I finished it feeling relatively calm as well, it was just that point where I had this huge burst of emotion. I know being calm and controlled is important but this just came out of nowhere. I almost started punching the heavy bags afterwards just to vent but it disappeared really rapidly. Have any of you guys had something similar happen in training or fighting?

I've recently watched a few movies that deal with the cliche of "friends with kids." Basically, as an adult, once you have kids your circle of friends becomes pretty limited to other people who have kids. People who don't have kids are like, "stop talking about your kid's potty training," and people with kids are like, "stop asking me what I've been up to; I've been fucking parenting." I got married quite young, before any of my friends did, and being "the married one" changed our abilities to relate to one another. People who have children aren't "obsessed" or "love-having-no-sleep junkies." They're called parents and that's what their world is defined by. As athletes, our worlds are in some very key and definitive ways different from our non-athlete associates. So it's hard for us to relate on that time expenditure. I have a hard time with my family on this one. They love me, a lot, and they all support me a great deal. I might consider one of my brothers my biggest fan, outside of my own husband (who absolutely takes the top tier on that title). But my family doesn't "get it." I'm frustrated all the time by how it's seen as a "phase" or something I will turn into something else by opening a gym and becoming a teacher or something. This isn't just something I did when I was young, like a "study abroad" or kiddie soccer clubs. This is my life, my passion, my transformation. That's hard for people to get because most people use physical challenges as hobbies or for fitness. Hobbies stop being "hobbies" when they are transformative. Take for example Mark Hogancamp, who creates an entire world out of dolls and model buildings. There's a whole documentary and in it you learn that this is Hogancamp's therapy. It's not temporary, it's not "just for fun" and it's not a hobby. Dolls are stuff of hobbies, but only if it's practiced as a hobby. Is Mark "obsessed?" Surely. Am I obsessed with Muay Thai. Yes. But that's not a bad thing. If you're climbing Everest and you're not "obsessed" with getting to the top, you not fucking getting there. I can promise you that. It's not a casual endeavor. And in the end, you should ever be made to feel bad about the thing that makes you feel good.

I've definitely had this happen a lot in the past. I couldn't even tell you how many times people who I no longer associate with called me 'boring', 'anti-social' or 'addicted' in the past. It was an issue for me when I first started training and fighting, but over time, my social circle changed - partly because I'd started actively adjusting it and partly because a lot of my friends moved on. That's the thing about living abroad, a lot of people around you are on temporary lifestyles. Now, the only people I spend time with when I'm not working are my training partners or other people I've met through Muay Thai. I still have wonderful friends outside of Muay Thai, but they are now dotted around in other parts of the world, which, as much as I miss them, is great for me because it allows me to completely focus without any distraction or social pull. Any friends of mine outside the gym fall into two categories: ones who don't understand what I'm doing but love me for it, support it and express a genuine interest in it; and ones who care very much about me but are completely clueless or uninterested about what I do and what it means for me, so just never talk about it (this category only consists of people I met before starting Muay Thai). I'm now in the UK on vacation and I spent today with some girls who fall into the second category. The subject of my training or fighting wasn't raised once, despite it being pretty much my entire life right now. It was slightly weird for me and I felt like a fish out of water. I'm not offended by it, I just don't think they would know what to say or ask. To be honest, I sometimes find it easier not to broach the subject with those people. It saves some awkward conversation. I actually wrote a bit about how finding Muay Thai meant that my lifestyle adjusted and my need for 'me time' increased in an old post of mine, 'Does Fighting Change You?' As you guys have already said, it all comes down to priorities. The people who called me boring for wanting to spend my free time in the gym instead of partying didn't understand that I was passionately working towards goals that were important to me. When they told me 'let go and have some fun', they didn't realise that being in the gym was my idea of fun. We just had different wants and needs. This even goes for some people in my gym, who don't take training quite as seriously or see it as just a hobby. It's fine if we're not on the same page with it, as long as everyone does what makes them happy. You asked if it's possible to become addicted to training in an unhealthy way, and I do think that's true in extreme cases. I say this as someone who previously had problems with an eating disorder and used excessive exercise as a way to fuel that. However, this was before I'd found Muay Thai. If you're interested, you can read my story about that here - 'How Strength Training Saved me from an Eating Disorder'.

To me it's just different passions, you enjoy muay so you do it as much as you want. I think she just perceived it wrong like she felt it was more important than her, but it's more like; there's no pointing missing it if I don't have to, we can meet whenever but training is set times. It's like saying to someone ohhh I can't come over because I'm watching Hollyoaks or I'm watching UFC. It's hard for her to understand your passion because she doesn't have it herself. Like I don't understand why people like golf, if someone said to me I can't meet because I'm going golfing, I'd be like who cares? It's golf, whereas that person likes golf and enjoys it so they will go and do it. I guess at the end of the day it is priorities, because you could skip training and go meet her. It's weird, imagine saying to your trainer I'm going out with my friend I can't train, he'll think 'you can do that anytime' and when you tell your friend you want to train instead she thinks 'you can do that anytime'. Lol, I always write posts more complicated than they are, but I think it's her view, she doesn't like muay/training she doesn't like it so she doesn't understand why you'd prioritise it over her, when she wouldn't do the same. :smile:

I train 6 nights a week, and on the 7th day I have to do some relaxing like yoga, sauna and all social stuff goes around it. My friends laughed a bit at me at first that I have to schedule a meeting with them in advance, but yeah it's like that. Some of them, who also have a tight schedule (not necesserly because of training) understand it and cooperate with me nicely :) Others...well we just see each other like once in a month or two..or less. I have close to no social life, apart from spontanious outings with the guys from my gym after training. I think now my friends or people around me in general just don't care about me anymore, coz I withdrew myself so much from any kind of social life with them. My family cooperates with me nicely, if there is a family meeting and I have to leave the party early to go train, my parents understand it, my aunts and oncles don't, but I don't care what they think. :) My parents are actually helping me out a lot, letting me use their car to go to training, otherwise I had no way to maintain this crazy schedule (or I had to spend the money I'm saving for going to Thailand for buying a car ;)). I don't think it's connected with being a junkie of some kind, it's like you said: priorities. Before I shifted my focus to Muay Thai I was obsessed with rock shows, I had no problem with going to Germany, the UK, Czech, Slovakia, just to see my favorite bands, sleeping on the railway station or not sleeping at all - just going to the show and back home (like...a 6 or 12 hour trip one way, who cares? ;)). I was at a show almost every 2-3 weeks and this was the meaning of my life. Now, there are still bands I like to listen to, but if the show is on a training night I will try to make both work or let go the show. It's just that my priorities shifted from going to shows to training. I'd rather say it's a state of focusing of yourself, a kind of meditation and not being a junkie! But honestly speaking... I'd love it if my friends were more excited about my training, but it's so out of their worlds, they are only scared for me and don't understand why I'm doing it....Actually on Sunday my friend messaged me pleading me to stop it, coz she cought glipses of how Joanna Jędrzejczyk massacred Jessica Penne in their UFC title fight. :) :) I tried explaining to her why it happened, but nooo ;)

I think men react differently, maybe more with aggression than with crying. Although I re-read your initial post and realized you talked about anger more than I'd realized. I get pissed off - well, not really, but a surge of aggression and wanting to go after someone - in padwork and sometimes sparring but never in fights. I kind of wish I would get it in fights because it might be helpful, but it's just never happened for me. My trainer tells me about all these male fighters who used to cry all the time. Very famous fighters now. He kind of laughs about it, but I also know he's telling me so that I know it's normal. But basically these superstar fighters, when they were kids up until about 14-15 years old were still crying all the time. His son, who is now 14, doesn't cry anymore but my trainer told me that once or twice he took his son out back and whipped him on the butt for getting angry in training; I think it was during sparring with other kids and he got too emotionally aggressive, tried to hurt the other kid, and that was unacceptable so he got punished. You know Thailand, so I don't have to tell you about the inappropriateness of showing emotion in any extreme, but for those who are less familiar - and when I first heard this story from him - it's surprising that the outward demonstration of aggression when it's expressing an emotion is totally out of line, whereas aggression that's calm and devoid of emotion seems okay. That's fighting, but it's controlled. So, at my gym: tears = totally okay if you ignore it like it's not linked to an emotion. Aggression/anger = only okay if you also don't link it with an outward emotion.

My trainers do not yell but the quiet judgement and disappointment sure works. And I don't always have a trainer involved in my fits of crying (or nearly crying), either. Just a few days ago I was clinching with a kid who I was basically tossing around, totally controlling him, and a couple men in the ring started kind of teasing him and that made me get all emotional and had to go cry in the bathroom for a quick minute. For me it's got almost nothing to do with the actual triggers in training, I'm just totally already primed to cry and anything, anything can set me off. But I've had this for a long time now and have blogged about it many times. For me it's a matter of controlling the message I'm sending to my gym when I get like this. I try to still show that I want to be doing what we're doing, even if I'm struggling. It's a male environment and seeing a woman crying usually means something is "wrong." Luckily, my gym now raises young boys up to be champions, so my trainer Pi Nu has seen literally hundreds of boys crying for years already. If we all respond in the "Thai" way and ignore it, it's all good.