Content Warning: This installment of Glowing Review discusses self-defense when dealing with a potentially violent attacker.
Welcome back to Glowing Review, an exploration of self-care, health, and wellness experiences created and offered by amazing local people. For a little more than a year, I’ve been sharing different kinds of facials, massages, fabulous hair how-to’s, botox, facilitated stretching, and more. Today’s Glowing Review will be totally different because I’m going to tell you about how I punched someone in the face in the name of self-care. More on that in a moment.
My Glowing Review Partner in Wellness is the wonderful Angela Hugghins, owner of Monarch Brow and Facial Studio in Carrboro. She is empowerment personified, and I am so lucky to work with her on this project. Next month on Glowing Review, I’ll finally have the opportunity to discuss Angela’s specialty – Microblading!
Now, back to that whole “I punched someone in the face” thing. I recently had the pleasure of taking a private self-defense class with Jaimie Lee at The Coalition NC. The Coalition is a Krav Maga studio that offers Kickboxing, Strength and Conditioning, and Self-Defense classes. This edition of Glowing Review isn’t going to break the relaxation meter, but we’re going to basically shatter the empowerment meter. In fact, I’m ditching the “Self-Care Scale” this month because this was such a different experience in personal wellness.
Self-Defense is not something I spend a lot of time thinking about. “I could fight back,” I often tell myself, but the truth is that anytime something remotely uncomfortable has happened regarding someone entering my space, I pretty much freeze. As it turns out, this is very common, especially in women.
The first thing Jaimie discussed with me is that most attacks last less than 15 seconds. At The Coalition, they teach that self-defense skills and a quick reaction time go hand-in-hand. If you can learn to react quickly to a potentially dangerous situation, you improve the odds of catching your attacker off-guard, and therefore improve your odds of injuring them, running away, screaming for help, anything you can manage. Those first few seconds make all the difference.
Jaimie taught me a series of defensive movies during our time together, all building on the basic flat-handed strike – right punch, left punch, right punch, left punch, in very quick succession. One helpful tip she gave me was to make a noise while I punched. First, this ensures that you’re breathing, but this also makes you sound more aggressive! (Think of Serena Williams’ grunt when she serves a tennis ball – if I ever end up on the receiving end of that, it will be the coolest and most terrifying day of my life.)
Jaimie suggested I pick a word that would make a hissing sound that I could say quickly, so I picked “ice.” It felt silly for a few moments, but once I got over the awkwardness, I understood why it was beneficial. By making a noise and taking up space, I felt myself shift from potential victim to potential attacker.
Speaking of me being the attacker, once I ‘mastered’ this series of punches, I thanked Jaimie for our wonderful time together by missing the pad she was holding and accidentally striking her in the face during a drill. Do you know what Jaimie did? Told me to keep going, to keep hitting the pad, because when you’re fighting an attacker who, statistically speaking, you probably already know, there’s no time to feel bad about it. I chose to ignore this really awesome advice and decided to cry about it for the next 10 minutes.
The Coalition is clean, bright, safe, and full of experienced people who want to make you feel more confident in your own skin. I walked in feeling awkward and unsure, and I left feeling strong and empowered. Even if self-defense isn’t something you’ve ever thought you needed, I recommend taking a class with Jaimie.
I’ll see you next month for another installment of Glowing Review!
As an accomplished painter and sculptor, Angela Hugghins brings an artist’s eye to her work transforming how the world sees her clients’ faces. A professional aesthetician since 2000, Angela launched Monarch Brow & Facial in 2016, providing expert skincare treatments, organic facials and lash and eyebrow tinting. After intensive training under Francek Prsa and the pioneering Serbian Master Microblading artist Branko Babic, Angela is one of only a handful of professionals in North Carolina fully certified in PhiBrows microblading.
The Monarch studio is an intimate space, designed for private, personal attention. She uses only organic, hypoallergenic and sustainable cleansers and makeup, providing treatments and simple-to-follow guidance to achieve great looking, healthier skin with a minimum of regimen at whatever budget you can manage.
