Fighting for health: A UFC veteran helps vets connect with jiujitsu group

My name is Michelle Waterson Gomez and I am here today at MCON and I will be teaching a seminar on the mats at the Weedify station

So the seminar today is going to be a quick seminar. We only have about an hour and a half

So we're going to just start with the basics. Every fight starts standing. So we're gonna start the fight standing and kind of teach you how to get in on a good single leg takedown

so a little bit of wrestling. And then once we hit the mats, we're gonna kind of show you what we're gonna do

what are some different submissions that we can attack once we hit the mats from that takedown

I've been doing martial arts for as long as I can remember, since I was about 10 years old

And then when I got old enough, I started fighting, so I fought professionally for over 18 years

18 years. I have my black belt in American freestyle karate. I also have my black belt in

Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. And I just absolutely love all things martial arts because of what it's

done for me in my life. What brought me here is linking up with a company called

We Defy, which is a non-profit organization that I'm really passionate about. I am a military spouse

I come from a military family, and I really love and support our military who serve now and who are veterans

And I believe that there's a very, very strong correlation between people in the military and people who do martial arts

because it's very singular focus, singular mindset, and we bond through doing hard things

And so what We Defy does is get veterans on the mat and I think it a beautiful thing because a lot of times veterans kind of lose their way when they step away from the military They lose their brotherhood they lose the structure they lose the camaraderie

that they felt, the discipline that they felt and in doing jujitsu you will find

all of those things. So anytime I get the chance to kind of share my love and my

passion with with the rest of the world I'm jumping to the opportunity. So what

We Defy does is they sponsor veterans to be sponsored athletes at Jiu-Jitsu

schools in their community and so they have to vet the Jiu-Jitsu school make

sure that it's a legitimate school but it really does kind of give them a space

to lean into themselves to give them something to look forward to every day a

a community that they can grow with, go and kind of just be themselves

If you've ever been on the masks in Jesus' 3, you understand that you don't have to explain yourself to anybody

Nobody's going to treat you any differently. And that's what a lot of these veterans want

They just wanted to be treated like a normal person to come in

They want to get hardworking and they want to sweat. They want to experience some type of adversity that's going to make them grow

And they want to do it with people that they love and care about. The We Defy sponsors an athlete for an entire year

They pay their tuition on a monthly basis. They give them uniform and give them the head start that they need on their jiu-jitsu journey

So if you're a veteran interested in receiving a scholarship from We Defy and starting your jiu-jitsu journey

go to the We Defy website, fill out the application, and if you get that scholarship

they'll be able to link you up with an affiliate school in your community