#but honestly I’m just feeling kinda... confined and not just in a Because The Pandemic way | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

funkymbtifiction · 3 years

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Hi Charity! I hope you are doing well. I have a question about judging types. Do judging types get frustrated by monotonous tasks or tasks that require constant attention? Or is this a perceiving function problem? And if its not, is there a way to deal with this?

I’m pretty sure I’m an EFJ. Even before this quarantine, I couldn’t stand doing household chores, primarily because it felt so pointless having to build and work on something only for it to turn to be for naught and having to start again the next day. It’s like a worthless necessity that needs to be done for the house to function. And I always try to get them done asap so that I can do anything else but this. And it gets on my nerves that my siblings don’t cooperate and do their part and in the end I get told I’m being too rigid and I should stop nagging them.

But its not just chores, I don’t like sitting in one place for too long because I get very fidgety. I find studying at one place for fixed intervals on a daily basis extremely mind numbing and so I tend to only study a few days before the test or before the assignment is due and it normally works out for me. My general approach is like “okay if I mess up and don’t get a good grade, then that’s a lesson and I’ll just do better and start earlier next time”. Except its gotten worse this year because its almost as if I’ve stopped caring and that worries me because I normally put in a lot of effort to maintain my gpa and have a good standing and now I’m really worried by this almost apathetic outlook I’ve ended up in.

I think that’s why I like going to college, because I had so much to do and people to talk to and different places and libraries to sit in and study at. But back here at home, my life feels confined to my bed and my desk and it just really makes me feel disheartened by how my life seems to have turned out and everything looks kinda bleak. I know that rationally, others too are in the same boat, but I can’t help but feel concerned because others don’t seem to be struggling like I am and seem to still have fun.

And it all ties back into everything feeling monotonous now and how everything feels like a chore to do. I used to love the classes I take and even had a clear idea about where I wanted to go after I graduate. I used to be so optimistic and would always have something to be thankful for and look forward to, but now it feels like I’m trapped in this endless cycle and I’m confined here and I can’t get out.

So is there anyway or anything that I as an EFJ can do to go back to my normal achiever self while I’m stuck at home or do I have to tough it out till lockdown is lifted?

Thank you so much for your time and patience. I really appreciate all that you do for us :)

To be honest, this sounds more like an N problem than an EFJ problem. ESFJs are more comfortable with routine tasks, but N users become angsty with too much same-ness and boring, rote behaviors. Housework is something “you do” but you find no pleasure in it.

As an ENFJ, you’re facing a loss of big picture perspective combined with frustration in the moment -- a Se loop. You are cycling between how unhappy and frustrated you are right now and how you are stuck in a situation that does not foster your ability to engage with other people and new environments and allow you to move toward the future that you want. On the bright side, you did not mention over-spending, so you’re ahead of a lot of ENFJs at this point in the pandemic. Tert-Se can become quite excessive in chasing after pleasures to distract themselves from hating their present situation / their boredom. ;)

To some extent, yes, you are going to have to wait this out, but there is a bright side in that the pandemic is going to wane, the vaccinations are doing their job, and various states are opening up, so by this summer large swaths of the country (assuming you are in the US) are going to be open to you; and the rest of the world may soon follow. Hopefully. So, I would re-engage Ni by going into yourself, thinking about the future you want, visualizing it, and focusing on the intellectual and/or psychological side of things more than on your present stuck situation. Do something or read something that engages your intellect and challenges you to adopt a new way of thinking. If you are stymied by a lack of physical changes, challenge your mind. ENFJs sometimes neglect Ni development because Se opportunism and being present is ‘easier,’ but now is a good time to get in touch with and strengthen your N. Think about what you can do right now to get prepared for the future you intend to have, that will allow you to use NiSe in tandem the way it’s meant to work.

N’s feel frustrated when they are not MOVING FORWARD. Stagnation is something that you hate, so start intellectually working toward the future, even if you cannot physically yet change your environment. That will help you.

I also sense some Enneagram 7 frustration in play here, so you may want to read up on the 7 profile and growth patterns and see if some of that is playing into your approach to life. You may need to learn how to balance ‘fun’ in your daily life through little pleasures rather than focusing on a constant need for outer physical stimulation. It could also be 3 related, if you used to be very focused, ambitious, and determined to succeed, and are now in a state of apathy.

Lastly, this is completely normal. Millions of people feel the way you do right now, in that things do not seem “worth doing” because they exist in a state of depressive “no one cares, nothing is changing, so why should I make any effort at all?” I battled that all of last year... but things ARE going to improve, they ARE going to get better, and this is just a temporary blip. A depressive state, because your life has been disrupted for the last 12 months. Allow yourself a period of mourning and sadness, and then think about what you can do to get yourself out of your depression. Because honestly, that’s what this is: depression. There are endless resources out there for you to consult, and therapy if you feel it is truly serious in such a way that it is preventing you from functioning normally.

#question #mbti #enfj #depression #pandemic fatigue #submission

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oneweekoneband · 3 years

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In the first cold hours of a new December morning, Taylor Swift once again revealed herself to be the primary antagonist in my hero’s journey. Weary and woebegone as I am, I will not waste strength on any attempt to deny that this latest attack has knocked me off balance, but I believe it is important that I—we, really, the lot of us who have been bloodied pitiably beneath this most brutal show of force—rebound immediately into a defensive posture so that there might be any hope at all for survival. Taylor’s second pandemic album will be released at midnight tonight, so I guess Shakespeare and his little “play” about elder abuse can get fucked after all. The album is called evermore. It was hubris, I can see in retrospect, which led me to tempt my enemy by writing all these words about her on this, the week of her birthday, knowing as I do that Taylor is one of those especially dangerous adults who make a big deal about both birthdays and lucky numbers. Icarus is my name now, covered in melted wax and tumbling to the sea. So as to steel ourselves for these horrors yet to come, I offer now, with not arrogance but the faith of the foolhardy, my best conjecture as to the content of each detestable track.

willow - Could be about a tree. Could be about a girl. More likely it is both somehow, which is extremely pervy, and not just because that’s part of the plot of the unspeakably cursed The Raven Cycle novels, which I, a full blown adult with, generally speaking, normal brain function, voluntarily read for the first time this summer because some of us, ma’am, used the pandemic for activities that hurt only ourselves, not others. Well, happy holidays, tree fuckers.

champagne problems - Whatever this is, know that I will be considering it a work after Fall Out Boy’s “Champagne for My Real Friends, Real Pain for My Sham Friends” and I’ll be right to do so and many people will say as much admiringly and they’ll smile at me with pride and doff their caps as I go.

gold rush - If this song is anything but a loving, comprehensive summation of the children’s novel DEAR AMERICA Seeds of Hope: The Gold Rush Diary of Susanna Fairchild then I’m going to walk directly out of my home and, deadly virus be damned, keep walking until I’ve entered Taylor Swift’s instead, at which point I will begin to scream out a litany of complaints at the very top of my voice, ceasing only when her security team kills me or we fall in love.

tis the damn season - Worst case scenario this is a sad Christmas song (the best kind of Christmas song) and it devastates me in the most degrading way possible. Best case scenario it’s really bad and dumb and I can live without pain.

tolerate it - Many possibilities here. Could be about white-knuckling it through a period of depression, or a breakup. Most obviously, it could be about COVID-19 lockdowns keeping us trapped in our homes, disconnected from loved ones, going slow-brained and strange, bowls piling up, and suddenly so desperate for human interaction that even memories of having drinks with somebody from Hinge who quoted Friends twice in an hour are tantalizing in comparison to the touch-starved dreamstate of staying indoors... But I kinda feel like this is Taylor replying “COPE” from on high to my tweets about how I would rather be boiled alive than have to face the existence of this record.

no body, no crime (feat. Haim) - What would be very good is if this is a homosexual romp about Taylor Swift and the one hot Haim guitar girl with the really gay energy doing a murder together a la “Somethin’ Bad” by Miranda Lambert with Carrie Underwood, but honestly, it is probably another song about Gone Girl.

happiness - Impossible to speak on this since, thanks to Taylor Swift, happiness is something with which I have no familiarity.

dorothea - Have seen chirping on the odious bird application about how perhaps this song title suggests that Taylor has written a song about Middlemarch, titling it for Dorothea Brooke, but I reject this because it implies that Taylor has read Middlemarch, which is a premise I cannot accept. Whether this refusal is out of self-preservation, being unwilling and in fact unable to face a world where Taylor Swift read and was moved to creation by the novel which was my most essential friend the summer I got dumped by a guy who I still had to work feet away from in a candle factory for another month, and about which Emily Dickinson (Emily Dickinson whose birthday it happens to be today, which isn’t to say that this means anything about anything. I am simply trying to batten down all hatches literally and spiritually in light of having been had once again by this numerology obsessed demon) once wrote "What do I think of Middlemarch? What do I think of glory.” or because I just at my core do not believe that Taylor has read a single book since Gone Girl I couldn’t possibly say.

coney island (feat. The National) : Some ungodly americana ass bullshit that is going to ruin my life. The thought of holy terror shaped like a horse girl Taylor Swift and trickster nymph in the body of a tax accountant Matt Berninger, two individuals I have allowed, separately, to cause me grievous psychic harm, having even the barest amount of one to one contact, even digitally, has made me want to peel all my skin off and put it back on flipped inside out so that I might, when I look in the mirror, see a version of myself which approximates how I feel.

ivy - Another song for the plant lesbians. That’s fine, and I’m happy for that community, but what I want to know, looking at this growing pile of songs named after women, is where, Taylor, is the song about loudmouth queen Inez, legendary gossip and, for my money, the star of folklore?

cowboy like me - Putting it as mildly as humanly possible, to slit my throat would be less cruel. I am drawing a straight line from me writing illegible sequels to perfect film An American Tail: Fievel Goes West (itself a sequel) in crayon as a toddler, to Paula Cole’s “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?” on the radio in my mom’s two door Honda, to me everyday after school in third grade changing into the cowboy costume my godmother bought, to me at fourteen internalizing a sense of righteous indignation that would take years to even begin to outgrow when Crash beat Brokeback Mountain for Best Picture, to the winter I dropped half my classes out of fear and sickness and read paperback westerns on the twenty third floor of the college library for tens of hours at a go, to the profoundly gay episode of Supernatural called “Tombstone” which is, yes, named for the profoundly gay cowboy film Tombstone, to the inspired and revitalizing pause in “Space Cowboy” by Kacey Musgraves where she’s like, “You can have your space........ cowboy”, to Mitski’s Be the Cowboy, to the perfect boygenius cover of certified classic “Cowboy Take Me Away”, to whatever the hell this is going to be.That line is not to make a point at all. It’s just that there is a line and beside it there is me, incapacitated.

long story short - Just like all the other times anyone has ever invoked this phrase in the entire history of human beings expressing themselves with language, it is going to be a huge lie, because this woman never shuts up.

marjorie - After all that Taylor has put me through over the years, she should have at least named one of these wretched things “ellen” after my dead Sagittarian grandmother, whose birthday is tomorrow, December 11th, which is again, the release date of Taylor Swift’s second album in sixth months, but it’s probably for the best that she didn’t because you simpletons would immediately think it was an homage to George Bush’s friend Dory the fish, and therefore gay, regardless of the actual text of the song, and it’d be the “betty” massacre all over again. That being said, this is almost assuredly another horny song about some mid-century white lady. Only days ago Taylor was telling Entertainment Weekly that she’s been watching a lot of movies in quarantine, and while she didn’t name 1958’s Marjorie Morningstar starring Natalie Wood, I wouldn’t put it past her.

closure - God, I hope this one is another Kaylor classic so we can all act like complete raving lunatics online from the confines of our own plague quarters for a few days. It’s been a hard year.

evermore (feat. Bon Iver) - I’ll be catatonic by this point. Who cares?

right where you left me - Yes, in hell.

it’s time to go - Yes, TO HELL.

#taylor swift #folklore

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hmajorgirl · 4 years

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so here I am for old times sake. it’s been 5 years and a lot has changed. but i’m kinda still the same. maybe my inner monologue doesn’t sound as self-assured as it did when I was 15. maybe i don’t romanticise the shit out of every 2 second eye contact i make with cute strangers. maybe i don’t grammar well anymore because i think it’s a cute look. Oh wow. so much of the world has changed. facial recognition, instagram shops, the pandemic... so many new songs i play on repeat until i’m sick of them. i’m a lot less motivated than i was before, and i’m ashamed to admit that. i have smile lines. i feel more and more defeated everyday (actually, we’re trying to work on this). but yh the sad emo vibes never quite dissipated like i dreamed they would, i felt so betrayed by the order of things and the way of the world that i lost a lot of hope. gave up on myself (a bit... a lot sometimes). but other times, it’s gucci. i feel like i’m definitely more cringe than cheesy now. not sure if that’s a good thing, pretty sure it’s not.

hmm. what hasn’t changed? still unfortunately in love with love, but i can mostly see the difference between real life and the cute shit that happens in my head. i’m learning to have faith, to trust. to start living life and exist in the same dimension as other people because even though it sucks, it’s better than existing alone in your head. i realised that studying will only get you a quarter of the way to things and unfortunately stopped that shit. it wasn’t a good idea because i didn’t pick anything else up. i’m still writing songs. still singing them badly. BUT my singing has improved marginally:) i still love my parents, family is all good (touch wood). still a bit too impressionable but we’re working on building a stronger willpower and independence. still love taylor swift. still want to run away to the creative industry. still want to runaway sometimes (in general). I still write! sometimes. wow, i guess some things really just don’t change.

The good? Hmm my eyes have been opened to the multi-dimensions of wealth and inequality and cultural differences that exist in the world. I am thankful for that and didn’t know that money could buy so much. but simultaneously feel disheartened that the discrepancy is so large between people at birth. inequity is real and idk how i feel about that because i really believed in the natural justice system. and then I was so caught up in these feelings of betrayal and injustice that i forgot that i am lucky enough to have the opportunity to change things. I forgot about it for 5 years and now it feels like it’s too late. i know it’s not.

that was a digression.

the good. okay. hmm discovered korean dramas and the mastery that is cinema and how it evokes emotions through stories and idk that’s just a piece of my soul coming together. i work out occasionally. sadly i stopped dance but i’m vowing to sign up for classes once i have the money. i got a spotify membership and spend my days making playlists for myself and it’s one of the best things that has ever happened to me. I really hate how my inner core is so soft and romantic, it’s not fit for the capitalist society that we’re living under. i have friends, i like them, they like me. there is a guy, maybe. there were a few guys actually. i’m not sure how long this one is going to be around for GAHHH omg imagine if i re-read this in five years time and i’m laughing at myself because he screwed me over so bad idk. i have bad self-esteem issues. i am kinda joking, kinda not. okay, i like him but let’s move onto another topic. i’m trying my best to adult and be honest with my feelings and approach things with feigned maturity to mask my pre-teen thoughts. let’s leave it at that:)

i remember that taylor said that the lucky one was the hardest song to write for the red album. because it was solely about her and her life. no guys (apart from the second verse but okay that’s not central to the song). it’s the same for me. i don’t want to talk about the direction of my professional life because it scares me more than messing my life up romantically. for now, i’m beginning to see the role of passion and interest in work and it’s importance. I’m trying my best to walk towards that direction because i know that ultimately i want a career that I would love to work overtime for. but i’m still trying to balance the scales between what i want and the confinements of reality. i need to make money. sometimes it feels like an either or kind of situation and i don’t know what to do. but maybe this is just standard 20 year old thoughts. okay but we have 2 months left of uni so i’m going back to studying. i hope that when i look back on this i would have a 2:1 bachelors (but let’s be honest we want a first)

some final thoughts for 25 year old me because why not make your tumblr a time-capsule? dodie-style.

what are you listening to right now? I’m listening to 21 by gracie. Are you seeing anyone? Honestly, I don’t see you in a steady relationship because i feel like your self-esteem will get in the way of things - either that or you get your shit together and focus on your career too much. I hope it’s the latter. I hope family is all well and healthy. call them. right now, if you’re not living with them. DEAR GOD PLS don’t still be living with them. OH GOD DO YOU HAVE YOUR OWN FLAT/HOUSE?? where are you by the way? london? what are you doing right now career-wise? how’s it going? is it what you want to do? does it fit in with your life plan? please tell me you have a life plan by now. i hope i’m proud of you. i hope you’re working hard. how are you? really? are you rich enough to afford therapy and weekly spin/pilates sessions? what’s up with your social circle? are you still writing? ARE THERE DRONES EVERYwhere? How’s chloe? Elizabeth? Jason? Update me, what happened with the guy - i want to hear a story. do you cook now? did you manage to turn your personality type from a 2/9 enneagram to a 3? bitch we gonna work on this. do you still write songs? can you sing? you don’t have kids right lmao pls no god help us. what’s your yearly salary post-tax? did you start dancing again? did you start to learn piano again? what happened with the pandemic? how long were you quarantined for? do you still make spotify playlists haha? what tv series are you currently binging? do you hate me? please tell me your still blogging ur life on ur private instagram. how many followers do you have now? who are you having conversations right now with on facebook? what are your colleagues like? are you less people orientated now that you’ve realised that they cannot provide you with the love that you are depriving yourself of from yourself? DO YOU READ? are you the perfect health-freak, ig-girl, smart business woman, go-getter in her white suit at the glass media company that you dreamed about being at those dark spin sessions? GOD IMAGINE. I hope you are but i don’t have faith right now. pls tell me you don’t teach (or you teach and ur salary is insane in a good way). are you a journalist? you didn’t go into consulting right? did you study again after uni? are you the screenwriter that you’ve dreamed about? did your poetry account blow up and now you’re a full time poet? I still kinda hope you work at a nice glass office (brand consulting, advertising, media, journalism) and wear cute coords suits to work. and i hope you’re writing on the side because it’s who you are. I hope you’re reading lots and I hope you’re super smart and switched on. I hope you’re memory has improved a lot. I hope you’re in love, I hope he loves you back and I hope you know that too. I hope you have a great and healthy relationship with your parents and see your extended family and grandparents often. I hope everyone is healthy and I hope you took your parents to duck and waffle like you wanted (don’t do it when you’re poor though). I hope you’re taking care of your health and eating well. I hope you’re still dreaming in a realistic way. I hope you have great mentors and a supportive friend group. I hope you’re living your best life. re-read the defining decade. but i hope you don’t reminisce to much anymore and don’t write too many songs because you’re 25, time to break out the novel shit. I hope you’ve travelled alot. I hope you spend a few more summers in china falling in love with life and yourself again. how is your chinese? are you still a romantic? tell me, have you changed, if at all? do you read the news? are you less cynical about yourself and more realistic or less optimistc about the world? I hope you are. contingencies are important.

are you excited for the future? I hope you are. if not, please change, you have time, all you need is faith and diligence. hope you’re holding up well. Me? at 20? I’m excited about what my 25 year old self is going to be like, like i was excited to see what my gcse results were going to be like. I hope the results are the same. work hard. i love you. hope you love yourself more. BELIEVE IN YOURSELF. have faith. :) i can’t do much for you, but i hope i did a lot to get to where you are right now. hoping is useless, i’m going to work now.

take care x

#hmajorgirl

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frontproofmedia · 4 years

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Jessica McCaskill's Journey to the Undisputed Welterweight Title

By Steven Weinberg | Contributing Writer and Photographer

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Published: September 17, 2020

Jessica McCaskill’s (9-2, 3 KOs) birthday came a few weeks early this year. On August 15th, the now 36-year-old, unified 140-pound champion moved up a weight class and dethroned the First Lady of Boxing, Cecilia Braekhus (36-1, 9 KOs), by majority decision to become the new undisputed WBC, WBC, WBO, IBF, and IBO Welterweightbelt champion.

The fight, originally scheduled for April in Maryland, was postponed due to COVID and rescheduled to take place in Tulsa, OK. Despite the pandemic, McCaskill viewed the shutdown as a positive.

“I felt like Chicago really prepared us for Tulsa. We pretty much kept a quarantine life here – I came to the gym. I went home. Maybe I went to the pet store, maybe to get groceries. But I was in the gym most of the time.”

As a result, by the time McCaskill arrived in Tulsa, the “fighter’s bubble” didn’t impact her. At the hotel, the team was cut off from each other and confined to separate rooms. McCaskill was able to leave her room with a security escort for one hour per day to work out by herself. Walking one building over from the hotel to the gym, which was equipped only with a heavy bag, treadmill, bike, and scale, was the only outdoor activity for the week.

Back in the hotel room for 23 hours per day, room service was available, and Uber Eats orders had to first pass through Matchroom COVID screeners.

McCaskill said with a laugh, being stuck in a hotel room wasn’t that bad. “I love fight week. I get three times as much sleep as I normally do, and watch a bunch of trash TV to relax.”

Other than that, she conducted Zoom workout sessions with her strength and conditioning coach and phone interviews to stay busy.

Making weight has been a problem for many fighters returning during the pandemic, but not for McCaskill. Leading up the fight, which was at a catchweight of 145 pounds, McCaskill wanted to keep her weight between 147 pounds and 152 pounds. On her social media, she was often seen working out in a simple tank top and spandex. During fight week, all she had to do was work out and back off her eating to be good to go.

Braekhus, however, appeared to have weight issues, and Team McCaskill viewed Braekhus agreeing to the 145-pound catchweight as a huge tactical error. They believe Braekhus simply overlooked McCaskill to where she backed off her weight loss and gave McCaskill a head start.

On Braekhus’s social media, she was often seen in plastics, working out with weights, trying to sweat everything out. In fact, McCaskill feels that Braekhus was drained on fight night.

“She guzzled, like, 2 liters of water right after the weigh-in, and even during the face-off, I could see her chest and her abdomen, kinda uneasy breathing and anxious, like maybe she was feeling bad. And seeing how uneasy she was, was such a confidence builder.”

McCaskill emphasized, “The face-off means everything to the fighter. It tells you their mental state.”

Thus, Braekhus never having fought below 147 pounds gave McCaskill an immediate advantage.

Despite the Tulsa cityscape that served as the backdrop to the fight, McCaskill remained focused in the ring. She said not having a crowd in such a unique venue was beneficial. With no noise, there were fewer distractions, which dulled down the moment. McCaskill felt that had people been in attendance, especially in such a nice and unique venue, it would have hyped things too much. Without the distractions, she was able to level herself out and remain focused.

Additionally, the day’s heat was not an issue. Prior to the start of the fight, the temperature was above 90 degrees. But, by the time the fighters left their dressing rooms, the temperature had dropped about 10 degrees. As McCaskill made her ring walk, she felt a breeze and knew the heat and humidity of Tulsa would not be an issue. Braekhus, however, had been in Big Bear, CA, since January, and the climate of Tulsa likely weighed heavily on her.

Once the fight started, McCaskill planned to see what Braekhus was going to do. Her team thought Braekhus would either come forward as a result of new trainer Abel Sanchez, or get on her bike, punch, and move. McCaskill specifically remembered in the first minute, moving, punching, and circling to her right. Braekhus began moving forward.

McCaskill said, “I thought, oh, that’s their game plan. She’s going to come towards me. Well, let’s go.”

Rick Ramos, McCaskill's trainer, and manager said the plan was to wait the first 30 or 40 seconds. He wanted Jessica to slide off and not come forward. If Braekhus came forward, that meant she was going to try and walk McCaskill down and implement the Abel Sanchez style, the Mexican style. If Braekhus was to do that, Ramos wanted McCaskill to stop and go forward herself.

And he beamed with confidence, “if that happened, we were going to win the fight.”

Sure enough, Braekhus came forward.

McCaskill jumped in the pocket and went full throttle. “I was very surprised at how fast I was able to start.”

She continued, “I felt like a lot of things made themselves available that we practiced for. Uppercuts on the inside, long right hands straight down the middle. I had some bigger, wilder right hands, but there were a lot of punches that just snapped her head back. It made me seem like the dominant puncher.”

The result was that Braekhus was uncomfortable. For the first time in 36 professional fights, she tried to brawl. In fact, Braekhus, who never recorded a knockout, seemed to want to brawl.

Ramos emphasized, “Cecilia couldn’t adjust because she looks up to Abel Sanchez, rightfully so. So she listened to him and stuck to his game plan, and she didn’t want to go off his game plan. She tried to come forward and do what he taught her to do because she trusts him. It was bad coaching. It was the wrong style for a 39-year-old fighter. She should have tried to be more slick as an older fighter rather than a banger.”

In other words, Abel Sanchez pushed Braekhus to be a type of fighter that she’s not.

McCaskill was a bit more blunt.

“It was arrogance. Arrogance in what he [Abel Sanchez] thinks his ability is as a coach and arrogance collectively that they can just try something new on this random person, and either way, they’ll just come out on top.”

Ramos echoed the sentiment. “This will sound disrespectful, but I think it was arrogance from Cecilia and more so from Abel. They’ve been in the game so long that we’re basically fighting their names and reputations, right? I think it was arrogance. They didn’t really think of us. I always pay attention to the coaching, and I’m sure Abel Sanchez didn’t even blink an eye at me. Right before the fight, I pointed at them and said, Jess, look at them; they’re old. We should beat these guys. They are not on our level anymore.”

What’s more, Ramos didn’t think the arrogance was confined to two people.

“It was pure arrogance on everyone involved. If you even look at the championship belts [given to Jessica], they say Cecilia on them. That’s the highest level of disrespect. It wasn’t just Cecilia and Abel; it was promoters, writers, odd makers, and everyone involved.”

Immediately after the fight, McCaskill wondered if it was going to be a draw and if Ramos would be okay with that. Ramos had McCaskill winning by one round, but wouldn’t have been surprised if it was a draw simply based on being the “B-side” and Braekhus’s status in the sport.

The first score read: 95-95. After hearing that score, McCaskill thought about how she had the dominant ring presence, threw more punches, and didn’t do things wrong like backpedal and get caught on the ropes. She felt confident the win would be hers.

Interestingly, McCaskill says a key give away is how the other scores are read. If it is announced that one judge has a certain score, and another judge has a different score, it will be a draw. But when the scores are read together, it will be a majority decision. Sure enough, the next two scores were read together, 97-93 and 97-94, and McCaskill waited for what felt like a year to hear “and the NEW . . . “

The sense of relief was overwhelming. Ramos says the win cements his place in the boxing world and McCaskill's place in the hall of fame as a two-division, unified, and undisputed champion.

“I’m just happy for everything we’ve been through. Buying all of the tickets ourselves, all of the promoters and sanctioning bodies blowing me off . . . I honestly want to say “Fuck You” to everyone for not believing in us.”

McCaskill wasn’t as defiant but did say, “the haters are out there, and they’re salty, and they’re upset, but we did it. We came and did exactly what we said we were going to do, and I was very happy for the team. “

Thanks to COVID, Team McCaskill’s celebration was muted. Some close friends and gym members had driven down from Chicago, and together they enjoyed cheeseburgers, ice cream, and beer from room service. Nonetheless, a celebration was to be had. Jessica McCaskill unseated the First Lady of Boxing to become the new undisputed welterweight champion.

Immediately after the fight, Braekhus intimated that she was hanging up the gloves. But after reflecting on what she viewed as a poor performance, she elected to exercise her rematch clause.

Both McCaskill and Ramos believe that exercising the rematch clause doesn’t make good business.

Ramos said, “She’ll have to fight by the end of the year, and I don’t think she stays with Abel Sanchez, and I don’t think she learns a whole new style from a new coach in three or four months. She could go back to her old coach, and that’s cool, but there was something going on for her to leave in the first place. I don’t think she’d be putting herself in place to win. And I think whoever is managing her and promoting her would agree with me."

McCaskill holds a slightly different view. When the rematch happens, because McCaskill is now the “A” side, the fight will be at 145 pounds again, which proved detrimental to Braekhus the first time around. If Braekhus insists on the fight occurring at 147 pounds, McCaskill laughed, she’ll have to get paid more, that’s how it works.

But McCaskill also has the interests of women’s boxing at heart.

“If Cecilia fights me again and loses, or gets knocked out, nobody is going to want to see her again. If she sets the rematch aside, and Taylor v. McCaskill 2 happens, Katie has momentum; I have momentum, that’s going to be a good business plan. Cecilia can make contracts to fight both of us, winner and loser. That will give her at least two more fights, whereas if she fights me right away, that could be her last fight. A good business plan all around is to keep female boxing going; we don’t want to stifle it.”

Nonetheless, Braekhus seems only interested in attempting to getting her former belts back. But McCaskill gave Braekhus her first taste of defeat in 13 years of professional boxing. That can have a tremendous psychological toll on a fighter. With the rematch slated for early 2021, McCaskill and her team are more than willing to give Braekhus a second helping loss.

(Featured Photo: Ed Mulholland/Matchroom Boxing)

#HF #Jessica McCaskill #Cecilia Braekhus #Rick Ramos

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