Adjust to Life After Prizefighting

When your boxing days are over, you must quickly adjust to a different life. At age 35 years or so, you cannot keep fighting and with 15 - 20 years of fighting behind you, it will be difficult. You must change, the career of a fighter is short - that is how it is.

Steps

  1. Find a job, any type of a job, as soon as possible. With a regular job your income flow will be steady. A fighter's life is hard because he lives between matches and has many expenses. He has to have a trainer, manager, and has to deal with promoters (a difficult task). For a related profession, consider being a trainer or working with amateur boxers as a director perhaps. You have to make money. Only a small number of fighters who made a lot of money can retire, most fighters will have find a job.
  2. If you have the desire to make a comeback, do so, but be thoroughly prepared. You could get permanently injured if you are not prepared, so you should not work full-time and train part-time. Boxing is life or death. With age, however, even after a good comeback fight, you will be eventually defeated (more sooner than later). The comeback desire is very strong because you have been fighting for many years - it is a part of you. Satisfy that urge, so you will not have regrets later, and when you get defeated soundly, go back to working a normal job.
  3. Keep your body weight at the level that is healthy and do not overeat. Follow the strict diet that your trainer had you follow including the minimal consumption of alcoholic beverages, saturated fats and sweets. Don't womanize if married. Practice moderation.
  4. Continue to hone your old skills. Fighting is a way of life, do not end it when your prizefighting days are over. Keep doing roadwork, calisthenics and shadowboxing for your fitness and self-protection.
  5. Try to save your money when prizefighting to prepare for the future. Consider investing your money, starting a business or start making payments for a house. Take care of your family. Sometimes you will make a lot of money, but this will not last forever.
  6. Be accepting.
    • After retiring, you will not be often recognized and adored by your fans (young fans especially) and courted by movie stars and politicians. You must simply accept this change, as this being a new era, and move on with your life. Professional fighting, unlike professional ball playing, does not have their educational requirements, so keep your composure, when some of your old fans, who followed your career in their youth, are now educated and respected professionals, come up to you bubbling with admiration.
    • Travel if you can because traveling the world was often a part of your life. However, in reality, a lot of traveling, too, will be a thing of the past.
  7. Have self-respect and dignity, be a role model, and a credit to the boxing community. Maintain your fighting ability for your health and fitness, your self-protection, and your fans.

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References

  • AndrĂ© Baynum (ring name: Phil Robinson)
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