‘Boxing let me be angry’: Anna Whitwham

After her mum died, Anna Whitwham was drawn to martial arts, and found an outlet for her grief in the ring

I am standing in the middle of the boxing ring, a stage lit up like a theatre. I’ve hit the woman so hard she staggers back into the ropes. The pause makes me relax. I think I’ve won, but I’m wrong. Rage moves her. Boxing can be like a game of chess, a play on stillness and control. But not now, and not here. I am scrappy and wild. When she comes for me, I launch myself at her. My face can take this pounding – it’s been thickened by temper and that’s enough. Then she hits me and my legs buckle and my head spins. There is the thud of silence as I scramble for sense – but it’s over. My body is done.

I started boxing soon after my mum died. It had been a long and brutal three years of watching the tumour take over, edging closer to her throat. It happened during Covid, so visiting her in the hospice felt clandestine and sneaky – we’d stalk the silent wards in masks, hands raw with sanitiser, scared to touch each other. I nursed and helped her to the end. I witnessed how the mechanisms of her body stopped working. I watched Mum stop eating because her body wouldn’t let her swallow. Bedsores stopped her sleeping. She needed extra blankets to stop the mattress causing her pain.

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