Hello, my name is Jen and I am a fashion blogger who plays contact flag football. I add the contact part in it because we get blocked and “tackled”(those flags aren’t always easy to pull off) without wearing any pads. Previously I posted pictures of me on the field after an interception and well… I got yanked, pulled, punched square in the jaw and then finally tackled. I loved every single physical minute of it. Call me crazy but life happens on that field! Because of the toughness of flag football, we have to rely on any additional natural padding our bodies give us. I love this sport with all of my heart and I love the girls I play with. On Saturdays I also play on a co-ed team but that is not as physically demanding as all girls but still very fun. People always assume that those who are passionate about fashion are girly girls… I am definitely into fashion and I am definitely a girly girl, but the minute I hit that football field, I feel like I become a different being. I have gotten hurt. I have also hurt others. I am far more intense in co-ed than all girls but its probably because I am still learning it every single time I am on that field. In co-ed I have guys come up to me on a regular basis about my intensity and trash talking. Yes, I will pull a guys flag with the quickness and talk mad smack to his face about it. I am a woman playing a man’s sport! Like I said before though I love this sport! I have met some of my closest friends through football and have met some of the most evil people as well. I started off playing football on a team named Lady Elite. I never played a single game with them and did not even have a jersey but I still include them in my football resume because I love the girls and well I did go to 2 practices and 1 scrimmage lol. If I was there solely for the social aspect of the game, I would have stayed but I knew I needed more fundamentally. At the time they weren’t able to offer that. I decided to play my first all-girls football season with a team named Lady Falcons. They are an extremely solid team but unfortunately the coach has not quite learned personnel management and would rather run a few of his faves into the ground playing offense and defense than use the talent on his bench. I am not a great football player (yet) but I am not bench material either so I had to do what was right for me and find a team that I could learn and use my skills. A new team was formed named Ballerz United and they were the answer to my problem….. or so I thought. We had intense practices where we went over fundamentals from start to finish. We had decent coaches and talented players. Unfortunately as time went by we noticed that some of our coaches are not on the same page as the rest of us. One of my coaches, Kitt this is for you, is AMAZING! He will work with you till your legs are numb and he will scream at you till you go deaf but he will NEVER ever stop encouraging you and being in your corner. He does not talk out of the side of his mouth and he doesn’t bad mouth any of his players. He will come to you with anything and offer his help. He not only tells us he wants to see us succeed but he does all he can to give us the tools to do so. Besides the girls on the team, he is the ONLY reason I am still with Ballerz United. Its evident that whenever you get a group of women together there will always be drama. That is a given. Its just nature for us to be catty and hormonal but its tough when you cannot always count on all your leadership. But alas we are all humans and cannot be perfect. In the end we have to be a family, one way or another. But….. I am not here to rant or vent. I just wanted to share with all of you what I do on the weekends and why I love flag football so much. As much as I try to make fashion events on Saturdays and Sundays, its not always feasible for me because I am on the field. Huge thanks to Elle and Sig for coming to a few of my games and supporting me.
I appreciate you more than you know.
You can see below what happens Any Given Sunday at Deanwood Rec in good ole DC………….
I sincerely adore almost all of the ladies I have met but I really want to highlight a few:
Vogue Ellis:
You are my girl. Through and through. Saturday we ball together and Sunday we ball on opposing teams but in the end I love you!
Ceci:
We are on opposing teams always but guess what I learn SO MUCH from watching you. You improve every single game and are truly an inspiration!
The Lady Elite girls.. “cs”:
You guys make me laugh and smile every time I see you. I love how tight knit you are and how fun you make football.
Juanita, Vee, Shaun
there are NO words… you guys are my roll dawgs and my heart. You keep me sane and going when I really just want to show my West Indian side and tell everyone where to stick it lol
Photo credits: Myself, Sig, Greg Proctor, and Louis Hopson
Videos:
Jenni Jehanne
