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When she was young, Dulce María García left her job, home, and professional dreams when she thought she had found the man with whom she would create a family, but soon after she became a victim of domestic violence .
When she was 23 years old , Dulce was alone, with shattered dreams, and thinking life had no sense.
She remembers that, as a kid, she always liked sports , but she never thought that contact disciplines, such as Lucha Libre , boxing and mixed martial arts (MMA), would change her life and that they would provide her the ideal catharsis to overcome the violence she had suffered.
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Nowadays, Dulce practices these three sports. For 13 years now, she has professionally practice Lucha Libre and is known as Sexy Dulce – and Sexy Star before that. With this sport, she has performed in sports arenas in the United States , Japan , England , and different countries in South America .
Moreover, she dabbled in boxing four years ago and she has a streak of six unbeaten matches and recently entered the world of MMA .
“Some people can listen to my story and say ‘You did all this for a man? How could you!’ but we all have a different threshold for pain ,” says the athlete .
Dulce, a major in Communication Sciences by the Autonomous University of Nuevo León (UANL) , proposed the creation of centers or refuges for women who experience domestic violence so that they no longer feel afraid and denounce their cases.
According to the 2016 National Survey on Domestic Relationships Dynamics by Mexico’s National Statistics and Geography Institute (Inegi) , the main space of violence against women are from their couples and their families .
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Encouragement
“I didn’t know how my life would be if I left my partner because in with his words and mistreatment he made me feel the worst woman, that I was nobody without him. I didn’t know what I was doing in life and I thought that perhaps it was the best to disappear,” remembers Dulce , without being able to hold back her tears.
“When I decided to have a relationship with that person, I left everything: I left my job and told my mother to get rid of all of my things because I wanted to make a life with him from zero. Imagine, when I ended that relationship, which I thought was going to be forever, I had absolutely nothing ,” she says.
Then came a series of coincidences, she says, that gave her life a new meaning . She remembers that she was watching the movie called “ Enough ,” which is about a domestic violence history and she felt identified with the main character. In a commercial break, she saw publicity for a personal defense course that caught her attention.
With the support of her parents, Dulce started learning boxing and Muay Thai (am extreme sport also known as Thai boxing).
Back then, she says, a friend invited her to a Lucha Libre show where the rivalry between heels and faces, the amazing movements, and the connection it all generates in the public made the young woman relieve her anger with the athletes in the ring.
“You’re going to pay for this! I’m going up there and give you what you deserve,” she told them from the audience, which caught the attention of Jesús Arreola , the administrator of the sports venue and who asked her if she meant what she was saying.
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“Since I was very sensitive, I felt attacked and thought ‘This one doesn’t trust me, I will show him.’ I turned and said ‘It’s all true.” Arreola gave her an appointment and, without much preparation, she debuted four weeks later in an out-of-program fight.
“It was a very magical moment; when I went out, there was music , I began dancing and there were many children and at that moment I thought: ‘Can I really cause this in people who don’t even know me? How is it possible that someone who knows me has treated me so badly?
“In the middle of the ring, I took a deep breath, I closed my eyes, and said: ‘ Here’s where I die and here’s where I’m reborn ’ and so it was how I began in Lucha Libre at 24 years of age, old for the sport.” That was the birth of Sexy Star who later became Sexy Dulce .
Five months later, she performed in Mexico City and since then she was fought for 13 years and has won several championships. Among her feats are three female championships , three times champion of the AAA Queen of Queens , one world championship of AAA mix pairs , and in 2016, she won the Aztec Warfare 111 .
“In Lucha Libre, I found the way to defend myself, of how my body could react; it gave me the security that I could defend myself in a certain moment of aggression, to escape, run, or ask for help, and at the same time I was nourishing my self-esteem by seeing that people who didn’t know me wanted to be near me,” says Sexy Dulce.
The athlete rebuilt her love life. She married boxer Jhonny González – bantamweight and featherweight champion – who is also her boxing coach.
In this sport, she debuted at 33 years old , after having a daughter who is now six years old and is part of the inspiration that encourages her to keep going.
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Breaking patterns
“They told me ‘You’re crazy! You’re old! You’re a mother! You’re wrong!’ but I told myself, I’m not wrong, I’m going to show it, and I did, I have an unbeaten streak of six or seven fights,” she says with pride .
As if that was not enough, about a year ago, Dulce entered the MMA world .
“I remember they told me ‘What are you even thinking?¿ but I feel fine. I’m here (…) it’s a way of showing myself how far I’m able to get,” she asserts.
Dulce knows that by having overcome the terrible experience of domestic violence she has a great responsibility for she is aware that she is an example of fighting for many women. “I want to keep spreading the ‘Yes, you can,” she mentions.
“There is a successful young woman wrestler that says she remembers I gave her a mask and so she began in Lucha Libre . To one girl with cancer I said, ‘Here, I give you my magic powers ,” and her mother says that she suffered a lot with her chemotherapies but always became strong and brave by saying “I have magic powers, here’s Sexy Star’s mask and she’s with me.”
Nevertheless, despite her sports achievements , she admits that she still suffers from discrimination since the sports she practices are more focused on men.
“We want equality because the wages do not compare. For example, from the three sports I practice, if I earn one peso, a man is paid 10, even if I’m at a higher level with a good ranking.”
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