Your best bet is to do your shopping and see what is available in your area. We can suggest all kinds of styles if they are not available in your area it is not going to help you. Also keep in mind no matter what style there are also good and bad teachers in all styles and all styles can also be taught for sport. So the best thing for you is to get a feel for what is out there. After you visited a few school you will be able to weed out the obvious sports oriented schools. Then I would go back to the ones you liked and ask for free trial classes. Then make a decision which one is teaching what you want to learn and also pick the teacher who can teach a woman. It is not the same as teaching a guy as guys tend to use a lot more strength to make their techniques work and make up for lack of techniques. This is a luxury you will not have so you need a teacher who understands leverage and how the techniques work and who can also teach it. The better a teacher understands the techniques and the less strength he uses to execute the techniques the better your chance to learn something you can use. When visiting the schools watch the female students and make sure they can actually defend themselves against the guys because this is what you will learn and look like if you train in that school.
You age weight, height and or gender doesn't matter. What matters is finding a good instructor. The style does even matter. But I will caution you there are many schools that teach a sport instead of self defense and some even call it self defense. Example muay thai is awesome, but it is a sport. It use some technique taught in self defense but they are used differently and with a different intent.
Every style is not available in every area. You need to visit several schools. Take their trial classes. Then determine which instructor will best help you reach your personal goals.
From reading your question, if you can find a Bujinkan (Ninjutsu), or Krav Maga (a self-defense system developed for the military in Israel) is probably your best bet, just not widely available. Stay away from Tae Kwon Do if your intentions are for self defense. Good Luck.
unfortunately we were not all built the same so gender does play a factor
of course there are the exceptions but for example bone density is different in
the sexes ,same analogy can be given for a chimpanzee and a regular human
can be applied to this case ,id suggest tai boe at least in this manner u will get in
shape and will practise the body mechanics of punching and kicking
I suggest you Tae Kwon Do or karate. Muai Thai is full contact and according to your gender its not matching well. Jiu jitsu or grappling arts not good for you much. Due to you are smaller and light weight. You will be uncomfortable with it.
I'm a lighter weight female (about 115 lbs and 5'6"). Never taken any martial arts or sports classes before. Mostly interested in self-defense (like if someone is actually attacking me, not competition), but also want to get more in shape, feel more confident, be able to kick butt, etc. I'm currently in decent shape but lack lots of muscle, and my flexibility sucks hardcore.
From what I've read, Muay Thai, Brazilian Ju Jitsu, and Krav Maga sound most like what I'm interested in, but I still don't know much about any of them. I'm also concerned my flexibility (or lack thereof) would be a serious problem in anything I do. If I go without stretching for a single day most of my progress is lost.
Any advice for a total noob?
