The former UFC bantamweight champion and Olympic bronze medalist Ronda Rousey started her MMA career by winning 12 fights in a row; she embarked on a meteoric rise to become a household name and the biggest star in UFC. She often hyped as the Mike Tyson of women’s MMA, seemed as if she were unbeatable.
Then in 2015, Holly Holm faced Rousey at UFC 193 and knocked her out cold with a legendary head kick, after the loss Rousey contemplating suicide and actively avoiding media. She took a year hiatus then return to fight newly crowned bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes, hoping to reclaim her 135-pound title. It was another disaster for Ronda, as she was knocked out in under a minute at UFC 207.
It’s been more than two years removed from the end of Rousey’s dominant run as UFC champion. Still, the former UFC bantamweight titleholder can’t open up about a pair of devastating knockout defeats which derailed her mixed martial arts career.
She went to sign a multi-year deal with the (WWE) World Wrestling Entertainment and although the new chapter in her life might seem like a suitable opportunity to address her past demons.
When Ronda made her thrilling pro-debut at WrestleMania 34 in New Orleans on April 8, where Rousey revealed she has finally come to terms with a pair of shocking losses in UFC.
On Wednesday, During a public Q&A session hosted by Hollywood director Peter Berg at the Wild Card West boxing gym, a former champion who’s promoting her new movie Mile 22, revealed she cried for two years:
“I did a whole lot of crying, isolating myself, (husband Travis Browne) held me and let me cry and it lasted two years,” Rousey said, per MMA Junkie’s Martin Rogers. “I couldn’t have done it alone. There’s a lot of things you have to remember. Every missed opportunity is a blessing in disguise.
“I had to learn from experience. From the worst things, the best things have come as a result. Time is a great teacher. It’s that belief that time passes, even bad times.”
Ronda Rousey admits her mother never taught her how to lose, as the thought of losing in the Octagon never cross her mind and revealed why losing affected her so much.
“My parents expected me to be special, so I expected to be special,” she said. “I was just trying to create the job I wanted, and I wouldn’t have the audacity to do that if my mom didn’t tell me I could.
“But one thing my mother never taught me was how to lose. She never wanted me to entertain it as a possibility. She’d say: ‘Let it suck. It deserves to suck.’”
Rousey also explained why she was away and quiet with the media after her UFC losses.
“We live in an age of trial by Twitter,” Rousey continued. “What is really gained by stating opinion on anything? It whittles people down. It gets cut and pasted 10 times and it’s in (a) headline.
“(Famous people) keep more and more of it to themselves. Why should I talk? I believe hearing me speak is a privilege, and it’s a privilege that’s been abused, so why not revoke it from everyone? I don’t believe public criticism beating you down is the right thing to do.”
UFC president Dana White has said in previous interviews that he doesn’t see Ronda Rousey coming back, and Ronda confirms the on The Ellen Show that she’s interested in coming back to MMA. It seems like she started to accepting her MMA losses.
