From a small town in Brazil to becoming a veritable UFC star, Karine Silva has overcome a lot with poverty being a constant reminder of misery throughout her life. ‘Killer’ grew up without much money, and had to literally fight and work hard for everything she has accomplished in her life. Her triumphs inside the octagon are a testament to her struggles.

Coming into the UFC, all seventeen of her wins at that point came via stoppages, thirteen of them in the very first round! The Brazilian has continued her promising MMA journey in the MMA juggernaut and looks set to contend for the title in the not-too-distant future. But a lot of that has to do with how she grew up and the hardship she had to face in her early life.

What is Karine Silva’s ethnicity and nationality?

Karine Silva’s journey started in the southwestern Brazilian city of Dourados in the border state of Mato Grosso do Sul, where she was born and spent her early years. ‘Killer’ is a Brazilian national but not much is known exactly about her ethnic background, including if she has any native or tribal blood.

Since her hometown is quite close to the Paraguayan border, around 30% of Dourados natives have some family connections in Paraguay. It is also unknown whether Silva has any familial connections to that country or if she comes from a fully Brazilian background.

Her journey to becoming an MMA star was a pretty uncertain one and is a testament to the strength of her character and her excellent work ethic. “I didn’t plan to become a professional. I was only seeking a better quality of life. I barely knew the sport, but I fell in love with it, so here we are. Everything happened very quickly. I decided to leave school, family, and my job behind. I went to live at my academy so I could be 100% dedicated,” Silva would reveal in an interview. Now let us take a closer look at how she came to be a professional mixed martial artist.

More about Karine Silva’s early life

Karine Silva, like many of her Brazilian counterparts in the UFC, comes from a family that struggled financially. This is why she was compelled to start working as a teenager to help her family make ends meet. It was at this phase of her life that she decided to take a leap and start training in martial arts.

With the little money she had saved up, and determined to do something that could get her out of poverty, ‘Killer’ got attracted to combat sports. But the path ahead of her was full of hardship and very uncertain. After all, she couldn’t even really afford to join a gym. But that wouldn’t stop her as she quit her job and started living full-time at a martial arts academy- on the condition that she helped in the upkeeping of the academy and assisted in teaching the students when she could. But that still wasn’t enough to make ends meet and she would moonlight security guard at night-clubs.

“Early on, I only had my courage. I didn’t have any money. I used what little money I had after quitting my job to move into my academy. My family didn’t like the idea. I didn’t have their support, moral or financial. I quit my job at a sex shop to go live at the academy. I had to learn how to teach martial arts,” she told Sherdog in an interview. By the time she was nineteen, Silva knew she wanted to be a mixed martial artist and made her professional debut in 2013. The rest, as they say, is history. What are your thoughts on Karine Silva’s journey to becoming a mixed martial artist?