Without Her “Dad’s Death,” Ronda Rousey Admits She Wouldn’t Have Become a UFC Legend

The name Ronda Rousey certainly needs no introduction to fight fans. The 35-year-old has showcased her awesome mettle in MMA, judo, and wrestling to boast unmatched fame in the entire sporting world. Rousey is the first-ever American female to win an Olympic medal in Judo. She has also ventured out into the world of glamour and can be seen in some of the big-money movies like ‘Fast and Furious 7’ and ‘The Expendables’.

In her course of growing up, Rousey didn’t have much time with her father. The former UFC Bantamweight Champion has gone on record multiple times to iterate how her father passed away when she was just 8 years of age. Rousey also battled speech impediment during her childhood.

It was understandably hard in the initial days for Rousey and her family to cope with the loss of her father. But eventually, she too had to adopt the ‘life must go on’ notion of the world. In her autobiography, ‘My Fight/Your Fight’, Rousey described how the early loss of her father propelled the series of events turning her into a fighter.

Ronda Rousey and her family normalized her father’s loss with the passage of time

There will hardly be any daughter in this world who won’t be devastated by the loss of her father. Things were very much the same for ‘The Arm Collector’ as well. But, as we all know, nothing in this world stops it from advancing in time. Eventually, Rousey and her family also got used to the demise of her father.

In her book, Rousey stated, “But after a while, him not being there started to seem normal. I still missed my dad. I still thought about him every day. I still think about him every day, but I knew not to expect him to walk through the door.”

‘The baddest woman on the planet’ also described how her mother started dating a person named Dennis. She wrote that Dennis also flattered her mom once with “a pink fractal for Valentine’s Day”. Rousey penned that Dennis eventually married her mom and her family “moved back to California”. She also mentioned the birth of her sister, Julia, just after her “eleventh birthday”.

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The ‘two-time WWE women’s champion’ laid stress on how getting back to California allowed her mom to get in touch with her old judoka mates. This, in turn, propelled Rousey into the judo circuit, which made her the modern-day legend we all know.

Ronda Rousey followed her mother and credited her dad’s absence for the direction she took

Rousey wrote about how one of her mother’s old friends “had started his own club” and invited her mom “to work out there”. Like a lot of other usual kids, Rousey also displayed her interest in trying what her mother was doing. She narrated her first visit to a judo arena stating, “The next Wednesday afternoon, I hopped in the car to head to judo. I didn’t expect it to be a life-changing moment.”

‘Rowdy’ also discussed how her father’s death had created the circumstances which finally led her to visit a Judo arena. She wrote, “My dad’s death set off a series of events that would not have occurred had he lived. We wouldn’t have moved back to California. I wouldn’t have a younger sister. I wouldn’t have taken up judo. Who knows what I would be doing or how my life would have ended up. But I wouldn’t have ended up here.”

Most combat sports fans know the rest of the story about what Rousey has gone on to achieve after she visited the judo arena for the first time. The regretful event of Rousey’s father’s untimely death eventually directed her journey to greatness. It’s an unpredictable world. Isn’t it?

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