Rousey My Fight/Your Fight on sale today: There was a lot of $#!^

UFC women’s bantamweight champion Ronda Rousey, 28, is ranked the #1 P4P fighter in MMA by SI, made SI swimsuit issue, Maxim’s Hot 100 and Forbes magazine’s 30 Under 30, was named the Most Dominant Athlete Alive by Business Insider, appeared in multiple Hollywood films, got called a slaughterhouse in a blouse by Eminem, and her My Fight/Your Fight” goes on sale Tuesday.

Written with her sister, sports journalist Maria Burns Ortiz, the book is part memoir part how-to manual. Maureen Callahan spoke with Rousey about her long, strange trip.

The way I got here wasn’t perfect, said Rousey accurately. It was messy, and there was a lot of s— along the way.

Rousey was born blue, with her umbilical cord choking her. She was revived by doctors, but damage was done – she did not begin speaking until she was four.

At about 6, I began speaking coherently in sentences, Rousey says. They told me I had brain damage from the hypoxia. But when you’re a kid, your brain figures out a way to reorganize.

Her beloved dad and namesake, Ron, encouraged her. You’re a smart kid, he’d say. It’s not like you’re some f—in’ moron.

Ron took her shopping for her first doll — a Hulk Hogan Wrestling Buddy, which she slept with every night. He took her hiking in the woods. At the end of each day, they’d sit together and watch the animal documentary series Wild Discovery.

When Rousey was 8, her father killed himself, committing suicide by asphyxia in the family garage while Ronda and her sister Jennifer watched Nickelodeon in the living room. He had suffered chronic, acute back pain since a freak accident a few years before, but no one saw it coming.

None of us were the same after that, Rousey says. Her father’s death was the most formative event of her life, and she almost never talks about it.

I never wanted to be in the situation where I’ve told the story so many times that I become detached from it and don’t cry, Rousey says.

That same year, Rousey had another transformational moment. Rooting around the house, she came across a scrapbook. Inside were photos of her mom, who had her own secret: She had been a judo champion.

It was an unbelievable discovery as a kid, Rousey says. All this time, I’d been looking at my dad as big, strong, invincible, and my mom as the nurturer. I had no idea that my mom could kick my dad’s ass.

Inspired, Rousey took up judo, and her mom became her first coach.

At 16, she dropped out of school, left her family and moved to Boston to train to compete in judo at the 2004 Olympics. She was thriving and unraveling, and began bingeing and purging to make weight.

For all that, Rousey placed ninth. I cried harder than I’ve ever cried, she writes. She was petrified she had disappointed her mom.

You didn’t let me down, her mother said. You just had a bad day.

Rousey came home with a serious case of depression: all that build-up, all that training, for what felt like nothing.

Her mother refused to let her live at home without a job. So, at 18, she went to live with a trainer who stole what little money she had. She found an older boyfriend who lived in his parents’ basement, cheated on her constantly, and told her that, physically, she was about a six.

Her life fell into chaos. Rousey still competed and would take the bronze in the 2008 Olympics, but her relationship with her mom was rocky.

All that discipline felt suffocating, and she wanted a year off, as she writes, to party.

Her $10,000 prize money ran out quickly, and she got a job bartending at a theme place in Los Angeles.

Rousey began smoking and drinking heavily, often beginning her day with a cigarette and a vodka espresso. She developed a pot-and-Vicodin habit. She’d sleep in her car, and when she did find an apartment, all she could afford was a 12-by-12-foot studio.

On more than one occasion, she writes, sewage would come up out of the toilet and shower, and I’d come home from work to an apartment filled with s- -t. I didn’t think I could get any lower.

Then one day at work, Rousey caught an MMA highlight reel on the flat-screen over the bar.

I could totally do that, she thought.

Rousey began seriously training again, but she was still getting her sea legs as an adult. In 2010, she took a job on the graveyard shift at a 24 Hour Fitness but still couldn’t afford bedsheets. She found a new boyfriend, this one a recovering heroin addict whose relapse ended the relationship. That, and he stole her car. She has asked herself over and over why she picks such bad men.

Her career took off when she had an epiphany in her first MMA fight: Her arm bar was enough to defeat anyone.

I felt a level of joy that I had never experienced before, Rousey writes.

Though she was still working three jobs and living in a dump she found on Craigslist, Rousey knew she was on her way. She dialed back on her self-destructiveness and channeled that rage outward.

From this day on, I’m just going to break everybody’s f—ing arm, she said.

Rousey used to pocket, on average, $400 a fight. Today, she earns up to $1 million on a pay-per-view event.

Rousey began with the UFC as champion, shrewdly positioning herself as the heel — MMA slang for the villain. And she is widely disliked.

Pretty looks are going to get people to glance in your direction, but it’s not going to get them to sit down and watch, Rousey says. That’s why it was important to push the rivalries at first.

For Rousey, the ultimate win will be not just the survival of women’s MMA, but widespread recognition that women fighters are just as good — and in some cases, hers especially — better than the men.

If any of these girls knew how much I actually worry about them and their careers and that we’re all part of this symbiotic ecosystem, she says. I need that for the future of the sport. I need them to wake up every day wanting to kill me.

Read entire article…

Buy My Fight/Your Fight…