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“I Cannot Live Like This” – Opening Up About His Debilitating Illness, BJJ GOAT Gordon Ryan Makes a Decision on His Returning to the Sport

Published 01/16/2024, 1:25 AM EST

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Has Gordon Ryan finally hit a roadblock he can’t body slam? It certainly looks that way for the Jiu-Jitsu master who took to Instagram in a massive post announcing that he was taking some time away from the sport. It’s common for combat sports athletes to allow their bodies some rest between bouts. But for Ryan, it’s more.

Recently, the famous grappler and mixed martial artist went through a lot of physical stress. Something that made him regret pushing his body to a camp that should have never been. In a post, he cited his stomach issues hurting him so bad he couldn’t even compete. Here are the details of his statement.

Gordon Ryan is in dire need of a break

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Gordon Ryan loves ADCC and it shows. He competed and won in his super fight against André Galvão in 2022 and decided to go right back to camp. However, what he took for granted was his health. This move would soon come back to haunt him as he pushed onwards.

“I’m taking some time” he announced on his Instagram. “I came back for ADCC 2022, which I barely made it to with my stomach. After ADCC, I got overconfident and went ahead and started competing again. . .” He reported how going into that camp was perhaps the biggest struggle of all. His stomach ached, his body shut down, and he felt punished.

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“It took me 6 months to recover from that camp,” he wrote. It wasn’t at all comfortable for an athlete of his level. His stomach was full of bile and he used to spend hours upon hours belching in the bathroom. Gordon Ryan was bedridden for weeks on end, too.

Now, the athlete has promised to take his issue seriously. He would not return to the competition except for ADCC until his stomach is a “100% better”. Nothing else matters to him right now. He said it himself: “I can not live like this.”

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What were his other health complications?

Gordon Ryan clearly went through a lot during the process. He had to work with medical experts and take a lot of medication to help him recover. He reported a suppressed immune system that took about 45 days to help him out of a simple throat infection.

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It later developed to the point that his intestines had strep and staph in them. Like he said, it took him about six months to recover from that intense camp. He has now accepted that his life as an athlete means taking days off for his health. And that’s exactly what he’ll be doing. Will Ryan return in 2024? Perhaps we’ll see him at the next ADCC.

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Written by:

Prit Chauhan

926Articles

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I'm Prit Chauhan, and I'm a UFC writer at EssentiallySports. I've been in the writing business for three years, covering areas like mass media marketing, and even tried my hand at fiction. My experience includes research work at the University of California, Berkeley, which helps me spin fact-based stories about the world of Mixed Martial Arts effortlessly.
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Edited by:

Yeswanth Praveen