Kayla Harrison didn’t become a parent by planning for it. She became one because life forced a question on her, and she answered without hesitation. As the looming superfight with Amanda Nunes approaches, the UFC women’s bantamweight champion recently revealed how her world shifted suddenly when she decided to take on the responsibility of raising her sister’s kids.

That’s the version of Harrison fans don’t always see. Not the Olympic gold medalist. Not the champion. But the woman who packed a rental car, took two kids who needed stability, and drove toward a life she hadn’t prepared for, because someone had to. And when Daniel Cormier asked her to talk about that moment, Harrison didn’t dress it up.

In a clip from her interview, shared on X by Dovy Simu MMA, Harrison laid out the chain of events that changed everything. “I mean, it was very sudden,” she began. “So my mom had a stroke in 2019. And then about five months later, her husband passed away. And she had custody of my niece and nephew at the time.”

There was no safety net waiting in the background. Harrison explained that her sister had been “in and out of the system for most of her adult life,” which meant the responsibility didn’t have anywhere else to land. So Harrison stepped in.

She said, “And so I flew home to Ohio. I helped take care of the funeral arrangements, and I just felt really called to take the kids. And I didn’t know what that meant exactly. But I convinced my mom to let me take them, and I packed up a rental car, and we drove to Florida. Ali met me in Atlanta and helped me drive the rest of the way home with two kids, and they haven’t left me since.”

Cormier followed up with the obvious question. How much did it change her? The champion didn’t pause. “Oh, I mean, it’s changed everything. It’s changed everything about me as a person, about how I view life, how I do life. It’s the single greatest thing that’s ever happened to me.”

Back in 2019, Kayla Harrison was already a world-class fighter. She’d won Olympic gold. She would soon win a PFL title and a $1 million prize. But motherhood rewired her motivation entirely. As she explained in a previous interview, wanting to be the best fighter in the world didn’t compare to wanting to get it right for those kids. Multiply that feeling “by a hundred thousand,” she once said, and that’s the new standard.

That perspective matters as she heads into UFC 324, where she’ll defend her bantamweight title against Amanda Nunes in what Dana White has called the greatest women’s fight of all time!

Dana White heaps praise on the Kayla Harrison vs Amanda Nunes clash

That’s the real tension hovering over UFC 324. Kayla Harrison isn’t just defending a bantamweight title on January 24. She’s stepping into history against a woman many still consider untouchable. Amanda Nunes isn’t returning for a tune-up or a farewell lap. She’s coming back to reclaim something she believes still belongs to her.

The stakes couldn’t be higher. UFC 324 doesn’t just mark Harrison’s first title defense; it also launches the UFC’s new seven-year, $7.7 billion broadcast partnership with Paramount. The co-main event needed gravity, and fewer fights boast more pull than this one.

As such, in a recent interview with CBS, UFC boss Dana White didn’t hold back saying, “The Kayla Harrison-Amanda Nunes fight is the greatest women’s fight of all time.”

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According to White, “Kayla Harrison, an Olympic [gold] medalist in judo, has ripped through everybody. She was in another company before she came here, and she ended up winning the world title. Amanda Nunes, who is the GOAT, the greatest female fighter of all time in any combat sport, says if this woman ends up winning the title, I will come back to face her. It’s a great, great fight. In my opinion, the greatest female fight of all time.”

Harrison has only lost once as a professional, a decision to Larissa Pacheco that came after she’d already beaten her twice. Amanda Nunes, meanwhile, flattened an entire generation, defeating every former bantamweight champion she faced. Yes, she stumbled against Julianna Peña in 2021. But she corrected that mistake decisively before retiring on her own terms in 2023.

So when the cage door closes on January 24, this isn’t just about who hits harder or who’s done more historically. It’s about who they are now. And for Kayla Harrison, that answer was forged far away from the Octagon, in a rental car, with two kids in the back seat and no guarantee except commitment.