🙏👏Kayla Harrison decided to take care of her
sister’s children, as her sister is struggling with addiction🎥 @ufc ▫️
pic.twitter.com/NlRUK9XZ8g— Home of Fight (@Home_of_Fight)
June 1, 2025
Advertisement
Kayla
Harrison has her hands full as a mother, although not in the
conventional way.
Harrison recently revealed that her sister has been engaged in a
long battle with addiction. Harrison’s niece and nephew were
initially under the custody of her mother and stepfather. However,
Harrison had to take control when her mother suffered a stroke.
Harrison decided to take care of her sister’s kids, initially only
for a while.
However, there was no looking back once they moved in with
Harrison, who acquired full custody after the death of her
stepfather. According to Harrison, taking care of her niece and
nephew was the boldest yet best decision she ever made.
“It’s definitely a bittersweet story,” Harrison said on the UFC 316
Countdown show. “My sister his struggled with addiction for most of
her adult life. And so my mother, she had custody of my niece and
nephew. In 2019 my mom suffered a stroke. She was recovering with a
6-month-old and a 5-year-old. So I flew up, packed up the kids and
I said, ‘I’m just gonna take them for a while.’ We drove down here
to Florida and becoming a parent overnight is the best thing that’s
ever happened to me. It’s also the hardest thing I’ve ever done.
The scariest thing I’ve ever done by far. The thing I’m most proud
of about our family is that we’re breaking generational cycles. We
are healing each other. They know that this is home and they know
that they are safe.”
Harrison has torn through the world of women’s MMA since making her
PFL debut in 2018. The two-time Olympic gold medalist judoka won
the
Professional Fighters League lightweight championship twice
before signing with the UFC. In just her third promotional outing,
Harrison will challenge Julianna
Pena for the bantamweight title in the co-main event at
UFC
316 on Saturday at the Prudential Center in Newark, New
Jersey.