“It’s going to maybe sound strange if you haven’t had this experience, but it makes you realize that we’re all connected.” —Miesha Tate
Former UFC women’s bantamweight champion Miesha Tate, who also held gold under the Strikeforce banner, is opening up about her recovery as both a fighter and as a person, which includes her use of psychedelics to help “have a better relationship” with herself.
“The thought of psychedelics … my friends were doing this more and people were having great stories of how they came out on the other side of this better and I thought okay, well I’m not going to a rave and going to eat mushrooms,” Tate explained on her YouTube channel. “My intention is actually to like sit in my backyard and try to become more one with myself — and that’s exactly what I got out of it.”
Tate, 38, snapped a two-fight losing streak by submitting Julia Avila as part of the UFC Austin fight card roughly one year back. “Cupcake” has two children with former “Ultimate Fighter” contestant and one-time Bellator MMA fighter Johnny Nunez.
“It was hard though because it brought up some traumas and I had to work through those traumas while being in this different state of mind,” Tate continued. “And so I cried heavy and I cried deep and then I said, okay now it’s time to let go of this. I’m going to change. I was inside at first and then I went outside to my pool and I just noticed everything about the outside and in a way that I felt like I had never been connected to nature before. And not just nature, but the universe.”
Tate (20-9) has been connected to the combat sports universe since making her amateur debut back in early 2006. In addition to her UFC championship, “Cupcake” helped transform women’s MMA through her longstanding rivalry with Ronda Rousey.