Rose Namajunas will be left unable to sneeze or blow her nose for months after an injury sustained during her fight at UFC 324.
The two-time former UFC women’s strawweight champion revealed Tuesday in an Instagram video that she was poked in the eye multiple times during her unanimous decision loss to Natalia Silva at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Saturday night.
The video was shot before the 33-year-old fighter was going in for canalicular tube surgery to fix a break in the tear drainage system of the eyelid due to physical trauma. The lower portion of her left eye was swollen and black and blue.
“Pray for me guys, and I’m just glad we can get it fixed,” Namajunas said.
She revealed further details about her recovery and why she did not protest for a potential point deduction during an appearance on “The Ariel Helwani Show” on Tuesday.
Namajunas’ fiancé and training partner, Pat Barry, told Helwani that she was poked in the eye twice — one that cut the inside of her eyelid and all the way into the tear duct.
She will need a silicone tube placed in her eye for three months and “won’t be able to sneeze or blow her nose,” Barry told Helwaini.
“This is crazy,” Namajunas said in a video sent into the show. “I have to have a tube in my eye and my nose for three months, and I can’t blow my nose for three months, so it’s gonna be rough.”
Namajunas (15-8-0) lost a tight decision to Silva (20-5-1), with each judge scoring it 29-28 for the rising star. Silva has won all eight of her UFC fights.
Looking back, Namajunas, who has won three of her past five fights, wishes she had spoken up to the referee about the eye pokes.
“I’m upset because I got poked in the eye in the second round, couldn’t see after that,” she said in the video sent to Helwani. “I’m now seeing from pictures, it was multiple times. I was so locked in. I wish I would have protested, ‘Like that’s some bulls–t,’ you know.
“But I was so focused on knocking her head off, and I was getting momentum. It’s just frustrating because I know accidents happen, so I’m not saying it couldn’t happen, but I never poked anybody in the eye. So I feel like a point should be taken right away. Then people would be more careful.”
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
