WWE superstar and current women’s tag champion Ronda Rousey recently spoke with PEOPLE to hype up her new television series Stars and Mars, as well as discuss a number of different topics about her life. One subject Rousey touched on was being a mom to her child, La’akea Makalapuaokalanipō Browne, and how much she enjoys it. Highlights can be found below.
On missing her baby while filming for the show:
That was the most challenging thing, just being away from my baby. I had a really hard time being away from her, and she was only 1½ when I was gone. It’s the cutest age and everything like that.
On the mom guilt she felt:
I was having a better and better experience, that I felt worse and worse about being away from her. And so, the mom guilt was compounding by the day, and I think that was more difficult than any part of the experience itself.
How having a child was beneficial for her mental health:
I’m just so much happier that I’m no longer ruminating over myself all day. I’m always thinking about her and focused on her and… I don’t know. Am I more considerate? I think the best part about it is that it’s mentally made me more healthy and made me stop beating myself up so much because I’m so concerned with taking care of her.
In a separate interview, Rousey spoke about the lack of competition in the WWE women’s tag team division. You can read about that here.