Rare Brain Disease Almost Kept Rafael Lovato Jr. From Fighting | Joe Rogan

Yeah, well this is why you're here. We're here to talk about that. And I guess you should probably just explain what's going on. Well, I guess I'll just kind of take you through the the order of events here. You know, that was my tenth fight, fighting for the Bell of Tor title. And in all my other nine fights previously, it was never required for me to get a brain scan done. Just due to the different states that I was fighting in at the time, the commissions there didn't require it. In the U.S., it's California and New York, and then Europe requires a brain scan. We were originally scheduled to fight in January at the Forum in California. The same event that just happened this past Saturday night. And so we were going to fight 2019 at the Forum in January. And that fight got postponed. Musasi was injured. And we eventually got rescheduled to fight in June in London. So I already had a brain scan scheduled for December to get approved for that fight in January. But I got the news about the fight getting canceled, like the week of that scan a couple days before. So I canceled it. I said, I don't need to go get that done now. And so fast forward, you know, I basically stayed in camp the whole year training, you know, with that fight on my mind, all the way from November, when I started the first camp for the fight in January, you know, into the new year, waiting for the new date. And it was March that I got the word that we were going to fight in June in London. And so, you know, I was basically training all year and I just picked right back up into camp. And fast forward on into the very beginning of May. I was, you know, already a good month into like the serious camp. And I was just getting ready to fly to Brazil, Cudiciba, to get into the, you know, the hardest phase of camp. I was going to be there for three weeks. And I had to get my MRI done, you know, and I wanted to get it done before I went to Brazil, just to check it off the list. So this was actually the week I had two good buddies of mine, Jake Mapes and Sam Alvey were in Oklahoma training with me. And we had a great week of training. Everything's going really, really well. And it's Thursday. And so I go get my brain scan done to get that done before I went to Brazil. And I'm in there and, you know, we're we get through the whole process and the machine is done. It's not, you know, operating anymore, but they haven't called me out of the room yet. And I could kind of just sense something was going on. So finally, they say, OK, come on out. And the radiologists with really no, like no candor or like, like an easy, soft way of saying it was like, dude, have you seen your brain before? There's some stuff in here you need to see. And he pulls me into the room and shows me on the on the screen. He's like pointing out these, you know, look like little balls. Obviously, it looked like something was wrong. It didn't look like a normal scan, but I'm not. I don't know. You know, balls like like shades of of. You know, discoloration, like according to the scan itself, like you could see that, you know, it wasn't normal. And he didn't even know what it was at the time. And he was like, let me let me look this over tonight. And I had my paper, you know, to get signed off that everything looks clear and normal. And, you know, and he was just like, you know, he asked me if I had any concussions and if I've had any issues. And I said, no, no. And he's like, well, this doesn't look right. And you shouldn't be doing what you're doing. I'm like, OK, so are you going to sign this paper? And he's like, no. And he's like, come back tomorrow and I'm going to give you some more information. I say, OK. So I go back Friday and he tells me that, you know, he did some research and he believes that I have a disease called cavernoma. And, you know, he kind of hits me with that. I had no idea what cavernoma was. And, you know, he says, look, I'm not signing this paper. You need to go see a specialist and get this looked at. But as far as I know, you should not fight. You know, you should not be fighting. And then the next morning I fly to Brazil for my camp, you know, to to go down there for the the hard sparring and everything that I like to do. You know, stuff we talked about last time. And so I'm like going, you know, in the airport, getting ready to go to Brazil for this portion of my camp, for this fight that is like the biggest fight of my life. You know, I've already waited an extra six months for it. I've been training for it all year. And at this point, I'm like just in shock of what is going on, my health. And, you know, I saw my googling everything that I can about cavernoma and trying to to understand what it is. And basically, it's a disease where probably like I probably got it from one of my parents. It's a it's normally a hereditary disease and your brain forms these extra blood vessels and these blood vessels grow and they can accumulate and sort of bundle up together into balls. Almost like like like weeds or vines, you know, they they wrap up together and these blood vessels are very prone to bleeding. Now, they don't bleed so much in a in an instance where, you know, they could cause a hemorrhage. It's more like a slow that they use the term oozing effect. So to oozes blood out over time. Very little, little by little. And as they accumulate, you know, those balls are very much more susceptible to bleeding. And, you know, reading about it while I'm getting ready to go, you know, I'm flying to Brazil, I'm in the airport, I'm taking off. You know, there's so many like extreme cases of this disease where people have to have multiple surgeries to get them removed, you know, seizures, vision issues, people going to comas. And then, of course, worst worst case is even death. And, you know, obviously, googling and, you know, not talking to a specialist and just kind of doing my own thing is not the best way to to get information. And so I just have all these thoughts running in my head about, you know, what I'm dealing with in my health and like, OK, now I'm going to Brazil to train and spar. And and I have this fight and I'm right now I don't have anyone signing off in this paper. You know, is this going to happen? What's going on? Like all these questions. And so I get there and, you know, at this point, the only one that that knows is my girl, you know, and I'm confiding in her and I'm just like talking to her and, you know, she's shocked. I've never had any issues. I don't even really get headaches. I've never been knocked out. You know, there's never been a time in my life where I thought, man, I should get my head looked at, you know, I think something could be wrong, you know. And so, you know, talking with her and then I have my coach Mauricio, he's my head MMA coach and I'm a teacher. And he goes with me down to to Kudiciba and we train there at his brother's academy, Andre Dita, Dita's Academy, evolution time. And, you know, we fly Saturday, arrive Sunday, start training Monday. And I'm just like I'm trying to train this first day and I'm just like, what am I doing? You know, and I'm getting hit in the head and I'm like, man, am I slowly killing myself right here? Like, you know, what am I training for at this point? I'm not I'm not approved. Like, what what am I going to do? You know, and and so we we talk it over and we're like, OK, obviously, we need to get more opinions, you know. And I'm down in Brazil for three weeks. Basically all of May. The fight was June 21st or 23rd, something like that. And and so I'm spending all of May there. So I need to see some Brazilian doctors, some doctors down here in Kudiciba. And so we've just begun the process. Let's get a prescription. Do you speak Portuguese? I'm not 100 percent fluent, but I can get around. I can do pretty well on my own down there just from all the trips that I've done over the years. So, you know, thankfully, Mauricio, his brother, Dita, they have so many connections down there, you know, being who they are and the history that they have, you know, teaching martial arts, you know, you get to know everybody. Right. And so they were able to make things happen quick for me. We saw a doctor got a prescription for another MRI. Get scheduled to get that MRI done, which happens on Friday, the end of my first week there. So I'm going that whole week training, you know, trying to stay positive. But I'm wondering, you know, what, you know, what am I doing? What's going on? You know what I mean? Like, I can't I can't begin to describe the the thoughts and emotions that I can imagine that need to be so distracting during sparring as well. Oh, yes. Yes. And, you know, they go harder down there, to put it mildly. Yeah. Yeah. That place is known for some of the most ruthless killers to ever come out of Brazil. One hundred percent. I mean, that's a shoot the box. Exactly. Yeah. I'm not sleeping well. I'm, you know, I'm an emotional wreck, basically. I'm calling my girl over FaceTime, you know, multiple times a day. We're looking at each other on the screen. I'm crying. I'm confiding in Maricio and Shonji Hibero was also there with me. I had an Airbnb with Shonji. So thankfully, I wasn't on my own 24 seven outside of the academy. My issue always stays with his family. And, you know, I'm just like, man, when Shonji arrived that Monday or Tuesday and I tell him what's going on, I'm just like, dude, I'm a mess right now. Like, I don't know. You know, I'm just so uncertain of of my health and what's going on. And, you know, like, man, I just can't put into words, you know, but I'm trying to stay positive. I'm trying to stay positive. And we get through that first week, get the MRI, the new MRI down there in Brazil. So then we have, you know, the Brazilian MRI to take two Brazilian doctors. And so then the second week we start seeing neurologists and, you know, specialists to get their opinion and and see what they have to say. And that was the hardest week ever because multiple doctors were all saying, no, you know, when you look at the scan right off the bat, it just like it doesn't look good. You know, when you have a picture of it, man, actually, I don't have. Sorry, I don't have one with me right now. But, you know, you just see these gray like little shades of circles like in a lot of them. Well, I have multiple and most of them are very small, like popcorn size. And, you know, those aren't that dangerous, at least yet. But there is one accumulation on the back side of my the right side of my head, you know, back here. And that has built up and and it looks it looks big like how big. Probably probably like somewhere between a like a baseball size like golf, golf ball to baseball in between there. Jesus. It's it's pretty big, but it's on the very outer rim. So it's not like in the middle of my brain. It's on the outside, you know. So if you were to go right through my head, it could be right there. You know, you could essentially pull it out without having to go through too much stuff. Is that something that might actually have to happen? No, not not now. Not now. I'll fast forward, you know, to the doctors I have seen here in the states who clarify a lot of this. But that's the doctors in Brazil all say the same thing. Well, they're kind of just I mean, you know, fighting already isn't good for your brain. You know what I mean? Getting hit in the head isn't good for your brain. And I think just looking at it when you see it and then you know that I'm going to get hit in the head. And when I do, you're you're automatically going to be like, hey, you know, there's already this extra bit of of danger that we're putting in to a dangerous situation. Let's not let's not play. Let's not roll the dice. You know, let's not play that game. And so we were getting multiple doctors saying no, you know, and even one was like, you know, they said that jujitsu could be dangerous. That's me getting my blood cut off like in a choke, you know, cutting off the circulation to my brain. That could be dangerous. And so this week I am literally not sleeping at all. I am crying multiple times a day and I'm just like, man, what am I doing? I'm going into the sparring, you know, and I'm training and I'm not I'm not going to get approved. I'm not going to fight, you know. And this has already been like a six, seven month training camp at this point, you know, and it's for the belt. It's my life's work. It's everything for me, you know. So I was just crushed day in, day out, trying to get through. And on Thursday of that week, I'm doing MMA sparring. And, you know, I kind of had it coming. I shouldn't have I shouldn't have been going as hard as what I've been going. But I was like trying to, you know, stay positive and stay ready. Like, what if I need to I need to be ready for this fight? You know, it's a saucy like I got to be at my best. And in reality, I was just training like garbage. I was I was having my worst training camp, my worst fight camp, you know, because of everything. And on this day, I'm in my third round of MMA sparring and I I strain my hamstring bad. I go for like a double leg and the guy has a judo background. He overhook like wizards me and goes for like a Uchimada, Haraigoshi type of throw. I'm wearing wrestling shoes. I try to drop my hips, you know, so he doesn't elevate me. And my legs, my knees go straight and my foot gets stuck in the floor with the wrestling shoe. And my hamstring just snapped, you know, like a loud like pop, pop, pop. And I just scream and I let it go. And I, you know, I get thrown down and I'm just like, and I, you know, he knew something was wrong. We stopped right there and my leg is just throbbing. And I tried to get up. I couldn't get up. So I had to like walk on my hands, scoot off the mat. I got carried out of the academy that day. Could not walk. And I'm sitting down on the edge of the mat and I'm just like, I'm bursting to tears. And I look to look up to Matt Easton. I'm like, man, it's not going to happen. Like there's no way, you know, all this is going on. I'm not approved. I'm training horrible. I can't walk now, you know. And so, you know, that was the end of week two. All knows we have one more doctor to see who's like the professor of many of the doctors that I already saw. He's very highly regarded. One of the best doctors in the south of Brazil. Neuro specialist, neurosurgeon. We were so lucky to get in to see him. And, you know, because he's booked up, booked up, booked up. But we managed an appointment time for Monday of the third week, Monday night. So, you know, I'm like, I basically given up. I can't walk. I'm at home that whole weekend. And Shonji, he he had seminars on the weekend. You know, he came down there to support me in camp. But on the weekends, he was going off to teach seminars in different areas of Brazil. And so I'm laid up in this Airbnb all weekend. And I'm like, just FaceTime and my girl. And I'm like, you know, baby, like, I don't think this is happening. I can't believe come this far, you know, to the title shot. This much training, you know, for the camp, like going from November of 2018 into the end of May of 2019. That was my that was it was just this fight with Masazi. And, you know, it took everything for me. Like, this sounds funny, but the house, the Airbnb, the host, you know, she's like a great host. She left so many chocolates and all this food in the house like sweets. And I just wanted to pig out and eat all these chocolates. You know, I kept telling Shonji, bro, you got to eat these things. Like, I can't look at these. I'm so I'm such an emotional wreck right now, you know, and I'm in I'm in the spot all weekend by myself and I'm ready to give up. I'm like, I'm going to go eat shuaskariya, you know what I mean? And eat all these chocolates and just like, you know, because I have to die. Very strict to make one eighty five. What do you walk around that around to 10 to 215 is my normal weight, you know, so I mean, that weight is kind of normal. Like most guys at one eighty five or around two ten. But I'm already tall. I'm already naturally pretty lean. So I have to be very strict on my diet to to get that low. And it took everything for me to not just pig out and just like totally give in. But, you know, my UCO was just like, hey, we have one more doctor, one more doctor. The whole weekend, all I did was just put CBD cream on my leg, resilient CBD. Shout out to them and my sponsor. And I was using the Mark Pro on my on my leg to Mark Pro. It's like a similar to like a tens unit. Okay. But it has different frequencies and you can go really deep in there. So I'm just like, okay, let me just try to recover this thing as much as I can. I couldn't train, couldn't do anything. I was basically stuck at home. And that's all I did. And I just said, okay, Monday night, that's it. If he says no, it's done. And at this point, I hadn't told anything to any. I let my manager Ed know, but we hadn't said anything to anybody else. Literally, the only ones that knew were my girl, Shangee, my DCO and Ed. And so we go see this doctor Monday night and man right off the bat, he kind of captivated us because he was the first one to be just chill and just like, okay, what's going on? What brings you here? Didn't look at any pictures. Didn't, you know, didn't rush it. And I tell him, yeah, you know, I got my scans. It looks like I have cavernoma. He said, okay, let me see your scans. And he's like, yeah, yeah, this is this is a cavernoma for sure. How do you feel? The first one to ask me, how do you feel? And so, well, you know, this is all a huge shock. I've never had any problems. I feel great. I'm fine. You know, I, you know, I don't even get headaches. And he's like, okay. You know, he talks with me and he's like, let's go do an evaluation. We do an evaluation and do some tests. Everything's normal, like just simple, like, you know, stand on one leg and all that kind of stuff. You know, and everything's fine. And so we go back to the office, we sit down. He's like, let me just see what I can find. But I guarantee I'm not going to find anything that says head impact or trauma is going to increase the risk of your cavernoma bleeding. And so he starts looking up, you know, journals and, and, you know, studies, all the things that doctors have access to. And he literally finds nothing. You know, there is no studies that say that getting hitting your head is going to make your cavernoma worse or, or cause you to bleed and, and something's going to happen. He's like, look, you can bleed, you know, you can be oozing blood at any point in time, a little by little. And it could become an issue at some point in time. But there is no treatment. There is no, we're not going to do surgery. Like there's nothing that's going to happen until you have symptoms, until you show signs. And because I can't find any studies that say getting hit in the head is going to make it worse. And because you are, you know, a normal, like healthy, functioning person at this point, I think it's fine for you to fight. You should continue doing what you do until it becomes a problem. And if it does become a problem, we'll go in there and we'll take it out. The big, the big mass. And, you know, then we'll move forward. And so I'm just like, you know, I started getting emotional already and I'm kind of like, wow, so you'll write a letter saying this. You'll you'll you'll support me. And he's like, yeah, sure, sure. No problem. Super calm guy. Just and he was the oldest doctor we had spoken to as well. Most experienced. And so we get this letter, man, we walk out of that office, me and Mauricio. And as soon as we we leave the door and we get to the elevator, man, I just, I just like burst into tears. And just I can't believe that there's some hope like this. This can still happen. And me and Mauricio embrace and just we both cry like, oh my God, we got the letter. We got the letter. So I send the letter to Ed and we begin the process of trying to get approved. We get everything into Bellator. Let him know they got the scans. They send it over to the Europe Commission. They use an organization called Safe MMA. And, you know, we kind of like we're happy. We're positive. But at the same time, I'm still not approved. It's still not on, you know, but the letter is like that was the missing piece. That was what we needed to be able to move forward. So I finished that last week unable to really move. You know, I can't wrestle. I can't kick. And my last week in Brazil, you know, I'm literally just hitting mids like this. And I'm like, OK, trying to stay positive. I still have like a month. Let's get this healed. Let's just keep sweating. Did you get an MRI on the hamstring? No, I didn't get MRI on the hamstring. It didn't have any discoloration. So it wasn't a tear. It was like a severe strain. But with the popping, it didn't turn black and blue. And so without that color discoloration, I didn't. I almost didn't even want to know. I was just like, you know, like when did it start feeling better? It didn't really. I actually still feel it now. Yeah, it was a situation the whole way. But I could stand. So I could stand and all I'm doing is boxing now at this point because I can't throw kicks and I can't change levels to do takedowns. And so that was a whole other thing because, you know, as I'm waiting to to hear back on if I'm going to get approved, I'm only punching mitts. Like I might as well be doing like a cardio kickboxing class, you know, without kicks. And that was the last thing that I want to do with my sauce is just go in there and box. You know, that's not what I do. Right. So the the hardships and frustrations were just continued as I'm dealing with my hamstring. But at least we had some some hope. So I finished that week fly home and now I'm finishing like my last couple weeks of camp at home in Oklahoma. Shonji comes to Oklahoma. You know, my radio's there and I'm trying to put together some great training. One of my best training partners from Kudiciba. His name is Chris Cristiano. He came to Oklahoma as well. And, you know, everyone's aware of the situation as far as my coaches, my team. I did not tell my parents. I didn't want anyone to know. I didn't want it to get out. And so I was just dealing with it with them, you know, and and so we send everything in. And we're waiting. We're waiting. This guy, his name's Yani. He's on the commission with Safe MMA. He reaches out to me like after the first week. And he said, hey, we need to talk. And so I give him a call. I give him a call. And he's like, we got the letter. We're looking at your scans. We've actually created a panel of doctors to talk about this. And at this point, it's 50 50. You know, I just want you to know we're unsure if we're going to approve. And I just want you to hear, you know, I just wanted to touch base with you. Wanted you here for me. We see everything, but you have to understand we're still not sure. So bear with us. I'm like, OK. Try to get through the next week. I had some decent days with my hamstring where I could shoot a little bit and work some takedowns. But if I had a good day, the next day, I had to take it real light because it was just it was so tight, so tight, so tender. Did you get a massage at all? Oh, yeah, I was doing everything, everything possible. I mean, getting it worked on, doing hot cold, like, you know, I'm I'm pretty. Like anything out there that is for recovery, I have probably at my house, you know, I'm big on really taking care of my body. So I was just trying to be as smart as I could and just get through it. And, you know, we come to this point now where the fight is two weeks away. And I don't know if it's on or not. You know, I'm just trying to put together as good of training as I can, stay as positive as I can. But at the same time, I'm just like, man, I need the yes, you know, I need to be able to focus. How are you staying conditioned when you build your body? You barely can use your leg. Man, it was it was really hard. I was heavier. I was walking around heavier than what I normally would for for my fights. You know, by this time, I'm normally below 205 in the 200 to 205 range. That's where I like to get to just off pure diet and off training. And I was still to 210 to 212. You know, it was hard like I couldn't I could box, you know, and I could box hard and I could spar boxing. But without wrestling, I didn't feel like I was conditioned the way I wanted to be. I couldn't sprint. I could ride the bike. The bike didn't put too much pressure, but I couldn't go all out the way I would like to. Like an air dine? Yeah, air dine. Everything was not the way it would normally be done. Now, you know, you're never 100 percent. You're always dealing with something. You know, I've had a broken nose before cuts, rib things like there's always something, you know, but but it was it was the stress of both in the uncertainty on if we would get to fight at all. Yeah, that was really hard. And for sure, that's why I got hurt. You know, that's 100 percent why I got hurt. But anyways, finally on like the last day that they could give me the answer, they gave me the answer. And I got the email and it said, we've approved you. You are approved to fight two weeks before the fight. I held off on, you know, I'm flying my family there. You know what I mean? I have all my my like there's the corner coaches, but I have a couple other coaches that I was going to fly out there and I was waiting to purchase these tickets. And, you know, I had some other guys like, hey, where are you staying? What's what's going on? Like, I'm ready. And I'm like, hey, don't book anything just yet. Don't book it because I don't want them to buy tickets to London. And, you know, I'm not fighting. And I'm trying to like be cool and not give anyone to, you know, too much an idea of what's going on and stay positive, stay confident and everything. Finally, we got the green light. And I'm literally flying a few days later to London. We left on Tuesday and arrived there Wednesday. I got there like 10 days before. So I have one weekend before the weekend of the fight. And, you know, at this point, it was like, OK, once we got that, yes, I mean, we celebrated. It was like, you know, that's all I wanted. I mean, I had already fought so hard just to be able to get to this fight, you know.