Maycee Barber still searching for answers after medical emergency, unclear when she can resume career
Maycee Barber is still searching for answers after she suffered a medical emergency that forced her to drop out of a main event fight against Erin Blanchfield just moments before walking to the octagon at UFC Vegas 107 this past Saturday.
The shocking announcement was made during the broadcast with Barber unable to compete and Blanchfield later revealing that UFC officials told her that the one-time Contender Series winner suffered a seizure backstage before being taken to a local hospital for treatment. Truth be told, Barber doesn’t actually remember much of what happened backstage because approximately 30 minutes before she was scheduled to fight, she started feeling off and the next thing she remembers is being transported out of the UFC APEX in an ambulance.
“I hate going back and being like we have no answers but we’re not entirely sure what happened,” Barber told ESPN. “Obviously, there was a medical emergency. We’re not quite sure what it was, what it is but there was something that happened. I don’t exactly remember everything but there was an event that happened in the back when I was warming up and the doctor, the commissioners, everybody saw it and the commissioners, I guess they were asking me if I was OK and I was saying I was.
“They didn’t think that I was and so they kept asking the coaches — and again, I’m not entirely sure because it’s hard for me to remember everything that happened — but from what I was told, the coaches were like ‘we’re not quite sure [what happened].’ So they were trying to figure it out and they ended up all going and getting the doctor and the next thing I know, I was in the back of an ambulance and being transported to a hospital. Then I stayed there, doing a bunch of tests trying to figure out what was going on.”
Barber dropping out of the fight happened after she missed weight on Friday, hitting the scale a half-pound over the flyweight limit for a non-title bout. The event also took place more than a year after Barber’s most recent UFC appearance when another mysterious illness kept her sidelined for several months with no real explanation about what happened to her.
There’s no word if the past illness and this current situation are related, but Barber says the UFC is helping her seek out medical treatment in hopes that doctors can finally diagnose the health issue.
“I was told it looked like my autonomic nervous system might have been having an issue,” Barber revealed. “They said it looked like a pseudo-seizure is what I was told. But there’s no answers. There’s really nobody who is like, ‘This is exactly what it was.’ It’s just a lot of ‘we need to run tests and we need to get some answers.’”
Barber admitted she’s utterly frustrated not knowing exactly what is wrong with her, which is why she doesn’t want to speculate if this latest incident is related to her past medical problems or the weight cut she endured prior to the fight.
“I felt great,” Barber said. “I remember going to the bus, I remember getting to the arena and I remember warming up and starting the warm up. I felt good. I was confident. I was like this is the moment, this is when I get to walkout, it’s my first main event. All of these things and then everything else is kind of a blur.
“There’s some random things. I know that I was on my period during the weight cut but as far as me giving a direct answer on ‘oh it was part of it from the weight cut, it was from something else,’ I mean again, I want to leave it up to the doctors to determine what that was. But I’ve cut the exact same amount of weight this week that I have in the past. I’ve had bigger weight cuts than the week that I just had. I don’t know if I would attribute it to the weight cut, that’s not what I do but again, I’m not a specialist. I don’t think it was that.”
When it comes specifically to her career and the timeline when she might fight again, Barber remains in limbo with hopes that doctors can soon diagnose what’s happening to then figure out a course of action.
Until then, Barber says she has to wait and see because the UFC needs those same answers before feeling confident enough to put her back in the cage again.
“I guess I’m just really confused to be honest,” Barber said. “As far as my career and everything goes, the only thing that will determine that is us finding out what it was. What’s going on or what the issue was. Whether it is a nervous system issue or whatever it is, because at the end of the day, the health is first.
“We have to figure out that before I can be like ‘oh yeah, let’s take a fight’ or before the UFC will even consider offering me a fight.”
Understandably emotional and fighting back the tears, Barber never imagined she would find herself in this position, especially after she built an impressive six-fight win streak that had her on the cusp of title contention.
Now Barber is unable to compete and waiting for doctors to figure out what went wrong.
“I’ve always given it everything I’ve got,” Barber said. “For something like this to happen, for me to be on my first main event — well I guess it’s my second because I got sick in my first — for me to be on this second chance of having a main event and second opportunity to show the world what I can do, to continue to chase this belt and this dream from being a young girl, this has been my dream. So it was never a part of my dream to get there to fight night and to not walk out.
“To disappoint so many people and myself. It’s tough. It’s not something that was in my control and it’s not something that was in anyone’s control. It is really hard because that’s not what I wanted. It’s not what I had in store. It’s not what I had planned. It’s not any of that so it’s really frustrating.”