From Darkness to the UFC: How Vanessa Demopoulos Embraces the Spotlight

It can be hell for a mixed martial artist.

The last few days before a fight—and for many, the hours just before a weigh-in—are the ones that test an athlete’s resolve in ways actual combat often doesn’t.

It’s stressful. It’s painful. And it’s typically not a moment for pleasant conversation.

Maybe so. But Vanessa Demopoulos is not a typical mixed martial artist.

Not only does the 34-year-old strawweight not dread the ritual to the extent of her contemporaries, she revels in it. As much as someone quickly shedding 10-plus percent of her body weight can, anyway.

“I get to come here and show up and I get to be a cool kid and sign posters and try on my superhero outfit and do a bunch of cool things and it's just really awesome,” she told Bleacher Report.

“I mean, we're cutting weight, I guess, but that's a part of it, and it's like doing all these other cool things that comes along with being a UFC fighter that I personally just love the most. This is such an honor for me to be able to have this entire week, you know?”

For the record, Demopoulos stands 5’2” and walks around at a fit 132 pounds.

Which means, to make her division’s non-title limit, she had to get to 116 before entering the Octagon to meet Brazilian Muay Thai ace Maria Oliveira on Saturday’s ESPN Fight Night card.

“It's another week at the office for me,” she said.

“I'm just like, ‘Yeah, OK.’ I've been doing this for however many years now and it's never changed for me. I just do it. That's what we signed up for.

“I've done all the testing at the [UFC Performance Institute], they look at my body scans and they're like, ‘How do you even make it?’ But I've made it every single time. I've never missed weight my entire career. So, it's fine for me. I don't really suffer too much. I just get it done.”

For those unaware, Demopoulos arrived to the UFC as a short-notice sub in August 2021, but her coming-out party with the company came on a pay-per-view undercard five months later when she rose from a knockdown and submitted Argentine striker Silvana Gomez Juarez with a first-round armbar.

The win drew a $50,000 bonus, and another fight in June yielded another win—this time over a foe who’d won two straight—and placed her on a short list of fighters to watch.

But while jiu-jitsu chops have yielded success in the cage, it’s a force-of-nature personality that seems sure to boost her profile far past its petite “Lil’ Monster” dimensions.

That makeup, she said, was built with mettle forged in “darkness.”

Demopoulos, who was born in Ohio and raised for several years in Greece, says decisions in her teens led to drug use and ultimately her experiencing periods of homelessness.

She followed family footsteps into a job as an exotic dancer at 18 and maintained the gig on at least a part-time basis for more than a decade—alongside an MMA career with smaller promotions—before giving it up for good when the UFC came calling full-time in January.

The occupation changed. Her gratitude didn’t.

“My background as an entertainer,” she said, “as somebody who's been through the trenches and through so much darkness and has always been a light amongst the darkness, has really kind of helped me to keep a positive outlook on life. I have had some really tough times and I love them because they've gotten to make me exactly who I am.

"I'm very grateful. I'm really appreciative of everything that I am, everywhere that I've been, and everywhere that I continue to go.

“I think just having gratitude is my No. 1 recipe. Just like having my faith in God. Just being really, really grateful for my life, being in love with who I am currently. And I think that that just shines. I literally love myself, and I pat myself on the back every day knowing what I've overcome and knowing where I came from. I couldn't be more excited to be who I am.”

That excitement resonated after her win at UFC 270 when an ebullient Demopoulos sprang into Joe Rogan’s arms as the analyst arrived for a post-fight interview.

The leap made her a trending commodity on Twitter. And, she said, the enthusiasm translates to a fighting style that’ll keep her in bonus conversations.

But, rather than chasing recognition via memorable or dramatic victories, her flair for the competitively dramatic springs organically from a spotlight vibe perfected by years on stage.

“That's just what happens,” she said. “I'm a f--king light-stealer. I am that person. I'm gonna shine so you can't put me into a room and expect me not to show off. That's who I am. And it's who I've always been. I look forward to these opportunities. I live for these opportunities. I don't put any pressure on it. I always get into some sort of crazy awesome like awesomeness and I just love it.”

That’s not ideal news for Oliveira, who’d won nine of 10 before a 2018 run on Dana White’s Contender Series ended with a KO to Marina Rodriguez. Now 25, she reached the UFC in 2021 and lost to Tabitha Ricci before a split nod over Gloria de Paula got her to 13-5.

But whaddya know? Two other L's have come by armbars, a submission path Demopoulos—who labeled her pre-fight state “hella good”—has followed three times in eight wins.

So, if you see her sizing up a hug for Daniel Cormier this weekend, don’t be alarmed.

It’s just her way. And she knew it all along.

“I just always believed that no matter what the f--k I was going through and no matter how rough it was, that I was gonna create a different purpose,” she said. “I wasn't going to allow my circumstances to be the last stopping point on the bus. I was going to go somewhere so much larger and so much more grand, and I was going to be able to take that bulls--t and turn it into something amazing.

“And then that way I could share with the entire freaking world and let them know it doesn't matter who you are, where you're coming from, where you’re currently at, you can create greatness through that situation. And that I believe in people because I know, because I f--king did it. So that always kept me going, even at my lowest, absolute lowest f--king point. And I've been there.”