Paddy Holohan on sudden retirement: ‘It feels like a death burial’

It’s been a strange week for now former UFC flyweight Patrick Holohan. Paddy, as he’s more commonly known, announced Monday he had been forced to immediately retire from mixed martial arts competition. This was no USADA issue or change of heart about fighting, generally. Instead, he had a rare blood clotting disorder than would prevent him from being medically cleared to fight.

For Holohan, the experience has been bizarre. His condition, known as Factor XIII deficiency, is something he’s lived with his entire life. He really never gave it much thought. It’s also extremely rare. It’s just been a part of his life he’s had to manage.

“When I was 8 years of age, I was diagnosed with it. It’s an extremely rare kind of thing,” Holohan said on Monday’s The MMA Hour. “It’s called Factor XIII deficiency,” he explained. “So, say you get cut and when the cut is healing, the clot doesn’t form properly.

“One in 5 million people get it, so it’s really rare.”

The problem, however, is that “individuals with factor XIII deficiency form blood clots like normal, but these clots are unstable and often break down, resulting in prolonged, uncontrolled bleeding episodes.” This has implications not merely for cuts on the skin, but internal bleeding as well.

As Holohan tells it, though, this was never something he was ashamed of or kept secret. He didn’t parade the fact that he had this condition, but it wasn’t something he tried to keep hidden.

“Not that I haven’t told anybody close to me. It’s not really a secret. It wasn’t as crazy as it sounds,” he explained. “Before I was diagnosed, I would have bruising and things like that, but then I was diagnosed and I got the treatment for it.

“At the time, not that I didn’t disclose it. I walk into John [Kavanagh]’s gym and at about 19 years of age, I didn’t expect to be going to the UFC, fighting in the main event. So, as the process went on and went on, I never denied anything,” he went on. “I never hid anything, but then when the UFC found out after the injury in Dublin, they diagnosed that I wouldn’t be able to pass me for a medical anymore. They told me they were going to have to remove me contract. It’s not their fault, it’s not my fault. It’s just the way it worked out.”

Holohan said he was being treated for a back injury in Dublin when “a team of hemophilia doctors” examined his blood work and discovered the anomaly. He eventually reported the information to the inquiring doctors in the U.S. and when he did, was told competing would be impossible as obtaining a medical license was out of the question. “There’s increased chances of cranium bleeds, so that’s what it says on the diagnosis of it,” he claimed.

“This was just a normal thing to me,” Holohan said. “The UFC informed me I wouldn’t be able to get passed for a fight …

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