Mike Tyson is sharing disturbing memories about his childhood, revealing that he witnessed his late mother engaging in sex work while growing up in a household marked by poverty, abuse, and instability.
In Netflix’s upcoming four-part documentary “TYSON,” the former heavyweight champion discusses his complicated relationship with his mother, Lorna Mae Smith Tyson, who died when he was just 16.
“My mother was a sex worker, a prostitute, whatever you call it,” Tyson says in the documentary, according to The Mirror. “I seen that. I saw it first-hand. I was in the bed with her.”
The 60-year-old also recounts witnessing domestic violence and experiencing physical abuse from his mother.
“I’ve seen a lot of vicious fighting… I remember my mother fighting with her boyfriend. I saw him beat her. He knocked her teeth out, then I saw him scald her with some boiling hot water. My mother was very violent. She hit me with anything, extension cord, a liquor bottle, anything.”
Tyson previously described a different sequence of events involving boiling water. During a 2014 interview with The Guardian, he recalled his mother pouring boiling water on her boyfriend after the man knocked out her tooth.
Beyond Tyson’s traumatic memories, his mother had a complicated history of her own.
According to Mark Kriegel’s 2025 biography, “Baddest Man: The Making of Mike Tyson,” Lorna once aspired to become a teacher and had pursued higher education. She also worked as a prison matron at Manhattan’s Women’s House of Detention and later as a nurse’s aide.
Lorna raised Mike and his older siblings, Rodney and Denise, amid financial hardship. After losing stable housing in Bedford-Stuyvesant, the family moved around Brooklyn before settling in Brownsville.
Tyson also describes the man he knew as his father, Jimmy Kirkpatrick, as “a pimp,” adding, “A pimp who was a trick. He was more of a trick than a pimp… My mother used him.”
Kirkpatrick left the family when Tyson was young, leaving Lorna largely responsible for raising three children.
Tyson’s childhood troubles eventually resulted in repeated arrests. He had been arrested 38 times by age 13.
His encounters with the juvenile justice system eventually brought him to the Tryon School for Boys.
“That’s where all the bad kids go that kill people, that did bad crimes,” Tyson recalls, describing the facility’s residents as “Apex predators.”
There, counselor Bobby Stewart recognized his boxing potential and introduced him to legendary trainer Cus D’Amato, who eventually welcomed the teenager into his home in upstate New York.
Although Lorna permitted Tyson to pursue boxing, the documentary reveals that she struggled to understand his newfound confidence.
“She’d never heard no talk like this from me before… She said, ‘There’s always someone better.’ I said, ‘Yes, exactly, Ma. I’m the guy you’re talking about that’s always better than the other guy…’ She didn’t like me no more after that. She thought something was wrong. Didn’t understand where all this confidence, all this zest came from.”
Lorna died of cancer in 1982, before Tyson became a professional boxer. D’Amato subsequently became his legal guardian.
“My mother never got to see me fight,” Tyson says. “It was just hard, because I was talking to her and the next thing you know, boom, she’s dead.”
Years later, Tyson continues to reflect on the emotional distance between them and the approval he never received.
In his earlier Guardian interview, he acknowledged that his mother never fully believed in his boxing ambitions, even as others recognized his potential.
Despite those painful experiences, Tyson says he has developed a different perspective on his past.
Directed by Floyd Russ, Netflix confirms that “TYSON” premieres October 13, 2026. Tyson has described revisiting his life as “a challenging journey, yet a very welcoming one,” viewing the experience “through the reflective lens of my growth and maturity.
Reflecting on his journey in his latest interview with People, Tyson explained, “Everything that was quote-unquote ‘negative,’ turned out to be a positive for me.”
“I’m very grateful for it all because it made me a better person.”
