Serena Williams Got Advice From Daughter Olympia After Tennis Loss

Serena Williams shared the heartwarming advice she received from her daughter Olympia after losing a recent match.

The 41-year-old tennis star divulged the tender moment during a Sept. 28 appearance on “The Drew Barrymore Show.”

"'It's OK, mama. You just have to do what you feel,'" Williams recalled of her 5-year-old daughter's reaction to her mom's loss. "I literally wanted to cry. It was like, 'Do what you feel, do what your heart tells you.' It was the sweetest thing ever and I was so proud of her."

Related: Serena Williams says she had to choose between motherhood and tennis. Being a mom won.

Williams, who shares Olympia with husband and Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, said she used to feel uncomfortable when her daughter attended her games.

"Well, I just was afraid I would get distracted because I would be like, ‘Wait, is she drinking? Is she doing this?’ So she came to a match once, like super brief, and I was like, ‘Oh my God, is she wearing sun cream?’ It’s nuts," Williams told Barrymore.

"And so, I would get stressed out and I'm thinking, ‘Oh my goodness, wait a minute, I’ve gotta serve. This makes no sense,'" she added. "So yeah, and I’ve never really had her at matches until this summer actually."

At the U.S. Open this summer, Williams beat two opponents before losing in the third round to Australian Ajla Tomljanović on Sept. 2. The loss likely marked the end of her solo tennis career.

“Apparently (Olympia) was saying, ‘Go mama, I’m so proud of you’ and I was like, ‘What?!’” Williams told Barrymore.

Williams' daughter began taking tennis lessons at age 3.

Though the little girl can obviously learn from the best, Williams refuses to coach her.

"I don’t really like to play with people who don’t know how to play tennis well. It drives me nuts," Williams told Ellen DeGeneres in April 2022. "So, I was like, 'I can’t. I don’t have the patience for this,'" the star said, adding, "So I signed her up for a class, a private teacher."

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This article was originally published on TODAY.com