Is Greg Olsen Married? What We Know About His Wife Kara Dooley
When Greg Olsen and Kara Dooley tied the knot in March 2009, they couldn't have predicted the lesson in resilience they would get in a few years. As a former tight end, Olsen thought he knew a lot about strength. But in October 2012, he and Dooley redefined their understanding of strength. Just two days after welcoming twin son and daughter, Olsen and Dooley watched their boy, T.J., be wheeled away to undergo open-heart surgery.
By the time he was 8 months, T.J., who was born with a congenital heart defect known as hypoplastic left heart syndrome, had had his chest cut open twice. "I wish I was as tough as him ... What he's gone through in his first eight months of life is more than any of us have gone through in a lifetime" Olsen told the NFL in June 2013. T.J. continued to surprise everyone around him. "Even the doctors and nurses say, 'This is a hypoplast [baby]? ... He's just truly a miracle in every way, shape, and form. He just truly amazes us every day," Dooley said.
After T.J.'s diagnosis, Olsen and Dooley co-founded The Heartest Yard, a nonprofit that raises money to help families cover in-home care. "These were needs that not only were critical to his day-to-day, but critical to his development, preparing to go back into surgery," he told ESPN. Through it all, Olsen and Dooley had each other to lean on. But that's something they had been doing for a long time.
Kara Dooley also attended the University of Miami
Kara Dooley is an alum of the University of Miami, which is where she met Greg Olsen in 2003 shortly after he transferred from the University of Notre Dame. Their relationship started out a friendship before evolving into something more. Dating an athlete made for an atypical college experience, but Dooley didn't care. "When everybody wanted to go out, and her girlfriends and sorority sisters wanted to go out, she would stay home with me because I had things I had to do bright and early," Olsen told Charlotte Magazine in 2016.
That meant that Olsen and Dooley often had only each other for support. "She understood the sacrifice that came with what I did and she was always a great supporter," he said. And they believe that made them stronger as a couple. "In his moments of weakness, I try to step in. In my moments of weakness, he's always done a good job of stepping in," she told The Charlotte Observer in 2019. After becoming a mother in 2011, when they welcomed their oldest son, Tate, Dooley made her family her focus.
Dooley doesn't update her Instagram often, but when she does it's either to show off her children, share support for her husband, or to promote the work of The Heartest Yard. Her role and dedication haven't gone unnoticed. "Happy Mothers day to the center of our worlds! Love and appreciate you," Olsen captioned a May 2023 Instagram post.
Kara Dooley has a passion for fitness
Besides being a dedicated philanthropist, mother, and wife, Kara Dooley also likes to stay on top of her health, a passion she often involves Greg Olsen in. In 2020, Dooley took Olsen to a pilates class at Hilliard Studio Method in Charlotte, North Carolina — and he wasn't disappointed. When the studio shared a photo of the couple before their workout, Olsen retweeted the post with his own thoughts. "UPDATE: Husband is exhausted," he wrote.
But as a retired athlete, Olsen isn't trying to look like he did in the heyday of his career. His goal is to age well next to Dooley. "I want to be able to run a mile of it or 2 miles of it and have my feet not kill and have my knees not ache and be able to exercise with my wife and go play tennis and just live a normal active lifestyle," he said on "The Thorne Podcast," referring to the 5,000 run his foundation organizes every year.
Similarly, Dooley also hopes to get to her golden years in good health to be able to enjoy that season with Olsen. "When we see older couples we joke about what we'll do once the kids are out of the house," Dooley said in The Charlotte Observer interview. What they envision does require some energy. "We want to travel. We like to eat. We have a long bucket list of things we want to do together," she said.