Kaitlyn has revealed the impact her body dysmorphia battle had on her career.
The former – whose real name is Celeste Bonin – was a big part of the women’s division after debuting in NXT in 2010 and going onto appear on both Raw and SmackDown before leaving the company in 2014.
She explained: ‘I left wrestling because I thought I was just gonna get fired. I felt less and less relevant.
‘I had so much shame I had gained all this weight, and like my body was just giving me every signal that I was not OK, emotionally, mentally.
‘I had so much hatred for myself, I had so much resentment for myself and like that projected outwards towards others. I was in self-destruct mode, so I just asked for my release on a day that was a really s***ty day.’
She explained the way wrestling had replaced the ‘fitness and competing’ side of her life, and how her whole ‘identity’ had become wrapped up in ‘being really muscular and strong’.
She told Renee Paquette’s : ‘So like my only relevance, I felt growing up like in my teen years, especially, I started to find my identity in being really muscular and strong.
‘So I started working out a lot and I competed as soon as I got out of high school and that became my identity. I was like, “This is the way that I’m going to get love and respect and be something in the world, through this. This is the vessel”.
‘And so when I started doing that, I had some success. Then immediately after the first couple of shows I did I started having like really f***ed up body dysmorphia and didn’t I didn’t understand nutrition, I didn’t understand how to take care of myself.’
Kaitlyn admitted while she felt for a ‘long time’ that her time in WWE ‘f***ed her up’, her return to a wrestling ring in the 2018 Mae Young Classic was a ‘big deal’.
She noted how it allowed her to focus on the ‘beautiful things’ she gained from the business, while pushing away the negativity after so long, and giving her a chance to help her fans.
She explained: ‘I’m like, “Just so you know, whatever you’re feeling it’s OK, when I was on TV, I felt like this every day.” So, we’re all the same.’
