Ahead of tonight’s season eight premiere of Total Divas, SmackDown General Manager Paige spoke with The Mirror to discuss what fans can expect from the upcoming season, advice she received from WWE Hall of Famer Edge and more. Highlights of the interview below.
On her personal story being told on this season of Total Divas: You hear a bunch of my stories, the year and a half I took out, just everything. All the trouble I got myself into. I was just very open about everything. I was very open with the taped sex that unfortunately got leaked, the popping [failing] of drug tests, I was just very open about everything because I want people to learn from my mistakes, you know? Obviously they get to see stuff like my neck injury, my emotions becoming general manager, it just has so much. I have so much to share with you guys and again you just see a different side of me, you get to see Saraya, more than you get to see Paige.
On advice she received from Edge: The person who helped me with that too was [retired former WWE Champion] Edge, because he was like ‘I promise you…’ he told me the day I was about to retire, he pulled me to one side because he had sort of the same thing – spinal stenosis – he told me ‘I promise you after you make this retirement speech you will have so much weight off your shoulders and you will feel so much better’. And I did, it did make me feel better. But he was like ‘you’ll also constantly be reminded of it and you will be upset, but you will be in a better place once you say goodbye’. And he was right. I do feel in a good place, but sometimes it can get me down, you know?
On how fans helped her overcome previous hardships: Yeah I feel it definitely helped a lot and the people who kind of got me out of my rut – I was at rock bottom for a year and a half – and the people who got me out of my rut were my fans. They were just like ‘I know you can get out of this, you’re stronger than what you feel right now, I know you can make a comeback’ and it just inspired me like ‘you’re right, why do I feel like I’m giving up right now?’ It just motivated me beyond… it motivated me more so than I’ve ever been in my life. Especially when my neck issues came around and I couldn’t wrestle anymore, I was like ‘okay, this isn’t the end of me, this is the start of something new, this is a different chapter of my story’. I just never wanted to give up.
Paige also discusses having an upcoming WWE Chronicles special.
You can read the full interview here.
What did you think of the interview? Are you excited for the season eight premiere of Total Divas? What would like to see in the upcoming season? Let us know in the comments below!
