Becky Lynch Opens Up About Battle With Depression During Wrestling Hiatus

Becky Lynch is one of the most successful pro wrestlers of the current generation but it wasn’t always the case. The former women’s champion stepped away from wrestling in 2006 and stayed retired for more than six years. According to Lynch, it was a dark time for her and she battled with depression during this period.

The Man recently had an interview with ESPN. Speaking about her early wrestling career, Lynch mentioned how she didn’t look like the girls that WWE was signing at the time. So she joined a bodybuilding competition in hopes of building herself up, but it turned out to be a slippery slope for her:

“At the time, they wouldn’t have signed me. I didn’t look like the models that they had under contract. So I started doing a bodybuilding competition because I thought, ‘Well, maybe if I look like these girls, then I’ll have a chance of getting signed.’

So I started doing this bodybuilding competition. I know there’s a lot of people that do bodybuilding, and they do great. For me, it was a slippery slope right into an eating disorder. [It] really ruined my mental health for a long time. I became depressed.”

‘It Felt Like A Death’: Becky Lynch

Becky Lynch stepped away from wrestling after suffering a concussion during an indie event in September 2006. She spent the next six years trying to figure out something else to do with her life. She also went to guidance counselors for help:

“I couldn’t face up to it. I was so ashamed that I had turned into this dark person in my head. That I hit this, this low point in this depression. I couldn’t identify with myself because I identified myself as being this great wrestler. Then I just I spent so many years trying to find who I was and what lit that fire in me again.

I would go see counselors and stuff. Guidance counselor. [I was] like ‘I was good at this thing, and I loved this thing,’ and they were like ‘Okay well, but you can’t do this thing anymore. So what else are you gonna do?’ It felt like a death I was kind of trying to grieve. I know that’s very morbid and it’s a dramatic statement, but that’s how it felt.”

Thankfully for Lynch, she managed to recover and get back into the wrestling business. She participated in a WWE tryout after encouragement from a friend. Lynch was signed to a development contract in April 2013, and the rest is history.

You can check out Becky Lynch’s full interview below:

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