Becky Lynch Discusses Why She Left Pro Wrestling For Several Years
As previously noted, WWE released a new edition of Chronicle this past weekend and it followed WWE SmackDown Live Women's Champion Becky Lynch from November 27 through December 11, documenting her journey to the first women's Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match. As seen in the video above, Lynch discussed what it was like learning to wrestle from Finn Balor at his pro wrestling school and she also recounted her seven-year battle with depression that took her away from the ring.
Lynch began wrestling at the early age of 16, when she followed here brother to the wrestling school of now fellow WWE superstar Finn Balor. Lynch discussed what her expectations were like when she arrived at Balor's school and admitted that her initial attempts at wrestling were awful.
"So I decided I was gonna get fit," Lynch said. "And I was an unconventional kid, I didn't want to go to a gym. So I was gonna take up kickboxing, but low and behold my brother found out that they were opening a school in Bray [County Wicklow], which was about an hour and half from where I lived. [It was] opened by Fergal Devitt/Finn Balor.
"I was the only girl in the place," Lynch continued. "And I expected to go in and see like a warehouse, and a bunch of big tough guys, and a wrestling ring, and a big sign on the door. I walk in to this little school gym. There were 6 blue, padded mats on the ground, and there's a bunch of skinny teenage lads with their hair trying to grow it, trying to look like the Hardy Boyz. And I was like, alright, this is it, here I am. And you have to believe me when I say I was awful. I was God awful. Most uncoordinated, couldn't pick up a damn thing, but my God did I love it. And I was just – I couldn't believe that I was getting to do it."
In August 2005, after successful stints in Europe, North America, and Japan, Lynch suddenly disappeared from the professional wrestling scene. She would only wrestle three independent matches before returning to the ring full-time at NXT in April 2013. Lynch explained her reasoning behind this unexpected seven year hiatus from wrestling, saying that depression and the fear of succeeding are the main culprits for her staying away.
"I left for seven years," Lynch said. "Seven years. It was a lot of self sabotage, like, people talk about the fear of failure, right? But they also don't talk enough, I think, about the fear of success. Because at the time, I was 19 and I was doing well. And I was making a name for myself. I also didn't really have any support, or any backing, or any guidance. Like, my mom didn't want me wrestling. And if you weren't in WWE you were off fending for yourself and I wasn't making a lot of money. I'd make like, what? $50 dollars a weekend, if even.
"So it was just a lot of, I got so in my head," Lynch continued. "I got to succeed, I got to succeed, I got to succeed, I got to succeed. But then it was like, oh, but what if I do? And what if I'm not good enough? Ya know? And all these things. So I kinda got depressed, I got confused, I got lost, I got hurt in a match, and I kinda used that as an excuse to kinda step away. And I couldn't even face up to the fact that I couldn't face up to it. I had to hide behind the excuse of, oh, I'm hurt. Which is why I think I take extra exception to when I'm genuinely hurt and people are calling me out like I'm hiding behind something."
Lynch would go even further, saying that she reached a place where she no longer recognized who she was. She claims that "The Man" character and who she's become is the result of gratitude and understanding that this is what she's meant to do.
"I completely lost myself," Lynch admitted. "And what we see here, we see me being built up, and me changing and me taking over. That's all from below zero that I've had to come up, and it's a little step at a time, at a time, but it's even coming from that low point when I was 19 to where I am now. I've been through all this and now I am so grateful, and I know what I'm meant to do because I lost it all."
You can check out Lynch's full comments in the video above.
If you use any of the quotes from this article, please credit WWE with an H/T to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.