AJ Lee didn’t just leave WWE in 2015 — she basically broke up with professional wrestling altogether. The former Divas Champion says she stayed so far away from the business after walking out that she wasn’t even watching it, and it took CM Punk getting back into the ring years later for her to finally give wrestling another look.
During a conversation with iHeart Women’s Sports, Lee was asked whether she kept up with professional wrestling during the decade she spent away from WWE. AJ compared the whole thing to getting out of a relationship and refusing to keep tabs on an ex because there was simply too much emotional baggage attached to that part of her life.
“Oh man, I’m like—to me it felt like a relationship, and like if it—I’m not like the type of person that’s like going to like stalk my ex on social media. Like I just—like that’s what it felt like. So like I never watched any wrestling and I stood far away from it.”
AJ explained that wrestling had meant so much to her that stepping away came with a broken-heart feeling. She also acknowledged there was trauma attached to that period of her career and said the environment she left behind wasn’t a healthy one for her at the time.
“I think a piece of me was like, so much of my heart was in it and I fell so much in love with it and there was a lot of like trauma also that happened back then. It wasn’t a very healthy place and so a little bit of it was like I had a broken heart. Um, and you know, didn’t kind of want to go there or think about it.”
Things finally changed when CM Punk returned to professional wrestling. AJ decided to watch one of his shows, and something unexpected happened — the women on the show immediately grabbed her attention.
“And then my husband went back to wrestling. And um I watched a show that he did and the women were so amazing. And I was like, ‘Oh, what—what is this? This is really cool.’”
That comeback to watching wrestling didn’t exactly last long. AJ said Punk ended up getting hurt on the show she watched, which was apparently enough for her to jokingly decide she had brought some seriously bad luck to the whole situation.
“And then um—and then he got hurt on that show and I was like, ‘Well, I’m never fucking watching again.’ Like I thought it was like bad juju. Like I was like, ‘No, I shouldn’t have.’”
AJ didn’t identify the specific show during this interview, but what really stuck with her was how dramatically women’s wrestling had changed while she was gone. She said being an “ordinary girl” once made her stand out, while the modern wrestling landscape suddenly had all kinds of women that different fans could see themselves in.
That makes AJ’s eventual return even crazier. After spending roughly a decade deliberately keeping wrestling at arm’s length, she returned to WWE television in September 2025 and ultimately got back in the ring. Her latest run wrapped after WrestleMania 42, but people around WWE still don’t believe she has wrestled her final match.
So AJ Lee went from treating wrestling like an ex she wanted absolutely nothing to do with to stepping back into the same world a decade later. The first thing that cracked that door open wasn’t nostalgia or even WWE calling — it was watching how far women’s wrestling had come while she was gone.
What do you make of AJ Lee admitting she completely stopped watching wrestling after leaving WWE, and are you surprised CM Punk’s return was what finally got her watching again? Let us know what you think and leave your feedback in the comments.
This transcript was produced exclusively for Ringside News from the original recording. Republishing the transcription in full is prohibited. When using excerpts, provide prominent credit and a link to this article.
