Daria Berenato says she never stopped loving professional wrestling, but everything surrounding the business was starting to wear her down before her WWE run ended. Looking back now, she admits the “politics” and other pressures that came with working at that level had left her feeling broken down and like she was losing her fire.
While speaking to The Determined Society, Berenato opened up about where she was mentally toward the end of her time with WWE. She admitted that WWE deciding not to renew her contract was still one of the biggest heartbreaks she had experienced in recent years.
“I am definitely more sensitive than I lead people to believe. I look at heartbreak, I guess, not getting my contract renewed with WWE would probably be the biggest example of heartbreak in recent years.”
Berenato didn’t really give herself much time to process it either. Her instinct was to pack everything up and keep moving, even though there were days when the reality of losing her WWE career hit particularly hard.
“And I really packed it all up and I just kept going. And I don’t know that that’s the advice I would give someone else. And then, you know, with that, I would have days where I would break down and it would be painful. But I wouldn’t allow myself to do that too often.”
The end of Berenato’s WWE run came after a particularly rough stretch. She had captured the WWE Women’s Tag Team Championship alongside Chelsea Green, only to tear her ACL three weeks later. Then, while dealing with her contract situation, she learned WWE wouldn’t be renewing her deal.
Berenato initially needed her faith in God and the universe to make sense of why everything had happened. Instead of looking at the WWE decision purely as something being taken away from her, she tried to believe it was pushing her toward another part of her life.
“Believing in the universe and God. That’s the only way I could wrap my mind around it, is that I’m always being protected. I’m always being watched. And things come and go from our lives for the reason of the journey.”
With some distance from WWE, however, Berenato can now see just how much the environment had been affecting her. She believes the company not renewing her contract may actually have been the best thing that could have happened because she had become stagnant and increasingly numb to the routine.
“And hindsight’s always 20/20. And so looking back, it’s probably the best thing that could have happened to me because I think that I was becoming… numb’s not a great word, but like, yeah, I was kind of becoming numb to the routine and stagnant.”
More importantly, Berenato felt like something was slowly being taken out of her. The energy and fire she had always carried weren’t coming as naturally anymore.
“And I felt a little, little like broken down. Like I felt like I was losing that kind of luster that I always had, that fire that I always had.”
That’s where Berenato made an important distinction. Wrestling itself hadn’t caused her to feel that way, because she still loved the sport. Instead, she pointed toward everything she had been dealing with behind the scenes, including the “politics” that come with performing at WWE’s level.
“And it wasn’t for a lack of the love of the sport, but, you know, just going through a lot of things and politics and all the kind of things that go into a high-level sport like that.”
Bottom line: Daria didn’t blame WWE politics alone for how she was feeling, but she made it clear they were part of what had started wearing her down. Losing her contract hurt at the time, but with some distance from that environment, she can now see why leaving may have been the reset she needed.
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.
