Bleacher Report recently posted a new interview featuring various wrestling stars talking about the physical effects wrestling can have on your body over time; you can read a few highlights below:
Diamond Dallas Page comments on the back bump that resulted in him rupturing his L4 and L5 vertebrae, and being told his career was over:
“I was in excruciating pain. I was on my back, and I crawled to the corner. I didn’t go back in the ring. They said I was never going to go back.
It wasn’t that move. That move was the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
Beth Phoenix explains how a slap to the face resulted in a broken jaw during a WWE match in 2006, but how she still finished the match:
“It broke all the way through. The entire bone. I could put my tongue between my teeth. So I thought, ‘Oh, I lost a tooth.’ You don’t know what a broken jaw feels like until it happens.”
“It didn’t matter what the injury was. I was going to finish this. I was going to get through this because this means everything to me. You go, ‘I tore something. I broke something.’ The first thought to go through your head is ‘That’s six months of rehab.’ Or if it’s broken, ‘That’s two to three months.’ That’s just part of the job. When you sign up, you know you’re going to have to endure those things.”
Paul Roma comments on the physical toll your body takes from wrestling:
“The constant jerking on the arms, the arm drags, the hip tosses. It took its toll. The body’s not built to not withstand banging around like that.”
“My knees have been replaced. They speak for themselves. I have trouble from the concussion aspect. I have trouble remembering things on a day-to-day basis.”
ACH talks about what your body feels like after the adrenaline wears off after a match:
“Most of the time, when you get back to the hotel, your adrenaline is still pumping. It takes a while for that to wear off. You don’t usually feel it until the next day, when you wake up at four in the morning to catch your 5 a.m. flight.
When you finally wear down and get that moment to yourself, it feels like you just experienced the worst car crash of your life.”
