A tough call. Nikki Bella revealed the real reason she chose to end her engagement to her former fiancé, John Cena.
“Overall, we did have such an incredible relationship, it was just two people that wanted two different lives,” Bella, 36, said on Maria Menounos’ “Better Together” podcast on Wednesday, May 20. “We were trying so hard to make it one.”
The Incomparable author continued, “Even in the end when he was willing to give me kids, I could just tell, it’s not what we wanted. And that’s really, like, you know, what pushed me in the end.”
Bella was first linked to Cena, 43, in 2012, and the former couple got engaged at Wrestlemania 33 in April 2017. However, Us Weekly broke the news in April 2018 that they had called off their engagement.
Though Bella and Cena reconciled shortly after their spring split, the exes broke things off for good that July. The Total Bellas star confirmed to Us at the time that they tried “to get back” to where they used to be, but moving on was the best decision for them “after much time and soul-searching alone.”
On Menounos’ podcast, Bella explained how she believed starting a family with the WWE wrestler could lead to him resenting her over time. “If I’m going to force someone to be a father … what if he looks at you down the road and just regrets everything, and then you have this child and you’ve built this life,” she explained. “Is that what you want? And I remember thinking: It’s not what I want.”
Bella met her fiancé, Artem Chigvintsev, while partnered together on Dancing With the Stars’ 25th season in 2017. Us broke the news in January 2019 that Bella and the 37-year-old Russian dancer were dating. Shortly after announcing their engagement in January, the couple confirmed that they are also expecting their first child together.
Bella opened up about her pregnancy symptoms on Us’ “Watch With Us” podcast in April. “I guess I just didn’t realize how all these body changes would feel,” she shared. “I don’t just mean outer, but inner. There are days I really get rocked and exhausted and my body’s going through so much. … It’s just in this shock. It’s just tough.”
Cena, for his part, is dating engineer Shay Shariatzadeh.
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