Paige Responds To Alberto El Patron’s Mental Health Remarks, Talks Heat w/ Lana, The Divas Stigma, Sasha Banks, & Her Career Ending Injury

On Whether She Blames Sasha Banks For Her Career Ending Injury & Her Take On The Brie Bella/ Liv Morgan Incident:

Accidents happen. It’s kind of like what happened to Brie [Bella] and Liv Morgan this week. Accidents happen in the ring. I’m not gonna hold Sasha accountable for what happened to me. It is what it is and we’ve all been doing it for years. At one point or another one of us is gonna hurt each other. We can’t be perfect all the time. I feel so bad for Brie. She’s never hurt anyone. This is the first time she’s hurt someone and she gets blamed for it? Come on dude, it’s an accident. Liv doesn’t blame her. The thing that I didn’t like about it was the fact that her teammates brought her back into the ring to do a suplex when everyone knew she was knocked out. That’s the thing I didn’t like. Don’t come back in for this suplex. You know you’re hurt. We have concussion meetings all the time. Take care of yourself; but, also your tag partners, as much as I love them, they’re very sweet girls, they know you were knocked out. Don’t let her back in the ring again. That’s what Sasha did with me. She saw something was messed up. She was like, ‘I’m not continuing with this match.’ That’s a professional. She’s like, ‘I can’t do this.’ I was trying to continue it and I was trying and trying and trying. She was like, ‘Stop, you’re gonna hurt yourself even more.’ I get where Liv is coming from. She wants to continue. Stop, it’s not worth it. You’re gonna end up like me. With Ruby [Riott] and Sarah [Logan], you see that she got hurt. Don’t let her back in the ring again. Referee in there, don’t let her back in the ring again. Apparently the referee didn’t know anything. Come on how didn’t you know?

On The Bellas and the Divas Stigma:

The backlash that Brie got, if it was anyone else there wouldn’t be that much backlash. It’s because she’s a Bella. People have such a bad stigma when it comes from the Divas name and I hate that. Without the Divas, we wouldn’t be here. I was a Diva. I loved it. When you think of WWE, you think of WWE and when you think of WWE you think of your passion and your dream, so I hate that. I hate that stigma. They discount The Bellas as being in the Divas realm; but, they’ve worked their butts off so hard to keep up with the rest of the girls. They do not stop and I think that’s fantastic; but, people kept them in that. They typecast them as Divas and don’t even give them a chance and I hate that.

On How She Found Out She Would Be The Smackdown GM:

Tuesday came along and I was sitting in the seats in the arena, just chilling out talking to my mom and dad and the writers and Road Dogg all kind of surround me. They’re like, ‘Hey, here’s your script for tonight. You’re in seg one.’ I was like, ‘What?’ They’re like, ‘Yeah, you’re gonna be Smackdown GM now?’ I was like, ‘What?’ I was like, ‘Oh my God, I have to remember these scripts now. This is gonna be crazy!’

On Returning To Total Divas:

Months passed and I remember saying, ‘Hey, I know I can’t wrestle anymore; but, I’d love to be back on Total Divas.’ They were like, ‘Don’t worry. We want you to be back on the show.’ It feels really really good [to be back on the show]. It just felt natural to be back on there and I just love being around the girls. We have such a good crew this season too and there are some explosive parts. I can’t wait for you to see the episode where me and Lana explode on each other. That was like out of control. I just remember screaming at her, ‘I hate you guts.’ This season just feels really good because I’m telling my story there too and they get to see me and see my face and see how I was the last year and a half, or how much I love their support, or how being injured really broke me and then you get to see me have arguments with Lana again and you get to see some really wonderful stuff too. I’m so excited for this season.

On Her Heat With Lana:

The thing is, I’m one of those people that’s like, ‘Don’t try to get a storyline. Don’t go into business for yourself and go on the internet and talk crap and pretty much try and get a storyline through that without my permission.’ So, it was like every tweet and I could never really forgive her and I feel like I was very petty for doing that. That I was being very petty. She said that I bullied her. She tweeted out all this long tweet about me bullying her at NXT and people just looked at me like I was just horrible, like I was this horrible bully and I’m not like that at all. So, I was mad about it. I was like, ‘What are you tweeting? Why are you tweeting that I was mean to you and that I bullied you? I don’t understand.’ She was like, ‘It’s just a storyline.’ I was like, ‘You can’t just do that.’ I was like, ‘You have to ask me before.’ We got it all worked out. It’s all good. You’ll see. It’s in Lake Tahoe. I lose it a little bit. At the same time, I’m at a stage in my life where I’m maybe a little bit overly defensive because of what I’ve been through over the last year and a half so Lana it’s kind of been a long time coming with her and I felt like we needed that to really get over the speed bump we had in between us. It did [bring us closer]. We are friends now.

On Alberto Del Rio’s Latest Comments:

I chose not to reply to that at the second. It hurt my feelings; but, I didn’t want him to know it hurt my feelings at that point. It wasn’t like it hurt my feelings in like, ‘Oh, I can’t believe you said that about me.’ You’re making fun of someone that had mental health issues. Like, who does that? I’m glad that he’s moved on and found someone. I love that. I want him & I want his family to be happy. I just wanted him to leave me alone. After a year of us not being together, I never expected him to bring me up. I was like I’m not even gonna respond to that right now. I wish him the best of luck. You don’t make fun of someone that has mental health issues. He knew I was depressed and how I was at the bottom and I wanted to kill myself. He knew all that stuff, so to throw it out there like that is pretty mean. It’s uncalled for, unnecessary. I was like, ‘Am I being bullied right now? What is going on here?’

On Del Rio Attacking Her Family Via Social Media:

I told my family straightaway. I was like, ‘Don’t reply to him. He’s not even worth it.’ Right now, I’m at the stage of my life where I’m the happiest I’ve ever been and I’m not gonna let someone like him bring me down. Maybe he’s not as successful as he wanted to be, I don’t know; but, I don’t have time for that. I don’t have time for that kind of stuff. I don’t know if it’s jealousy; but, it’s immature. He’s 41 years old. Don’t talk like that about a woman first of all, especially on the internet for everyone to see, especially when you’re in the public eye. Just keep your mouth shut. You don’t like me. That’s fine. We haven’t had any contact for over year. It just baffles me. Like, ‘What? Just leave me alone.’ It’s kind of laughable in the end. It’s like, ‘Come on dude, you look sad.’

Paige also discussed her new makeup line, the advice Hall of Famer Edge gave her, and the new movie about her life starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.

Readers interested in listening to Lilian Garcia’s interview with Paige in its entirety may do so below:

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