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Supercard Archives / Imperfections Pt. 5
« Last post by Julianna DiMaria on April 12, 2024, 11:47:52 PM »April 8th
“This is starting to become concerning…”
Dr. Montgomery’s words spook me a bit as I find myself in his office again.
“You had been holding up quite well for a good while but you’ve been seeing me for therapy sessions more times during your world championship reign than the 12 months leading up to that put together…”
I sigh, feeling a bit ashamed of the fact.
“There’s nothing wrong with that, but it makes me worried about you.”
“I admit, I’ve had a difficult time getting that incident out of my head… when I was blindsided by that nobody who shouldn’t even have the briefcase she does. It’s been difficult to move past the fact that someone like HER outsmarted me, even for a moment.”
Dr. Montgomery shakes his head upon hearing this from me.
“Ever since you’ve won your title, I’ve observed, through your promotional work and through face to face interactions like now, that you have experienced increased agitation, a decrease in patience, constantly worrying about others opinions of you and a relapse back to the tendency to flip a switch whenever the slightest thing doesn’t go your way. You’ve always had these traits and you had them under control, but since winning the title…”
The shame was filling my stomach at this point.
“In my professional opinion, Julianna, maybe it’s best that you don’t have that title anymore…”
My jaw dropped in shock upon hearing this.
“So you’re saying I should just hand Kayla the title and leave?”
“No. I think you would be much happier and healthier without the title than you’ve ever been with it. I feel like having the title is what is causing these triggers in you that ultimately create these concerning behaviors and being rushed into the title picture as you were doesn’t help at all.”
“Doctor, you’re not a wrestler. You’ve never been involved with the sport. It’s not me holding the championship that’s the problem. It’s everyone else trying to drag me down to their level… Kayla with her potshots, Seleana with her gross obsession over me, Courtney and her shit…”
“You understand that with the title that you have, you have a target on your back. With all of the mini-episodes you’ve told me about behind the scenes, I’m shocked that you haven’t flipped out on camera by now in front of that worldwide audience. During your time as champion, you haven’t handled the pressure well.”
“BULLSHIT!” I yelled, unwittingly proving his point. “Like you mentioned, I was thrown into the fire when I won this championship and ever since then, I’ve had to adapt on the fly and learn what it means to be a world champion in this company with minimal preparation and only six matches under my belt at the time and I challenge you, doctor, to find ANYONE in that locker room that would’ve done BETTER than me under the circumstances of which I won this championship! Name someone! Anyone! Oh wait, you CAN’T! And you know what the fucking sad part is? If my father was alive to see all of this, he STILL wouldn’t be proud of me because that perfectionist PRICK would’ve said just about the same thing all those dumbass bitches I work with have said about me and my title reign….”
“I understand where…”
“Wait…”
I cut him off, realizing some sort of epiphany about my father the moment that I mentioned him. I remembered when I first won my title and how I read that letter that he wrote before he died where he accepted me and admitted that he was wrong about me.
“That’s my problem… ALWAYS…”
“What are you referring to, Julianna?”
“My father. That’s the root of my problem. I’m a perfectionist because he drilled that into me and ever since I read that letter of his…”
I was suddenly starting to feel a sense of relief knowing that I had pinned the root of my issues, with my title reign and my time in the business, but also anger in knowing that when I won my title, I made a pretty grave error…
“I’m afraid time is up, doctor…”
Dr. Montgomery tried to get me to stay, but he looked at the time and realized that the session was over. There was only one place that I had to go…
And the root of my imperfections to confront…
April 8th
I was back in San Diego and I was at my father’s grave. My anger was increasing and I held the letter that he wrote me. I was regretting that I ever read it at all and I broke the ice with my father in the grave when I glanced back at the letter and remembered what he said to me.
It was clear to me now that all of the flowery, positive things he said about me in the letter suddenly became my biggest burden.
“Oh dad… even from the grave, you’re a prick…”
I paused before continuing to let out my anger.
“In hindsight? I was better off never reading your letter at all. I’ll tell you why. Because when I read that letter, I felt like I finally gained your acceptance and that I had nothing left to prove to you anymore. But the more I thought about your words and the more I thought about your motives and the fact that I wasn’t allowed to know about your words until after you passed and after I “was ready”, I realize now that your acceptance of me was both shallow and a damn mental trap…
If you REALLY felt the way you did about me as you expressed in what you wrote, why didn’t you have the balls to tell me to my face when you were alive?”
I gripped the letter tightly with my fist.
“All of this is YOUR fault, Dad! When you trained me, you mentally poisoned me. The way you brought me up in this business destroyed any chance I had to learn how to go with the flow and just breathe from the grind every once in a while. Your perfectionist BULLSHIT is why I grew to be the way I am… for the fact that I don’t even know how to have fun anymore and that my work-life balance is absolute shit! Your words, Dad? You know what they’ve done to me? To my reign?”
Reflecting on the ups and downs of my title reign over the last few months definitely left me seething.
“Those words trapped me. They made me let my guard down and think that I had it all figured out. They gave me this ‘satisfaction’ of feeling like I had proven what I needed to prove because I was lulled into a false sense of security that I finally made you proud and as a result, any little thing that has gone wrong with my title reign feels like I’ve let YOU and THESE EMPTY FUCKING LIES you wrote to me completely down. Every little thing that has gone wrong has made me feel like I’m not worthy of that praise you showered on me and in essence?”
I felt sick to my stomach admitting what I was about to confess.
“I subconsciously gave you control over my career and my psyche all over again from the fucking grave. Well… NO MORE! It’s DONE! I will NOT ABIDE YOUR BULLSHIT EVER AGAIN!”
I shredded that letter that he wrote to me and let the pieces fall on his grave.
“From now on, I am going to do whatever it takes to expunge your poison from my heart and mind even if it means leaving wrestling entirely!”
Suddenly, my anger froze and gave way to shock. I felt myself going cold for a minute and a quick glance at my hands revealed that for a second or two, they turned whiter. A doubtful question creeped into my thought…
“Is that what it is really going to take?”
I realized, stunningly, that venting toward my father wasn’t making me feel better after all.
Later…
I wasn’t feeling better when I went to his former wrestling school. Sitting down at the spot where the training ring once stood, depression was flooding my thoughts. I was questioning so much that the numbness I was feeling was unreal. All I could remember were moments where my father would call me names and psychologically abuse me in front of my entire class.
It wasn’t just being called “stupid”, “horrible”, and “disgraceful”...
It was being told that I wasn’t worth my mother giving birth to… that I would never be a success in wrestling… that I was the worst thing that ever happened to him…
All because I wasn’t progressing in my training the way HE wanted me to.
Remembering that made me feel so sad knowing that most of my self-esteem was based on my success in the ring… seemingly…
“Your mother told me you’d be here…” I heard Liam say as he walked up behind me. I was too stunned to really object to his appearance. “You haven’t returned my texts, my calls…”
“I know Liam, I’m sorry. It’s just…”
“Your big match? The embarrassment you went through in the triple threat? Save it. I felt like you were starting to come around only for a bad break or two to go against you making you regress back to what I’ve been trying to get you away from. What you said to me at the baseball game: is that even true at all?”
“Of course.”
“Blowing me off lately doesn’t show that, Julianna.”
“I feel TERRIBLE about blowing you off, I really do. I got in my own head after that triple threat and it’s such a struggle to separate myself from the way my dad brought me up.”
“I get that, but do you truly care more about your career than the people that support you? Especially your mother? She was the one you won that championship for to begin with. When you won that title, that’s what motivated me to seek you out again and reconnect because it’s the first time I’ve seen you do something in professional wrestling for anyone other than yourself. That’s what made me ‘crazy’ about you because I saw someone that is far deeper than what she portrays on screen. I saw it back when we were training too…”
I sighed, wondering what to say, as I remembered how I won at High Stakes and my motivations being so selfless.
“I wanted to live my life without my dad interfering, but…”
I sighed again, definitely feeling a heavy heart.
“Now I realize that I can’t live the life that I want and have my career at the same time…”
Liam’s eyes widen with surprise.
“I’m done, Liam… no matter what happens on Sunday, I’m done.”
“Julianna… you’re not serious…”
I shook my head.
“Dead serious. I feel like everyone around me wants me to be done and I am not talking about my stupid peers. I’m talking about the people that care about me… you, Ally, Christy, my mother…”
“Julianna, that’s not the case at all. Not once has any of us told you to hang it up. If this sport is what you really want to do in your heart, then keep going. We’re just looking out for you and trying to save you from yourself and from getting too deeply obsessed with your career.”
“Leave me alone…” I said with a sullen tone. “...I’ll call you tomorrow, I promise.”
Liam sighs and concedes and once I feel alone, I start to talk to myself.
“To my younger self, I am so sorry that you never got to go to that prom and everything that you went through because of my dad. Would I have grown up to be a happier person if I was never a wrestler at all? God, I REALLY wish I went to that prom that night. I should’ve… even if my father would’ve cut me off. I just think back to my career and what I’ve accomplished and the one TRUE moment of happiness I’ve had was when I won my title for my mom… and other than that, it’s always been about achieving my dad’s impossible standard and I should’ve known better than to think that I’d ever meet that standard with the title that I have…”
“With the title that WE have…” I heard my mother say to me from behind. She approached me and wrapped an arm around me.
“I’m walking away from wrestling, mother…”
“That’s not the solution, honey.”
“How can you say that? It seems like all this sport has done is made me mostly miserable…”
The tears were flowing down my face at this point as I lamented the happiness I likely sacrificed for this business.
“Julianna, if your career was truly all about your father and if wrestling is something that truly brings you no joy at all, you wouldn’t have thought of winning that title at High Stakes for me. But you did… because you ARE passionate about your craft and you showed that you could rise above your father. You proved that wrestling is what you truly want to do with your life because you wrestled with a purpose beyond yourself. Yes, you should’ve chosen the prom. I would’ve trained you myself even if it was in secret because I SAW how bad you wanted it, even then.”
“Knowing what I know now, I would’ve gone to that prom and forged my own path…” I admitted as I was feeling better. “I’ve ALWAYS had a right to carve my own path in life without my dad and the last few years, that’s all I’ve done… despite him at that…”
“You’ve always had passion for wrestling honey. Your father merely skewered it.”
“You mean I don’t have to give up wrestling to be happy?” I asked with a shrill in my voice. My mother shook her head as I had the epiphany I needed and I couldn’t help but slightly squeal with happiness.
“You can have the best of both worlds. You just need to learn how to not base your entire happiness on your career and you are smart and bright enough to do so. YOU determine your own destiny, Julianna: not your father, not your peers, not any of your challengers… nobody but you.”
I couldn’t hold back my happiness anymore as I suddenly embraced my mother, who had no hesitation at all at returning the brief embrace.
“I can take that moment from High Stakes… OUR moment… I can build on it, mother. I WILL build on it. That happiness and joy from that night? That’s the blueprint for what I need to apply to all walks of my life. I’m going to live my life and have my career MY way without either thing being defined by anyone else and I am going to tear down ANYONE or ANYTHING that gets in my way. I’m NOT retiring. I’m NOT giving in. I’m NOT giving up my title without a fight. I’m NOT going to be under my father’s thumb from the grave ANYMORE!”
“You bet your ass you won’t! I’ve been waiting to hear you say that for so long, honey!”
“I’m done soaking in the misery… and I’m sure as hell never coming back here again…”
With that 11th hour epiphany in mind, my mother and I walked out of my father’s old wrestling school… never to return again…
April 12th
Back in Flagstaff, I was really feeling that renewed vigor that was going through me. On top of the epiphany that I was having, I was also feeling some anger from Kayla Richards’s shallow words toward me. With the camera on me, now I knew it was truly time to rise my game to a higher level as the SCW Bombshells World Champion and I knew that now more than ever, I had to show this company exactly what a pure of heart Julianna DiMaria truly looked like and sounded like.
“From day one that I won this championship, hell, even before that, there have been a bunch of shallow bitches that think that they can define me and that they can define my destiny. I’ll get to the shallowest of shallow in Kayla Richards in a moment but that’s nothing new to me. It’s been happening to me my whole career and I realize that as far as the business goes, I’m not the only one that has had to persevere against that but this is also on top of the fact that when I first broke into this business, my father was controlling me in every sense. He thought he could run my life. He thought that he could define what my path in this business should be and yet, all I have ever done since I broke away from the bastard is go on a completely different path than what he approved of. It mirrors my journey here because everyone in SCW wanted me to start from the bottom and work my way up and all of that and I wouldn’t have minded doing that. I didn’t ask to be thrown into the fire as I’ve said many times before.
You know why that wouldn’t have bothered me? Because I knew in my heart from the moment I stepped into this ring against Dawn Warren that I was going to reign as the Bombshells World Champion at some point.
Yet, these same shallow bitches are pissed off at me because I took the unconventional path to success, not the path that any Bombshell would’ve approved of. So Kayla Richards, for weeks and for months you’ve thought that you can define me in any way you can. Your promo that you cut proves this. You think, therefore you say, you say, therefore it is. That’s your logic, right? Unfortunately, based on what you said to me, not only am I disappointed in you personally because I expected so much better from you than to go for low hanging fruit and to say basically the same exact shit I’ve heard for months, but what you said to me is really no different than anything my own father was saying to me during the early part of my career when he had the influence that he did.
Hell, maybe he should’ve been YOUR father based on what you were saying…
I guess in a sense, facing the bitches that I’ve beaten is like facing my own father repeatedly… especially when that bitch is someone as shallow as Courtney. Yet, all I’ve done is win. You want to keep beating the horse of me thanking you, then so be it. You really have never learned that what you say is a reflection of you, not who you are saying it to. What you say is merely an opinion and how you see things, as skewed as it may be. It doesn’t define the other person and it sure as hell doesn’t define me but you literally had the nerve to stand in front of that camera and DEMAND that not only I surrender the championship to you, but that I leave this company for a little bit and then return and start from the bottom?”
I took a pause and I tried so hard to contain my laughter. Unfortunately for Kayla, I just couldn’t. In fact, for a moment there, I was in disbelief that I even heard those words at all and that I was rephrasing them.
“I heard that correctly?”
I scoffed, still being in disbelief of this.
“The BIG BAD herself stoops to THAT level of BULLSHIT? Are you KIDDING ME? Just that by itself, the fact that you even SUGGESTED that I do such a thing, proves to me how pathetic of a person that you really are AND how hypocritical you’ve become. You’ve been going on and on for months about how much of a fighter you are and how much of a champion you want to be and you spew THAT? I’m not even pissed that I heard that. I find it that fucking hilarious that you would stoop that low, that you think THAT low of me but that doesn’t surprise me, Kayla. You always HAVE thought that low of me going back to New Generation Wrestling…
Hey, YOU brought it up first…
The fact that you mentioned that sorry excuse of a company, and I KNOW we both agree on that by the way, tells me WHY I am going to win this match…
Because you’re stuck in the past, Kayla…
‘
You STILL think of me as the same person that I was back then. YES, back in that day, I wasn’t doing so great. I was a joke in this business. I’ve admitted that countless times. That’s not exactly breaking news. You were the world champion of that company for a time, yes and for the roller coaster ride that my career has been, through good times and bad, I’ve ALWAYS been able to adapt, change, evolve and grow better and better with each passing year. You THINK that I am still exactly the same wrestler that I was back then, don’t you?
You THINK I am that same damn “nobody” I was back then. NOW all of your chirping toward me coming into this before I said ‘put up or shut up’ to you makes sense. You never gained any respect for me and it’s pretty fucking obvious that you never will and that’s whatever by the way, so seeing ME with the title makes YOU sick and gets YOU up in your feelings to the point where all you did for months before I called you out and made this match happen was talk a bunch of shit like a little annoying troll, basically BEGGING ME to pay attention to you until I finally gave you the time of day. I wanted to take the high road on this. I wanted to be beyond the past and whatever grudge you have carried toward me for years that you made plainly obvious with your chirping toward me week after week.
I wanted to see if you were either going to REALLY do something to back up your words or do whatever you had to do to earn your way to a match like this…
AND YOU… DID… NEITHER!
Your problems with me are a YOU problem, Kayla…
NGW was six years ago honey, it’s time for you to get over it!”
I rolled my eyes and scoffed, clearly taking humor in the fact that she brought up the past.
“I am a FAR BETTER WRESTLER than I was six years ago, even THROUGH the bumpy ride that I’ve had. I’m not going to mention every single company I’ve been in by name like you did because I don’t need to flex that even if in ONE company I wrestled for, I got that “HOF status” going on and YES, Kayla, I will admit that you’ve probably had less losses than me throughout our careers and that you’ve probably had better stretches of dominance everywhere you’ve been… but even then?
That gives ME the advantage because I have FAR more experience of dealing with adversity and setbacks than YOU do and THAT, Kayla, just MIGHT be one of the factors that pushes me to victory. It’s my ability to OVERCOME, to go through HELL… and you KNOW that in NGW, I went through a LOT of hell as they did EVERYTHING they could to make me a fucking joke in this business… to push through the shit that I’ve been through… that has made me strong enough to persevere as champion even when it looks like I’m about to lose it all…
Ever have a father tell you repeatedly that you weren’t worth your mother giving birth to, Kayla?
Your complete IGNORANCE and your total DESPERATION to paint me as something that I know in my heart I no longer am and have grown far too strong to ever be again shows me how weak inside you really are…
You want to lecture me about whether the words I say will mean anything in the long run? Shove it, Kayla! Because I’m walking into this match KNOWING that YOUR words in the long run toward me about about me WON’T mean SHIT in the long run, even if you do win on Sunday because for all the bullshit you want to preach about how you’re going to take this and that from me, in reality the only two things that you can take away from me are my title and the victory and you want to act like you can control my destiny and that my world is going to crumble over ONE loss and that should you win, everything that I accomplished so far means nothing.
You can take the title from me, Kayla.
But you’re not taking my fucking destiny from me. You’re not going to put me on a downward spiral. Maybe the Julianna of six years ago would’ve downward spiraled over losing a championship, which she did, I admit that. But you don’t define my path other than what can happen in that ring for three fucking seconds. The worst case scenario? I lose on Sunday and I win it back two weeks later… or at Into the Void.. or WHENEVER. I get it, Kayla. Six years ago, I’d treat one loss like the end of the world. But again, that was six years ago. I am not that person anymore. If you want to stay stuck in 2018, then be stuck there. I THOUGHT you were going to come at me BETTER than that for all the shit you were chirping at me for months…
Only for you to go through a ‘what’s what’ of what previous challengers have said about me before…
Calling my win over Courtney an upset? Not much different from the idiot herself calling it a fluke.
Basically insinuating that I won because she didn’t care anymore? Been there. Done that. Next.
Oh, going through the names of the challengers I’ve beaten during my reign? I’m pretty sure Krystal Wolfe did that, or came close to doing so? I mean it’s true that Courtney never had the heart of a champion and her recent walkout proves that, but that’s not MY problem, Kayla. Really, it’s low hanging fruit from you.
Especially coming from someone who’s kicked Ariana’s ass X amount of times and indirectly groups that in with the dominance she loves to boast about all the damn time. But hey, what do I know right?
I expected you to stand out with your words and to say something that made me REALLY think… REALLY question… REALLY challenge me and reflect on my journey and wonder if there was anything that I could’ve done better…
But all I got from you was a whole bunch of NOTHING…
When you take that into account…
When you take into account that you have gone out of your way for months to try to run me down and define me when prior to all of this, I really hadn’t done anything to you nor did I ever mention you in ANY negative way whatsoever DESPITE the history we share from six years ago mind you…
When you take into account that you stooped as low as to suggest I surrender the belt from you and walk away from this company…
When you consider that all you threw at me was low hanging fruit…
What I see in you, Kayla? From my perspective? Someone that is still a damn good, hell perhaps even great wrestler. That opinion from me about you is never going to change. But what I see is someone that has a louder bark than a stronger bite at the end of the day. What I initially saw as someone who wanted this title just as bad as I do… I now see as someone who wants the title to validate her own ego, who doesn’t have the heart for this business as I do, and who lacks the perspective and the knowledge that it takes to be a world champion… compared to me at least.
What I was HOPING would be at least a hard hitting battle between the two most passionate wrestlers on the roster in the first Bombshells Supercard main event in over the year… instead, what you have reduced it to… is this bullshit, mudslinging contest all because what? You want to hang onto the past? Because you dislike me that damn much?
The BIG BAD that should be SO FEARED and that many previous challengers to her Internet title reigns BENT THE KNEE to has really reduced herself to suggesting I forfeit the belt to her? I KNEW you were desperate when you wouldn’t keep my name out of your mouth for months, but that?
It’s a WHOLE new level of PATHETIC coming from someone like you. Don’t tell me that you truly believe you can beat me on Sunday… not when you even THOUGHT of something putridly STUPID like that…
I’ve already handed you this opportunity, Kayla…
And after I’m done with you on Sunday?
You’re not getting any more fucking handouts from me…
With that anger going through me, I shut off the camera at this point. Deep down I know I have every right to break the camera for that ‘surrender to me and leave’ suggestion…
But I also knew that I had to rise above it…
And on Sunday when I beat Kayla and shove her words down her throat?
That’s exactly what I am going to do as I continue to define my destiny… MY way!
“This is starting to become concerning…”
Dr. Montgomery’s words spook me a bit as I find myself in his office again.
“You had been holding up quite well for a good while but you’ve been seeing me for therapy sessions more times during your world championship reign than the 12 months leading up to that put together…”
I sigh, feeling a bit ashamed of the fact.
“There’s nothing wrong with that, but it makes me worried about you.”
“I admit, I’ve had a difficult time getting that incident out of my head… when I was blindsided by that nobody who shouldn’t even have the briefcase she does. It’s been difficult to move past the fact that someone like HER outsmarted me, even for a moment.”
Dr. Montgomery shakes his head upon hearing this from me.
“Ever since you’ve won your title, I’ve observed, through your promotional work and through face to face interactions like now, that you have experienced increased agitation, a decrease in patience, constantly worrying about others opinions of you and a relapse back to the tendency to flip a switch whenever the slightest thing doesn’t go your way. You’ve always had these traits and you had them under control, but since winning the title…”
The shame was filling my stomach at this point.
“In my professional opinion, Julianna, maybe it’s best that you don’t have that title anymore…”
My jaw dropped in shock upon hearing this.
“So you’re saying I should just hand Kayla the title and leave?”
“No. I think you would be much happier and healthier without the title than you’ve ever been with it. I feel like having the title is what is causing these triggers in you that ultimately create these concerning behaviors and being rushed into the title picture as you were doesn’t help at all.”
“Doctor, you’re not a wrestler. You’ve never been involved with the sport. It’s not me holding the championship that’s the problem. It’s everyone else trying to drag me down to their level… Kayla with her potshots, Seleana with her gross obsession over me, Courtney and her shit…”
“You understand that with the title that you have, you have a target on your back. With all of the mini-episodes you’ve told me about behind the scenes, I’m shocked that you haven’t flipped out on camera by now in front of that worldwide audience. During your time as champion, you haven’t handled the pressure well.”
“BULLSHIT!” I yelled, unwittingly proving his point. “Like you mentioned, I was thrown into the fire when I won this championship and ever since then, I’ve had to adapt on the fly and learn what it means to be a world champion in this company with minimal preparation and only six matches under my belt at the time and I challenge you, doctor, to find ANYONE in that locker room that would’ve done BETTER than me under the circumstances of which I won this championship! Name someone! Anyone! Oh wait, you CAN’T! And you know what the fucking sad part is? If my father was alive to see all of this, he STILL wouldn’t be proud of me because that perfectionist PRICK would’ve said just about the same thing all those dumbass bitches I work with have said about me and my title reign….”
“I understand where…”
“Wait…”
I cut him off, realizing some sort of epiphany about my father the moment that I mentioned him. I remembered when I first won my title and how I read that letter that he wrote before he died where he accepted me and admitted that he was wrong about me.
“That’s my problem… ALWAYS…”
“What are you referring to, Julianna?”
“My father. That’s the root of my problem. I’m a perfectionist because he drilled that into me and ever since I read that letter of his…”
I was suddenly starting to feel a sense of relief knowing that I had pinned the root of my issues, with my title reign and my time in the business, but also anger in knowing that when I won my title, I made a pretty grave error…
“I’m afraid time is up, doctor…”
Dr. Montgomery tried to get me to stay, but he looked at the time and realized that the session was over. There was only one place that I had to go…
And the root of my imperfections to confront…
April 8th
I was back in San Diego and I was at my father’s grave. My anger was increasing and I held the letter that he wrote me. I was regretting that I ever read it at all and I broke the ice with my father in the grave when I glanced back at the letter and remembered what he said to me.
It was clear to me now that all of the flowery, positive things he said about me in the letter suddenly became my biggest burden.
“Oh dad… even from the grave, you’re a prick…”
I paused before continuing to let out my anger.
“In hindsight? I was better off never reading your letter at all. I’ll tell you why. Because when I read that letter, I felt like I finally gained your acceptance and that I had nothing left to prove to you anymore. But the more I thought about your words and the more I thought about your motives and the fact that I wasn’t allowed to know about your words until after you passed and after I “was ready”, I realize now that your acceptance of me was both shallow and a damn mental trap…
If you REALLY felt the way you did about me as you expressed in what you wrote, why didn’t you have the balls to tell me to my face when you were alive?”
I gripped the letter tightly with my fist.
“All of this is YOUR fault, Dad! When you trained me, you mentally poisoned me. The way you brought me up in this business destroyed any chance I had to learn how to go with the flow and just breathe from the grind every once in a while. Your perfectionist BULLSHIT is why I grew to be the way I am… for the fact that I don’t even know how to have fun anymore and that my work-life balance is absolute shit! Your words, Dad? You know what they’ve done to me? To my reign?”
Reflecting on the ups and downs of my title reign over the last few months definitely left me seething.
“Those words trapped me. They made me let my guard down and think that I had it all figured out. They gave me this ‘satisfaction’ of feeling like I had proven what I needed to prove because I was lulled into a false sense of security that I finally made you proud and as a result, any little thing that has gone wrong with my title reign feels like I’ve let YOU and THESE EMPTY FUCKING LIES you wrote to me completely down. Every little thing that has gone wrong has made me feel like I’m not worthy of that praise you showered on me and in essence?”
I felt sick to my stomach admitting what I was about to confess.
“I subconsciously gave you control over my career and my psyche all over again from the fucking grave. Well… NO MORE! It’s DONE! I will NOT ABIDE YOUR BULLSHIT EVER AGAIN!”
I shredded that letter that he wrote to me and let the pieces fall on his grave.
“From now on, I am going to do whatever it takes to expunge your poison from my heart and mind even if it means leaving wrestling entirely!”
Suddenly, my anger froze and gave way to shock. I felt myself going cold for a minute and a quick glance at my hands revealed that for a second or two, they turned whiter. A doubtful question creeped into my thought…
“Is that what it is really going to take?”
I realized, stunningly, that venting toward my father wasn’t making me feel better after all.
Later…
I wasn’t feeling better when I went to his former wrestling school. Sitting down at the spot where the training ring once stood, depression was flooding my thoughts. I was questioning so much that the numbness I was feeling was unreal. All I could remember were moments where my father would call me names and psychologically abuse me in front of my entire class.
It wasn’t just being called “stupid”, “horrible”, and “disgraceful”...
It was being told that I wasn’t worth my mother giving birth to… that I would never be a success in wrestling… that I was the worst thing that ever happened to him…
All because I wasn’t progressing in my training the way HE wanted me to.
Remembering that made me feel so sad knowing that most of my self-esteem was based on my success in the ring… seemingly…
“Your mother told me you’d be here…” I heard Liam say as he walked up behind me. I was too stunned to really object to his appearance. “You haven’t returned my texts, my calls…”
“I know Liam, I’m sorry. It’s just…”
“Your big match? The embarrassment you went through in the triple threat? Save it. I felt like you were starting to come around only for a bad break or two to go against you making you regress back to what I’ve been trying to get you away from. What you said to me at the baseball game: is that even true at all?”
“Of course.”
“Blowing me off lately doesn’t show that, Julianna.”
“I feel TERRIBLE about blowing you off, I really do. I got in my own head after that triple threat and it’s such a struggle to separate myself from the way my dad brought me up.”
“I get that, but do you truly care more about your career than the people that support you? Especially your mother? She was the one you won that championship for to begin with. When you won that title, that’s what motivated me to seek you out again and reconnect because it’s the first time I’ve seen you do something in professional wrestling for anyone other than yourself. That’s what made me ‘crazy’ about you because I saw someone that is far deeper than what she portrays on screen. I saw it back when we were training too…”
I sighed, wondering what to say, as I remembered how I won at High Stakes and my motivations being so selfless.
“I wanted to live my life without my dad interfering, but…”
I sighed again, definitely feeling a heavy heart.
“Now I realize that I can’t live the life that I want and have my career at the same time…”
Liam’s eyes widen with surprise.
“I’m done, Liam… no matter what happens on Sunday, I’m done.”
“Julianna… you’re not serious…”
I shook my head.
“Dead serious. I feel like everyone around me wants me to be done and I am not talking about my stupid peers. I’m talking about the people that care about me… you, Ally, Christy, my mother…”
“Julianna, that’s not the case at all. Not once has any of us told you to hang it up. If this sport is what you really want to do in your heart, then keep going. We’re just looking out for you and trying to save you from yourself and from getting too deeply obsessed with your career.”
“Leave me alone…” I said with a sullen tone. “...I’ll call you tomorrow, I promise.”
Liam sighs and concedes and once I feel alone, I start to talk to myself.
“To my younger self, I am so sorry that you never got to go to that prom and everything that you went through because of my dad. Would I have grown up to be a happier person if I was never a wrestler at all? God, I REALLY wish I went to that prom that night. I should’ve… even if my father would’ve cut me off. I just think back to my career and what I’ve accomplished and the one TRUE moment of happiness I’ve had was when I won my title for my mom… and other than that, it’s always been about achieving my dad’s impossible standard and I should’ve known better than to think that I’d ever meet that standard with the title that I have…”
“With the title that WE have…” I heard my mother say to me from behind. She approached me and wrapped an arm around me.
“I’m walking away from wrestling, mother…”
“That’s not the solution, honey.”
“How can you say that? It seems like all this sport has done is made me mostly miserable…”
The tears were flowing down my face at this point as I lamented the happiness I likely sacrificed for this business.
“Julianna, if your career was truly all about your father and if wrestling is something that truly brings you no joy at all, you wouldn’t have thought of winning that title at High Stakes for me. But you did… because you ARE passionate about your craft and you showed that you could rise above your father. You proved that wrestling is what you truly want to do with your life because you wrestled with a purpose beyond yourself. Yes, you should’ve chosen the prom. I would’ve trained you myself even if it was in secret because I SAW how bad you wanted it, even then.”
“Knowing what I know now, I would’ve gone to that prom and forged my own path…” I admitted as I was feeling better. “I’ve ALWAYS had a right to carve my own path in life without my dad and the last few years, that’s all I’ve done… despite him at that…”
“You’ve always had passion for wrestling honey. Your father merely skewered it.”
“You mean I don’t have to give up wrestling to be happy?” I asked with a shrill in my voice. My mother shook her head as I had the epiphany I needed and I couldn’t help but slightly squeal with happiness.
“You can have the best of both worlds. You just need to learn how to not base your entire happiness on your career and you are smart and bright enough to do so. YOU determine your own destiny, Julianna: not your father, not your peers, not any of your challengers… nobody but you.”
I couldn’t hold back my happiness anymore as I suddenly embraced my mother, who had no hesitation at all at returning the brief embrace.
“I can take that moment from High Stakes… OUR moment… I can build on it, mother. I WILL build on it. That happiness and joy from that night? That’s the blueprint for what I need to apply to all walks of my life. I’m going to live my life and have my career MY way without either thing being defined by anyone else and I am going to tear down ANYONE or ANYTHING that gets in my way. I’m NOT retiring. I’m NOT giving in. I’m NOT giving up my title without a fight. I’m NOT going to be under my father’s thumb from the grave ANYMORE!”
“You bet your ass you won’t! I’ve been waiting to hear you say that for so long, honey!”
“I’m done soaking in the misery… and I’m sure as hell never coming back here again…”
With that 11th hour epiphany in mind, my mother and I walked out of my father’s old wrestling school… never to return again…
April 12th
Back in Flagstaff, I was really feeling that renewed vigor that was going through me. On top of the epiphany that I was having, I was also feeling some anger from Kayla Richards’s shallow words toward me. With the camera on me, now I knew it was truly time to rise my game to a higher level as the SCW Bombshells World Champion and I knew that now more than ever, I had to show this company exactly what a pure of heart Julianna DiMaria truly looked like and sounded like.
“From day one that I won this championship, hell, even before that, there have been a bunch of shallow bitches that think that they can define me and that they can define my destiny. I’ll get to the shallowest of shallow in Kayla Richards in a moment but that’s nothing new to me. It’s been happening to me my whole career and I realize that as far as the business goes, I’m not the only one that has had to persevere against that but this is also on top of the fact that when I first broke into this business, my father was controlling me in every sense. He thought he could run my life. He thought that he could define what my path in this business should be and yet, all I have ever done since I broke away from the bastard is go on a completely different path than what he approved of. It mirrors my journey here because everyone in SCW wanted me to start from the bottom and work my way up and all of that and I wouldn’t have minded doing that. I didn’t ask to be thrown into the fire as I’ve said many times before.
You know why that wouldn’t have bothered me? Because I knew in my heart from the moment I stepped into this ring against Dawn Warren that I was going to reign as the Bombshells World Champion at some point.
Yet, these same shallow bitches are pissed off at me because I took the unconventional path to success, not the path that any Bombshell would’ve approved of. So Kayla Richards, for weeks and for months you’ve thought that you can define me in any way you can. Your promo that you cut proves this. You think, therefore you say, you say, therefore it is. That’s your logic, right? Unfortunately, based on what you said to me, not only am I disappointed in you personally because I expected so much better from you than to go for low hanging fruit and to say basically the same exact shit I’ve heard for months, but what you said to me is really no different than anything my own father was saying to me during the early part of my career when he had the influence that he did.
Hell, maybe he should’ve been YOUR father based on what you were saying…
I guess in a sense, facing the bitches that I’ve beaten is like facing my own father repeatedly… especially when that bitch is someone as shallow as Courtney. Yet, all I’ve done is win. You want to keep beating the horse of me thanking you, then so be it. You really have never learned that what you say is a reflection of you, not who you are saying it to. What you say is merely an opinion and how you see things, as skewed as it may be. It doesn’t define the other person and it sure as hell doesn’t define me but you literally had the nerve to stand in front of that camera and DEMAND that not only I surrender the championship to you, but that I leave this company for a little bit and then return and start from the bottom?”
I took a pause and I tried so hard to contain my laughter. Unfortunately for Kayla, I just couldn’t. In fact, for a moment there, I was in disbelief that I even heard those words at all and that I was rephrasing them.
“I heard that correctly?”
I scoffed, still being in disbelief of this.
“The BIG BAD herself stoops to THAT level of BULLSHIT? Are you KIDDING ME? Just that by itself, the fact that you even SUGGESTED that I do such a thing, proves to me how pathetic of a person that you really are AND how hypocritical you’ve become. You’ve been going on and on for months about how much of a fighter you are and how much of a champion you want to be and you spew THAT? I’m not even pissed that I heard that. I find it that fucking hilarious that you would stoop that low, that you think THAT low of me but that doesn’t surprise me, Kayla. You always HAVE thought that low of me going back to New Generation Wrestling…
Hey, YOU brought it up first…
The fact that you mentioned that sorry excuse of a company, and I KNOW we both agree on that by the way, tells me WHY I am going to win this match…
Because you’re stuck in the past, Kayla…
‘
You STILL think of me as the same person that I was back then. YES, back in that day, I wasn’t doing so great. I was a joke in this business. I’ve admitted that countless times. That’s not exactly breaking news. You were the world champion of that company for a time, yes and for the roller coaster ride that my career has been, through good times and bad, I’ve ALWAYS been able to adapt, change, evolve and grow better and better with each passing year. You THINK that I am still exactly the same wrestler that I was back then, don’t you?
You THINK I am that same damn “nobody” I was back then. NOW all of your chirping toward me coming into this before I said ‘put up or shut up’ to you makes sense. You never gained any respect for me and it’s pretty fucking obvious that you never will and that’s whatever by the way, so seeing ME with the title makes YOU sick and gets YOU up in your feelings to the point where all you did for months before I called you out and made this match happen was talk a bunch of shit like a little annoying troll, basically BEGGING ME to pay attention to you until I finally gave you the time of day. I wanted to take the high road on this. I wanted to be beyond the past and whatever grudge you have carried toward me for years that you made plainly obvious with your chirping toward me week after week.
I wanted to see if you were either going to REALLY do something to back up your words or do whatever you had to do to earn your way to a match like this…
AND YOU… DID… NEITHER!
Your problems with me are a YOU problem, Kayla…
NGW was six years ago honey, it’s time for you to get over it!”
I rolled my eyes and scoffed, clearly taking humor in the fact that she brought up the past.
“I am a FAR BETTER WRESTLER than I was six years ago, even THROUGH the bumpy ride that I’ve had. I’m not going to mention every single company I’ve been in by name like you did because I don’t need to flex that even if in ONE company I wrestled for, I got that “HOF status” going on and YES, Kayla, I will admit that you’ve probably had less losses than me throughout our careers and that you’ve probably had better stretches of dominance everywhere you’ve been… but even then?
That gives ME the advantage because I have FAR more experience of dealing with adversity and setbacks than YOU do and THAT, Kayla, just MIGHT be one of the factors that pushes me to victory. It’s my ability to OVERCOME, to go through HELL… and you KNOW that in NGW, I went through a LOT of hell as they did EVERYTHING they could to make me a fucking joke in this business… to push through the shit that I’ve been through… that has made me strong enough to persevere as champion even when it looks like I’m about to lose it all…
Ever have a father tell you repeatedly that you weren’t worth your mother giving birth to, Kayla?
Your complete IGNORANCE and your total DESPERATION to paint me as something that I know in my heart I no longer am and have grown far too strong to ever be again shows me how weak inside you really are…
You want to lecture me about whether the words I say will mean anything in the long run? Shove it, Kayla! Because I’m walking into this match KNOWING that YOUR words in the long run toward me about about me WON’T mean SHIT in the long run, even if you do win on Sunday because for all the bullshit you want to preach about how you’re going to take this and that from me, in reality the only two things that you can take away from me are my title and the victory and you want to act like you can control my destiny and that my world is going to crumble over ONE loss and that should you win, everything that I accomplished so far means nothing.
You can take the title from me, Kayla.
But you’re not taking my fucking destiny from me. You’re not going to put me on a downward spiral. Maybe the Julianna of six years ago would’ve downward spiraled over losing a championship, which she did, I admit that. But you don’t define my path other than what can happen in that ring for three fucking seconds. The worst case scenario? I lose on Sunday and I win it back two weeks later… or at Into the Void.. or WHENEVER. I get it, Kayla. Six years ago, I’d treat one loss like the end of the world. But again, that was six years ago. I am not that person anymore. If you want to stay stuck in 2018, then be stuck there. I THOUGHT you were going to come at me BETTER than that for all the shit you were chirping at me for months…
Only for you to go through a ‘what’s what’ of what previous challengers have said about me before…
Calling my win over Courtney an upset? Not much different from the idiot herself calling it a fluke.
Basically insinuating that I won because she didn’t care anymore? Been there. Done that. Next.
Oh, going through the names of the challengers I’ve beaten during my reign? I’m pretty sure Krystal Wolfe did that, or came close to doing so? I mean it’s true that Courtney never had the heart of a champion and her recent walkout proves that, but that’s not MY problem, Kayla. Really, it’s low hanging fruit from you.
Especially coming from someone who’s kicked Ariana’s ass X amount of times and indirectly groups that in with the dominance she loves to boast about all the damn time. But hey, what do I know right?
I expected you to stand out with your words and to say something that made me REALLY think… REALLY question… REALLY challenge me and reflect on my journey and wonder if there was anything that I could’ve done better…
But all I got from you was a whole bunch of NOTHING…
When you take that into account…
When you take into account that you have gone out of your way for months to try to run me down and define me when prior to all of this, I really hadn’t done anything to you nor did I ever mention you in ANY negative way whatsoever DESPITE the history we share from six years ago mind you…
When you take into account that you stooped as low as to suggest I surrender the belt from you and walk away from this company…
When you consider that all you threw at me was low hanging fruit…
What I see in you, Kayla? From my perspective? Someone that is still a damn good, hell perhaps even great wrestler. That opinion from me about you is never going to change. But what I see is someone that has a louder bark than a stronger bite at the end of the day. What I initially saw as someone who wanted this title just as bad as I do… I now see as someone who wants the title to validate her own ego, who doesn’t have the heart for this business as I do, and who lacks the perspective and the knowledge that it takes to be a world champion… compared to me at least.
What I was HOPING would be at least a hard hitting battle between the two most passionate wrestlers on the roster in the first Bombshells Supercard main event in over the year… instead, what you have reduced it to… is this bullshit, mudslinging contest all because what? You want to hang onto the past? Because you dislike me that damn much?
The BIG BAD that should be SO FEARED and that many previous challengers to her Internet title reigns BENT THE KNEE to has really reduced herself to suggesting I forfeit the belt to her? I KNEW you were desperate when you wouldn’t keep my name out of your mouth for months, but that?
It’s a WHOLE new level of PATHETIC coming from someone like you. Don’t tell me that you truly believe you can beat me on Sunday… not when you even THOUGHT of something putridly STUPID like that…
I’ve already handed you this opportunity, Kayla…
And after I’m done with you on Sunday?
You’re not getting any more fucking handouts from me…
With that anger going through me, I shut off the camera at this point. Deep down I know I have every right to break the camera for that ‘surrender to me and leave’ suggestion…
But I also knew that I had to rise above it…
And on Sunday when I beat Kayla and shove her words down her throat?
That’s exactly what I am going to do as I continue to define my destiny… MY way!