NXT Superstar Bianca Belair was this week’s guest on Chasing Glory with Lilian Garcia. Belair opened up about her struggles with bulimia and depression, as well as her time in NXT and relationship with Montez Ford. Highlights appear below.
(Transcription Credit: Michael McClead, WrestleZone)
On Her Struggles With Eating Disorders:
In high school, I struggled with weight a lot. Running track….I was always considered one of the bigger girls and they always used to tell me, ‘You would run faster, if you lose weight.’ I think I weighed like 150 lbs in 8th grade. I was about the same height I am now, probably 5’6”. They wanted me to be in the 130s for a sprinter. In high school I was probably around 155. I wanted to run fast and get a scholarship. It was drilled in me to lose weight and then I’d run faster, so I went on a diet. I did lose weight, but I got to a plateau and couldn’t lose anymore weight, so I started throwing my food up. I became bulimic and I lost weight. I actually ran faster, which is crazy, but I ended up getting hurt because I wasn’t getting the right nutrients. I wasn’t keeping the vitamins down. I ended up getting hurt, but I already got my scholarship to South Carolina.
I went to South Carolina my freshman year and I decided that I don’t want to do this anymore, ‘I’m not gonna do this anymore. I’m starting over. I’m starting fresh. I got what I wanted. The goal was to get a scholarship and I got it, so let’s not do this anymore.’ I didn’t [seek help] and it didn’t end. In my mind I was telling myself I’m not going to do this anymore, but I ended up having this obsession with food where I was now binge eating at night….and gaining weight. I had the coaches telling me, ‘What happened to the Bianca in high school? We need the same Bianca from high school.’ Instead of seeking help and finding out a healthy way to get back there, I went back to throwing my food up again. Now, I’m binge eating and throwing it up. Of course, I’m not going to perform well doing that. Mentally, I wasn’t there. I got depressed and I ended up being prescribed medication and things just didn’t work out there….I was blaming everyone else, ‘It’s the coaches fault. It’s the program’s fault. I’m not running fast because of this.’ Really, I wasn’t running fast because of the things I was doing to myself and I wasn’t being honest with myself and so I wasn’t even able to seek help because I wasn’t being honest with myself.
On Depression, Taking Pills, & Ending Up In The Emergency Room:
All of a sudden I felt like I was losing a grip on everything and I couldn’t catch up. I didn’t know why. I started getting emotional and starting isolating myself, and I was having these emotions that I didn’t understand, and I started trying to tell my parents and my friends. They didn’t understand because they didn’t know I was on medication and quit cold turkey. It got to a point where I can’t even explain it, I was just out of it. You can’t quit your medication cold turkey because you go into a relapse even worse than what you were before. I felt like I wasn’t being heard. I tried telling people I needed help. I felt like no one was listening and I ended up taking – I’ve never really talked about this – a bunch of pills and my roommate took me to the emergency room. It wasn’t super life threatening bad, but the fact that I did take that action they sent me to a mental overnight hospital to try to get myself together. I ended up spending a week there getting therapy and afterwards I had to make the decision to go home or try to finish out the semester. I tried to finish the semester and ended up not doing well and that’s when I made the decision to go back home. That’s when I was forced to, ‘Hey you really need to get help,’ and I was forced to go back to my support system. The last thing I wanted to do was go back home because I felt like a failure….that was the last thing that I wanted to do, but I knew that in order to get better….I needed to home and be with my family and get myself together. I stopped running track for a year, got myself together, took accountability for my own actions, got therapy, got counseling. [Belair became a walk on at University of Tennessee and graduated from that school]
Read More: Bianca Belair On Montez Ford’s Influence On ‘The Braid’, Possibly Being Called Up Without Him
On The Severity Of Her Depression:
I remember I started isolating myself. I stopped going to church. I stopped believing in God. People would say, ‘Just be happy.’ That’s easier said than done. I couldn’t understand why I was feeling the way that I was feeling. I think I was frustrated. I even started doing weird things where if I wasn’t isolating myself, I would be in a group of friends where I wouldn’t even talk. I wouldn’t say anything. I would just be like, ‘If I wasn’t here, it wouldn’t even matter because they don’t even realize that I’m not joining in the conversation.’ It’s something I can’t even explain….I honestly don’t believe I wanted to end my life, I don’t. I think it was more a cry for help and attention. I was trying to tell people, ‘Listen to me. Listen to me,’ and no one was. I think it was more of a, ‘Now you see that it’s an issue. Now you see that it’s a problem,’ and I think it was a cry for help. I don’t think I was at the point where I really wanted to end my life.
Belair On Shifting Rib Syndrome:
I was training to go to the Games and I was training two or three times a day. I over trained. My rib in the back slips out and that’s what shifting rib syndrome is. The rib in the back came out and the same rib that wraps around to the front, popped in my sternum, so all the muscles in-between my ribs, the intercostal muscles, the rib popped away from it. I developed slipping rib syndrome and I had intercostal costochondritis. It was [painful]. I had to stop doing cross fit and I got really upset about that. I’m like, ‘Gosh, I finally found something that I’m good at and now I have to stop.’ Doors were opening for me. I was getting sponsorships. I was projected to make it to the Games that year. American Ninja Warrior had contacted me to audition. All these doors were opening and then this happened. It was probably one of the most painful things I dealt with. I couldn’t bend down to tie my shoe. I couldn’t lift up to do my hair. I couldn’t pick up my nieces to play with them. It was really tough to deal with. I went from working out three times a day to doing absolutely nothing walking around with my hand on my chest the whole time trying to keep my rib in….it doesn’t show up on XRays. It doesn’t show up on MRIs. There’s no surgery. It heals on its own eventually and it’s something you just have to learn to deal with and maintain.
Readers may listen to Lilian Garcia’s interview with Bianca Belair in its entirety below:
READ MORE: Bianca Belair Speaks On Her Ring Name, Her Hair, & Learning In The NXT Performance Center
