Sonya Deville On Why Her Girlfriend Didn’t Want to Do Total Divas, Not Wanting Sexuality to Define Her

– Sonya Deville spoke with CBS Sports for a new interview discussing appearing on Total Divas, using her platform for LGBTQIA causes and more. Highlights are below:

On not wanting her sexuality to define her: “No, no. It’s definitely one piece of Sonya’s puzzle. I don’t want it to define me, and I don’t want it to take away from my career and what I’m capable inside of the ring. At the end of the day, I’m an athlete. I’m a performer, I’m a former mixed martial artist. There’s so many layers to Sonya, but certainly her sexuality has become a part of her layers, because I firmly believe in love and acceptance for all, but that’s not only in the LGBTQ community. That’s gender, that’s race, that’s anti-bullying. And those are all things that I’m super passionate about. So it’s not just love and acceptance because I’m gay. That just happens to be one facet of what I stand for, because it is close and personal to me. But I also, I represent equality for all and in every other way.”

On finding the balance between being a heel on-screen and a champion for LGBTQIA causes: “Sonya, at the end of the day is a fighter, right? She likes to kick ass. She likes to get in there and take names and she sometimes does take unorthodox measures to get there. So if that’s what you consider a bad guy, then yeah, Sonya’s bad. But she also is someone who represents equality, and that’s something that’s very close to my heart and something that, whether I’m a good guy or a bad guy, I’m always going to represent, because the really cool thing about WWE is there’s always a larger message. I work a lot with Girl Up and GLAAD, and I had the opportunity to be in the New York City pride parade this year, WorldPride, on the GLAAD float. There’s so much more to our job than just what you see inside of the ring.”

On being featured on Total Divas: “Yeah, it’s crazy. Nobody kind of warns you for what’s to come when … It’s crazy enough being in the spotlight and sharing your life with the fans on WWE, SmackDown, and Raw, but doing it on Total Divas and getting on that more interpersonal level is super crazy. Then with me and my girlfriend, Ariana, we were only, I don’t know, four or five months into dating when Total Divas came about. So we were still pretty new in our relationship. So originally Ariana didn’t want to do the show. She’s not about the glitz and the glam, and she didn’t date me because I was WWE superstar. It was actually one of the downfalls of her dating me. She didn’t like all the attention and the publicity. So she decided not to do Total Divas. Then a couple of weeks later, we kept talking and she decided that to miss out on our relationship and how much we cared for each other just because of a show would be silly. So she agreed to do it with me, and it ended up being a really fun experience that we got to share together. Now we have memories of the beginning of our relationship kind of documented for eternity. So it was definitely a bumpy road, and it’s been a really kind of fun thing to experience together.”

On whether it’s more important for her to be known as a champion of LGBTQIA causes or as a championship performer: “I think I want to be known as a championship performer. It stands for a good cause and that’s love and acceptance overall. So I think I could do it all. I’ve always had that mindset since I was young. I don’t think any one thing can define me. I think, like we said, there’s layers to Sonya Deville, and those are two of her layers.”