Getty Nikki Bella and Artem Chigvintsev attend FOX's Teen Choice Awards 2019
Nikki Bella, known worldwide as one half of the professional wrestling duo The Bella Twins, is a reality TV star alongside her sister Brie on Total Bellas. She also competed on season 25 of Dancing With the Stars where she was paired with Artem Chigvintsev — who just so happens to now be her fiance and father to her son Matteo.
So, did sparks fly during Dancing With the Stars and that’s why Bella’s engagement to wrestler John Cena ended? Bella recently opened up about whether she started having feelings for Chigvintsev during their time dancing together.
Here’s what she had to say.
Bella Said She Had ‘None Of Those Feelings’ For Chigvintsev
On an episode of “The Bellas Podcast,” Nikki Bella confessed that she did not have any feelings for Chigvintsev while they were competing together.
“There was none of those feelings at all,” said Bella, adding, “That’s the crazy thing being with him now.”
But she did admit that being on Dancing With the Stars was the first time she was really vulnerable with a man.
“I think being an athlete — like I was used to Wrestlemanias, we’d wrestle in front of 100,000 people and then millions of viewers worldwide and when I did dancing I think it was the first time I was ever vulnerable, even with a man, because I was such a strong, independent woman. That’s where the bond started,” she said of her bond with Chigvintsev, adding, “You definitely get an emotional bond with them because it is so scary and you’re so out of your comfort zone, dancing live on TV, being judged for it, in front of the world to see. I’ve never been that nervous before ever.”
Bella also said that she wishes she could do Dancing With the Stars again because she was so busy being nervous and thinking about her choreography that she “couldn’t take in the moment of the dance being beautiful.”
“I wish I could have taken in those moments,” she said.
Bella Said It Was Actually Really Uncomfortable For Her to Be So Intimate
In addition to not developing feelings for her partner, Bella said that actually, it was really awkward for her to be so physically intimate with someone who was not her fiance. One move, in particular, made her really uncomfortable.
“I remember the one thing that was awkward for me … in some of your dance moves when their leg had to be in between your leg. Or when the faces were close. I remember it was the first time a man’s leg other than my fiance was in between mine. I was like ‘Whoa!’ It was weird,” said Bella.
At the time Bella was on Dancing With the Stars, which was in 2017, she and Cena had been together for almost six years. They became engaged in April of that year but called off the engagement a year later, less than a month before they were supposed to be married.
Then in January 2019, Bella began seeing Chigvintsev and they got engaged a year later. They welcomed baby Matteo in July 2020 and recently revealed they have set a wedding date — Thanksgiving weekend of 2021.
Total Bellas wrapped its sixth season at the end of January and has not yet been renewed for a seventh season on E!. Dancing With the Stars will hopefully return with season 30 in 2021. ABC has not yet officially announced a renewal and premiere date.
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