Rhea Ripley: WWE women have overcome a lot of obstacles

Rhea Ripley discussed some of the obstacles that have been put in the way of female athletes in WWE during a recent interview with Jazzy’s World.

Ripley, who has been out of action with a broken orbital bone since late last month, said that for a long time, women’s matches were considered a “toilet break” and that they’ve had to struggle to be taken seriously.

Ripley said:

“The women in WWE, we’ve come a very, very long way. We’ve overcome a lot of obstacles that were put in the way, and it’s been growing each and every year. I think that was the biggest obstacle, just getting people to sort of take us seriously. For the longest time, people joked about us being the toilet break, which is just plain disrespectful, especially when the women go out there, and we leave everything that we have out in the ring, and we go just as hard as the men do so don’t treat us with that disrespect. So, we’re making people realize that we can go just as hard as the men, if not harder.”

Ripley also mentioned during the interview that, given the constraints of their profession, it is difficult for many female WWE performers to start a family.

Ripley continued:

“A lot of us, we get motherhood taken away for a long time. I’m still young, yes, but I work for WWE; it’s very demanding. I probably can’t have kids for the next 5 to 10 years because I don’t want to have to bring them on the road and put them through that. I’m not good at that, but then you look at someone like Becky Lynch, who did go and have a kid and did come back and is still the badass, the man, she is herself and she’s a great mother while she does that. She brings Roux on the road every now and then and she’s absolutely killing it. But yeah, we get a lot taken away from us or pushed back, and I don’t think people really realize that.”

There is no timetable for Ripley’s return to WWE. The injury occurred just weeks after it was reported that she and WWE had agreed on a new long-term deal. Ripley also missed three months earlier this year with a shoulder injury and was forced to vacate the Women’s World Championship as a result.

Ripley’s full appearance on Jazzys World is below: