Don't be afraid. Don't be ashamed. Don't ever apologize for your sexuality. Just be you.
Sonya Deville
Equality for all is what we should all want, between race, religion, gender, sexuality... it doesn't matter.
With any minority group, it takes a strong presence in the public eye to make a change because everything nowadays is social media.
When I was 14 years old, I said, 'Mom, I want to fight MMA.'
Spreading the positivity is just as important as telling the difficult stories.
Sonya is the way she is for a reason and I love enlightening the fans on what those things are because so many people are going through similar experiences and have amazing stories I love to hear and relate to myself.
From a very early age, I realized why I was put on this planet: to fight.
Being a lifelong athlete, I am a firm believer that I am who I am today because of sports. Not only did it give me structure and a solid foundation, but it gave me a sense of failure and how to overcome failure.
I realized - and I think I learned this at a young age - that anything that's worth anything, you're going to take a risk to get there and it's not going to be easy.
Everyone has contributed to the Women's Evolution in their own way, and I hope that my message can just be it's okay to not look like the rest, it's okay to not fit in, it's okay to be yourself and be different.
I live for the pressure, I live for the moments when I'm deep in the match, out of breath, hurt and feel like throwing up. It's in those moments that I push through, I keep punching, I keep going forward, because no matter what, I will never stop.
I love being able to share my story to help others relate or cope with their own stuff they have going on at home.
As much as we don't like to admit it sometimes, we are the influencers.
I have a theory that confidence comes from self-worth.
I was in my junior year of high school and I had been playing soccer and basketball almost my entire life, and I wanted a change of pace. I wanted to do something more, something different. That's when I found an MMA gym about 45 minutes from my house and fell in love with the idea of becoming a professional fighter.
I look up to and have learned a lot from the women before me. With that said, there has never been a woman in this ring with the experience that I have in fighting.
Everything is social media nowadays, everything is sports and entertainment.
I think no matter what your job title or role in life is, it's important to just take pride in what you do and do it well.
I do feel pressure, but I put it on myself because I want to represent the LGBTQ community in a place where they've never really been represented that much, being the WWE and professional wrestling in general.
I love every minute of being inside that squared circle.
To force something that was not organic to who I am was tough on me, and so I can relate to all those girls and guys out there going through the same thing.
We're all equal and we should treat each other as such.
Being a part of the LGBTQ community myself, it's another passion of mine to let my fan base know that I represent another demographic in the WWE.
My first time being inside the Performance Center was for the WWE Tough Enough tryouts, and although I knew hardly anything about sports-entertainment, I knew I wanted to be a part of this place.
I've had tattoos since I was like 16, but if you would have asked the younger me to get a tattoo that symbolized my sexuality, I would have told you no, because that's how not okay I used to be with it.
I grew up riding quads, shooting guns and playing sports.
I really want to utilize my MMA knowledge in my WWE performance.
I think I was more just not comfortable with saying it. I was also in denial. I was like, 'I'm not gay, am I?' Cause I think, also the fact that I didn't fit the stereotypical mold of what a lesbian is supposed to be or act, I was just this girl that nobody would have expected.
I just, I was in such denial within myself for the longest time, just because of the place I grew up in. Like, it wasn't common. I didn't know anybody that was gay. I think I had one gay friend in high school and she never even, like, came out. It was just, like, we all just knew.
I've always been athletic my entire life and loved sports.
You can be happy with work, you can be happy in other facets of life, but if you're not happy in your personal life, and you're not loving open and honestly, it sucks.
Acting has been a passion of mine since I was young, I took acting classes through most of high school and years following while training MMA.
I didn't want it to feel like I was shoving my sexuality down people's throats.
A good friend of mine, Maria Menounos, she's kind of like a mentor to me. She dabbled in WWE and pro wrestling, and she said 'This is the perfect opportunity for you.' Once I started doing my research about the competition and the company, I fell in love with WWE even more.
My friend's mom said to me, 'honey, I think you're gay.' And I go, 'yeah, I am.' As soon as someone vocalized it to me, gave me permission. I was like, 'yes, yes, yeah!'
I just think I'm very honest and I say how I feel. Some people like that about me. Some people hate that about me.
I'm a very passionate person. I'm Italian, it's in my blood so when I care about something, I get emotional.
Let's just say my phone blew up when I came out on global television. The only people that knew were my immediate family members and my closest friends, maybe like three of them. So you can imagine how many texts and emails and Facebook messages that I got after coming out, most of which were very supportive from the LGBT community.
I think WWE superstars and Divas are here to change lives. That's why they do what they do. They want to make an impact on the world.
I started training at a local gym in New Jersey, and the day of my high school graduation, I packed up everything in my car and moved to Coconut Creek, Florida, where I trained with one of the best gyms in the world, American Top Team.
I had so much fun in the 'Tough Enough' barracks.
My MMA background, I think, only enhances my experience on 'Tough Enough' or in the WWE in general.
I'm an athlete. I'm a performer. Why the hell did I never think of combining the two?
I am an entertainer and I am an athlete, and WWE is the biggest performance-based show in the world.
It's insane how many fans I have from the LGBTQ+ community. I would say the majority of my fanbase are young, gay women.
It's not a good feeling to hide a huge part of your life. If you were meant to be somebody else, you'd be somebody else, so don't change who you are.
I love Daniel Bryan. He's such a sweetheart.
I feel like the story me and Ronda can tell one day will be so awesome, and I think we have something special here. I think that it's going to be an honor and a privilege to work in the ring with her. That's the biggest compliment, is that Ronda Rousey - she's done a lot in her life. She's accomplished a lot.
My goal in talking about my sexuality publicly is just so that a scared little girl or little boy can see me do it and think, 'wow, if she did it, then maybe it's OK that I do it.' It's to encourage people to be themselves.
You can call WWE whatever you want, but at the end of the day, it's a fight and fighting is my specialty.
