Paige Reveals How She Almost Missed Out On Competing For The Inaugural NXT Women’s Title

After seeing WWE Hall of Famer Edge, Christian and Daniel Bryan beat the odds and make their triumphant comebacks toward becoming in-ring competitors again after being told it may never happen, the former in-ring veteran Paige hopes she'll meet the same fate as her colleagues one day. This week on Oral Sessions with Renee Paquette, Paige took a look back on all her career highlights she made before announcing her in-ring retirement just three years ago. Surprisingly, she reveals how she was so close to not becoming the inaugural NXT Women's Champion – a moment that solidified her career in WWE.

"First of all, I want to talk about – just for one second – the day that I won the NXT Women's Championship for the first time," Paige began. "I was actually cleared that day to wrestle. I nearly missed it. I had a damn cyst on my ovaries, and I had to have surgery to remove it. Hunter actually cleared me that day. Could you imagine if I hadn't been cleared? I was so thankful that the doctor said I was cleared to go.

"It feels really good to see, especially Edge come back because we both have very similar injuries. Him and Beth Phoenix have reached out to me – which I would love if I did come back to face Beth Phoenix because she would make me look like a million dollars, and she would protect me. I got chills seeing Daniel Bryan and Edge talking to each other backstage. I was like, damn, that's so inspiring. It makes me feel good."

As of now, Paige stated that she is not having any sort of neck issues since undergoing numerous surgeries; however, she thinks she still has a long way to go before possibly returning to the ring.

"I haven't had any issues with my neck right now. Sometimes I'll wake up, and it's funny, you know, it feels weird, but it'll go away," she reported. "I'm going to get my neck checked very soon to see the progress of it. Hopefully, it looks good. I'm not saying in any way, shape, or form they're going to let me come back; it's literally just a checkup. But I am intrigued to see how my neck has progressed, for sure.

"Honestly, it actually scares me as well to come back to wrestling because I want to come back tomorrow, but I'm always going to have it be in the back of my head like what if something happens and I do get paralyzed; it scares me. I do know I won't be ready mentally. But when I am mentally ready to come back, watch out world. Everyone's in trouble!"

Paquette followed up by asking Paige if she still identifies as a pro-wrestler despite not being a full-time WWE Superstar at the moment.

"I still do," she replied. "It feels weird to say that I don't wrestle anymore to this day. I still call myself a wrestler, even though I'm not. I was born into wrestling, so I'm always going to be part of it. It can't go away. Once you become a wrestler, that's it; you just sold your soul to the devil, man."

With a new memoir in the works and a successful makeup/clothing line, Paige is still not done building her empire outside of WWE. She lists off some other projects she has in mind before concluding her interview.

"I don't like giving up on something so easily. I feel like the first time I had my neck surgery and like all of that bad s–t was happening, that was the first time I ever hit rock bottom, and I gave up. I was like that's not me, whatsoever," she revealed. "When I was wrestling in the UK, I would travel by myself all over Europe to America. I was like, I'm going to get to WWE whether I f–king die before or not. Like I will get to WWE. I've always had that mindset. With the projects that I've been working on now, I'm like, this is 1,000 percent going to happen. I didn't get signed right away. I changed a few things and came back again. I've always had that mindset of ok, let's switch it up and try and figure out different avenues to get to where we want to go.

"I want to have a reality show kind of like The Osbournes because you don't get a lot of alternative reality shows anymore; they're just all of these women bickering at each other or something like that. I want to have a reality show to be, you know... Ronnie and I being in the center of it, but to show a woman that has the drive to do certain things and then having no filter whatsoever. I still want to do acting and hosting, anything that involves being in front of the camera because I feel like I can flourish by doing that. And working behind the scenes, too, would feel good as well."

You can listen to Paige's full interview here. If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit Oral Sessions w/Renée Paquette with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.