Victoria Explains Her WWE Departure: Cites Fan Reactions as a Factor in Her Decision

In a recent interview with Bodyslam.net, former WWE Superstar Lisa Marie Varon, known as Victoria, opened up about her departure from WWE and her interest in potentially taking on a behind-the-scenes role.

Victoria's initial tenure in WWE spanned from 2000 to 2009. She made a notable return as the tenth entrant in the 2021 Women’s Royal Rumble match, marking her first WWE appearance in nearly twelve years.

Highlights from the interview include:

Regarding her WWE exit, Victoria stated, “The reason why I left WWE was, when I would come out to the car, the fans were, like, going ‘Oh, boo! How did you lose that match. You can totally tell!’ and I was like ‘Oh no. They’re not believing the magic.’ and it was getting to me. It was getting. It was hurting my feelings and I don’t have thick skin, whatever you guys think, I don’t. I’m very sensitive, too sensitive for the business, as Tommy Dreamer would say, but, you know, Fit Finlay was the man. He (Finlay) made us girls tough as nails, man, he was the freakin’ Godfather, I mean, the grand-daddy, like he made us freaking tough as nails. I was just, I was going to Fit (Finlay), he was like our dad, and I go ‘Man, am I ever going to wrestle for the championship belt again, or the championship straps or belts,’ right? The title whatever.’

She continued, “It was bothering me, and I went to go have a conversation with Vince (McMahon) and I was like ‘Do you guys see the championship in my future?” and they were like, THAT look. I was, like, ‘Alright, I get it.’ Basically, I was doing the outfit, came back to wrestle, to help bring up the talent, right? Enhancement, I guess you can say. So, didn’t plan on going to TNA, I just was like going ‘Man, I want to leave,’ I ended up going back and talking to Vince, Johnny Ace and Stephanie. I was knocking on the door and Chavo (Guerrero) comes by and he goes, he thought I was pitching a story line, all right, ‘You got this” and I’m like “Don’t talk to me. I’m going to cry. Don’t talk to me.’”

When discussing her conversation with WWE upon leaving, she said, “I went in there and I said “Hey guys, I really appreciate, like, my career. I wanna still love what I do, I don’t wanna be a bitter vet, like talking bad about “They didn’t do this with me”, I don’t, I don’t wanna be like that and I still love what I do“. I didn’t know what I wanted to be, when I grew up, even though I was an adult, and I was, like, I didn’t know if I wanna have kids. I still want to leave being on top, not like “That poor Victoria. Look what happened to her!”, you know what I mean, I still wanted a passion for it. They said “Yes. Is there anything you need?” and I go, “Could I have one last match?” and they agreed, so they had me wrestle Michelle McCool. Yeah, yeah, so I was bawling, all day, and I had a whole speech written down. Nope, didn’t even, nothing. I was so emotional, when I cry I can’t talk, I’m one of those people, you know what I mean?”

About TNA being like a second family, she remarked, “Yeah, wow. My second family was, like, TNA, you know, was at ODB’s wedding, Maid of Honor. Made some amazing friends, you know. Val/SoCal Val, Mickie James, myself, we have our own show in GAW TV, on Youtube. Thank you, thank you COVID for something positive out of it. Yeah, we wanted to do something and it’s our third year doing it and we love it. It’s doing well and we have amazing guests. I wanna say to everybody that wants to be a wrestler – Be kind to everybody. Don’t think you’re over anybody. The reason why, it’s like, when we asked our friends to be on our show, they don’t charge us. They’re like ‘Oh my God! I was waiting for you to ask me, I was kind of insulted you didn’t ask me’ and we’re like ‘Oh my! We don’t wanna bother you.’”

On the possibility of returning to WWE in a non-wrestling capacity, she expressed, “When people say ‘Would you go back and wrestle?,’ that’s probably your next question, I would love to be an agent, a coach. I don’t have anything else to prove in wrestling. I would rather help the younger talent, you know. Character development or work the psychology of a match, that kind of stuff, like, what Molly Holly does or what Gail Kim does, that kind of stuff. I don’t need to be on camera, you know, we have YouTube.com with GAW TV show, okay, slash (/) GAW TV show. That’s our entertainment right there, we’re in pajamas, drinking wine and shooting the s**t just, you know, having fun, having great guests on there sometimes. Just us.”