Sonya Deville

Equality for all is what we should all want, between race, religion, gender, sexuality... it doesn't matter.

I'm the first-ever openly gay female in the WWE.

I want the women's division to have that legitimacy, I want it to have that intensity and the aggressiveness, and I feel like that's where I personally can contribute.

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.

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.

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.

I am an entertainer and I am an athlete, and WWE is the biggest performance-based show in the world.

Sonya Deville was originally supposed to be NJ Deville to help me keep my MMA nickname of 'The Jersey Devil' after debating back and forth we agreed on Sonya Deville.

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 don't want it to be Sonya Deville, the gay wrestler. I want it to be Sonya Deville, the awesome performer who happens to be gay.

I was afraid of Sonya being defined by her sexuality because that's not fair to her. I don't want Sonya to be defined by who she loves.

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.