A step in the right direction! Nikki Bella and Artem Chigvintsev plan to set aside more time as a couple after he wraps season 29 of Dancing With the Stars.
“I would be lying to say, ‘Oh, it’s great.’ It has definitely been a struggle for us,” the Total Bellas star, 36, exclusively told Us Weekly on Wednesday, November 11, of being away from the professional dancer, 38. “It’s hard. We have so many ups and downs. It’s been so difficult on our relationship because I need so much from him, but he’s, like, torn between his job that requires so much from him and then us at home.”
Bella, who battled postpartum depression after welcoming the couple’s son, Matteo, in July, shared that her twin sister, Brie Bella, has had to step in to keep Chigvintsev in the loop.
“She had to come to Artem and be like, ‘Nicole isn’t doing well, and she’s hiding a lot from you,’” Nikki told Us, calling her 3-month-old son the “light” at the end of the tunnel.
Nikki acknowledged that she initially tried keeping her emotions a secret, but once her fiancé became aware of her struggles, he made sure to step up as much as he could while working on DWTS.
“I just told him, like, ‘I need more attention from you,’ and that is something we’ve worked on, and that’s gotten better,” she told Us. “Artem and I have great communication, but it’s been lacking, but that’s something that we’ve been so strong about in our relationship [in the past].”
The former WWE wrestler revealed that she and Chigvintsev have since made a pact to begin couples therapy following the finale of his ABC show.
“It’s with our life coach,” she said. “After Dancing, we’re going to start classes as a couple because we’ve realized that we both feel like we’re not listening to each other. … We finally both just said, like, ‘We need to bring someone in to help us so we don’t get [back] into that place.’”
Nikki, who was previously engaged to fellow wrestling pro John Cena, started dating Chigvintsev in December 2018. They got engaged in November 2019 but waited until January to share the news.
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The Incomparable coauthor exclusively told Us on Wednesday that she and the choreographer are on different pages when it comes to having more children. She wants “to be one and done,” while he hopes to one day have a daughter.
Total Bellas season 6 premieres on E! Thursday, November 12, at 9 p.m. ET.
With reporting by Christina Garibaldi