Nikki Bella clapped back at haters who said her relationship with fiancé Artem Chigvintsev would never last in a promo for the new season of Total Bellas.
“It has been such a whirlwind romance,” the former WWE wrestler, 36, said in the ad for her E! series posted on the Total Bellas Instagram account on Saturday, March 21. “We have just been caught in this tornado of happiness, paparazzi, media — it’s been insane but so worth it.”
The pair met in 2017, when she was paired with the Russian dancer on Dancing With the Stars. Bella was engaged to fellow wrestler John Cena at the time but they called it quits on their six-year relationship in April 2018.
Us Weekly broke the news in January 2019 that the E! star and Chigvintsev, 37, were dating. They got engaged in November 2019.
“I have never in my life had such a passionate connection with someone like this,” Bella said of her fiancé, who stars alongside her and her twin sister, Brie Bella, in the new season of their reality TV show. “Even when we hold hands or we kiss or we dance, it’s constant fireworks 24/7.”
Talking about those who doubted her relationship, Nikki added, “Everyone says, ‘You just have this lust thing. It’s not real, it’s gonna wear off, you’re gonna get sick of him.’ But I can’t wait to prove them wrong. You only hate it because you know it’s the real deal.”
Nikki and Brie announced in January that they are both pregnant and due less than two weeks apart.
The Belle Radici winemaker told Us exclusively in July that Chigvintsev had babies on the brain even before they started dating.
“When we [were] just friends and dancing, he would talk about being a dad and wanting a daughter first,” Nikki said in July. “I remember he used to tell me, ‘You just seem like you would be a mom one day. Like, it’s so weird to think that you weren’t.’ At that point when we were dancing, I was like, ‘No, I’m cool. I’m not going to be a mom. It’s all good.’” (Her then-fiancé, Cena, 42, had told her he was against having children.)
Nikki told Us in July that she’d heard about Chigvintsev’s “baby fever forever,” but at the time wasn’t ready yet to be a mom. “I’ve told him, ‘Look, I don’t know if I need to be on three birth controls, but we are not having kids anywhere in the near future.”
But her feelings quickly changed and in September she asked Chigvintsev during an episode of “The Bellas Podcast” if he wanted to have a baby with her and admitted that she wanted twins — a boy and a girl.
“I want to knock it out all at once,” she said. “I want an epidural right when I get into labor. I don’t want to feel anything. Those are the things I want.”
The new season of Total Bellas premieres on E! Thursday, April 2 at 9 p.m. ET.
