Post by Andrea Hernandez on Jan 18, 2024 0:07:38 GMT -5
Easter Sunday 2020 was the greatest night of my wrestling career…
Or it should’ve been…
For many wrestlers, the night they won their first world championship would be such.
Winning the Sin City Wrestling Bombshells World Championship, at that point, was my proudest achievement. I remember feeling nothing but pride and joy, nothing but optimism. I came out of that moment feeling like the prime of my career had started and that this was truly a new beginning of amazing things in a wrestling company that I thought was going to be home for the rest of my career or at least, the good majority of it.
Then the hatred kicked up…
Don’t get me wrong, that locker room already hated me prior to that title win. Even as the fans were behind me, they weren’t. But I’m not wasting this space elaborating on that. Fast forward to June 7, 2020 in just my second title defense and my first on a supercard and that title was gone… taken from a vapid, empty, piece of Poop excuse for a human being that would’ve never had the guts to venture outside of that company. I have nothing bad to say about them as a wrestler.
But as a person? They were among the worst people I’ve ever met in this business. If anyone epitomized the hatred I was receiving, it was that bitch.
That loss ate at me for so many years as all the haters danced on the grave my first title reign was just buried under.
Not even two weeks later, my father died of a heart attack. He was the glue that held it all together for me and had finally came around and I felt like I was finally bonding with him. The joy that I remember when he didn’t shoot me down for losing the title was something I remember… but what I remember more was how it all just died when he did.
For years, I suffered from that entire experience. I allowed myself to be a victim of that person. My mental health broke. I left SCW because of it all.
Someone tell me how I was able to go 2021 undefeated and win 18 matches in a row while I was suffering from all this.
Seriously… how did I do that? Fuding HOW?
It stayed with me for a while. It took me some time to recover from all of that and find my feet again, which I wouldn’t do until I signed with Thunder Pro. Ending the year as Prestige Champion was great beyond words.
Ending the year with the wounds finally healed, the phoenix resurrecting at last, and experiencing pure joy again… indescribable…
December 28, 2023
The second night of the annual Festivus in Florida IV event had come and gone and backstage at FAU Stadium in Boca Raton, the cameras were off, but I sat on a crate with my newly won Festivus World Championship, the 3rd world title of my career, and I was soaking it all in. It was the happiest I had ever felt in a LONG time! In fact, I would say it felt three times better, at least, than winning ‘the big one’ in Sin City.
“Congratulations…” I heard the voice of Clarissa Vega say. Clarissa was my former manager, one of my best friends, a wrestler in her own right, and perhaps the closest thing I had to a big sister. She had stuck with me for this unreal roller coaster. “...this has been a long time coming for you!”
“Thank you…” I said, smiling. Just this smile alone was enough to cause Clarissa to just trap me in an embrace.
“I’m so happy beyond words to see you this happy again…” she said. “It was really hard seeing you suffer the way you did when you were at…”
“Clarissa, I don’t mean to interrupt you or to be rude but…” I paused, glancing at the world title I just won. “...I want you to do me a big favor and never mention Sin City Wrestling again. They were a stop along the way… one where I learned many lessons that built to this night, but I’m never going back. I don’t need to. Whatever pain I still had in my heart from that experience is gone after tonight.”
“I respect that, Andrea…” Clarissa responded. “I’m glad you’re saying that. You know, I’ve waited to hear you say that for a long time. Still, I knew from your rookie year when you and Chelsea LeClair were tag team champions in GCW, that you were a special breed and you were capable of something like this….”
Clarissa was cut off by a happy scream and an “oh my god, Andrea…” from another familiar face in my life…
“Savannah…” I said, surprised to see my younger half-sister coming toward me. She nearly jumped on me as she gave me her own hug.
“You did it! You did it! You did it!” she said in a tone that truly highlighted her childlike naivety that you would expect out of a 21 year old that was training to be a wrestler in her own right. “You have no idea how much this inspires me!”
My heart was feeling warm at this point. I haven’t known Savannah too long. After all, I met her within a year after my father’s passing and from the moment I met her, I wanted to find a way to be that inspiration for her. But with the way things were for so long, I struggled with that, until recently.
“I’m glad I can finally provide that for you…” I said to Savannah. “From the day that I’ve met you, I’ve always wanted to look out for you and do whatever I could to make you proud of me. You know the story of our brothers… Roddy in particular…”
Not even the mention of the older brother that abused the hell out of me in that closet when I was 14 was bringing down the mood.
“How I never wanted to be like him when it came to you… how I wanted to be more like Eddie when it came to being the older sibling and just wanted to support you and make sure you were happy. I really hope you have a day where you get to experience what this is like for me. Keep training hard, okay?”
“You know I will…” Savannah says with a nod.
“I don’t know how this night can get any better…” I said to both Clarissa and Savannah.
“I don’t know either…” I heard a familiar male voice say. I turned around and my eyes lit up with joy.
“EDDIE! OH MY GOD!” I said, obviously thrilled to see him so unexpectedly. Roddy may have been the abusive big brother that never wanted me to be a wrestler at all, but Eddie was the opposite: completely supportive, always there for me, always having faith in me, always protecting me… and so many childhood memories of what was just described came flooding back. Not only did we hug each other just now, but he unexpectedly became a shoulder to cry tears of joy on.
“Congratulations, baby sis…” he said to me as he held me quite tight. “...Dad would be so proud of you…”
“I know he would…” I said as the tears of joy streamed down my face.
“He set you up for success…”
“You did too…” I said, surprising him as we let each other go.
“I’m not the one that trained you.”
“No, but I owe so much to you. It was you that sacrificed the wrestling dream for me.”
“I went to bat for you, yes. I only did wrestling myself to try it out of respect for the family tradition, but we both know it wasn’t something I wanted to do. I knew YOU wanted this the whole time and I convinced Dad to give you a chance after I told him I didn’t want to do it anymore.”
“Still, if you never did that, then I never accomplish this. Thank you so much for supporting me all the way and for being the rock in my life ever since Dad passed.”
“I’ll always be around whenever you need me, you’ve always known that. I’m never going to leave my baby sis behind.”
I playfully rolled my eyes through my own tears.
“I’m not a baby anymore, Eddie…”
“To Mom, you always will be considering you’re her youngest and all.”
“Suuuure….” I said with a laugh, before his two daughters ran up to me and greeted me with hugs, congratulations and the playful mini-speech about how I was their hero. This caused me to shed some tears of joy a little more, especially since my mother wasn’t far behind my nieces. This moment truly felt perfect for me: the healing was complete, the phoenix was resurrected, I was a world champion again, I was happier than ever and finally, I had put the pieces back together after my heart was torn out of me on that horrible June day in 2020.
But even with all the happiness, I had 2024 to look ahead to: a world title to defend, and my continued rise in Thunder Pro.
“There’s only one thing I have left to do…” I told everyone in the building with me, with my father quickly springing to mind…
The next night…
My father’s grave was a familiar place for me by this point…
I had to come back here now, with everything being so great and such a joy.
I was remembering all of the things that he taught me along the way and how recently, I was finally able to put it all together. As I had tweeted in the moment, nothing but pure joy.
“I can move on at last…” I told my father. “...my thanks for everything you’ve done for me will be eternal. But now? I’m more confident in myself than I’ve ever been and I feel like I’m ready to push on and meet any challenges ahead on my own without relying on you for guidance. I know I cash push forward without wishing that you were still here or asking what you would do in certain situations. I can live and move ahead without running back to you as a crutch when things aren’t going so well. After the way this year has ended for me, I know that you’ll always be in my heart, but it’s time to move forward and do this on my own. I can’t thank you enough… seriously…
I know in my heart that this is what you would’ve wanted for me: to be able to stand on my own two feet and be confident enough to fight for what I believe in. We’ll see each other again and I’ll still come see you…
But as far as my career goes, Dad? I’m turning the page.
And this really is the ‘goodbye’ that I never got to give you.”
I didn’t cry, or break otherwise after I said those words. I finally felt like I had closure over his death. However, I noticed that there was a folded note sitting next to the flowers I had placed on his grave when I walked in that had my name on it. I felt strange seeing this, but being as curious as I was, I picked it up and unfolded the note revealing a simple message.
“I hope we can talk soon. It’s something our father would’ve wanted.
Roddy”
My first instinct was to rip up the note in disgust considering I wanted nothing to do with him after years of having the awful relationship that we’ve had for so long. But this wasn’t the place to do that. Instead, I walked away with the note in hand. As much as I hated to admit it, I could only delay the inevitable for so long and some point, I’ve got to face him.
Still, I knew that facing him for the past was just one of the obstacles I was going to have to face in the new year.
And despite it all, not even a reminder of his existence will be enough to drag me down… not after I’ve grown into a more confident wrestler and an even more confident person in general in recent months…
