WWE's Carmella Says She's 'Very Grateful' to Be Pregnant After Multiple Miscarriages (Exclusive)
The pro wrestler, whose real name is Leah Van Dale, is currently pregnant with her first baby with her husband
Leah Van Dale/ Instagram
WWE's Carmella is opening up about her road to pregnancy.
Speaking to PEOPLE exclusively, the WWE professional wrestler, whose real name is Leah Van Dale, reflected on her journey to pregnancy and how she's been feeling as she gets closer to her due date.
"It's been a journey," she tells PEOPLE. "I had two miscarriages last year. I had a chemical pregnancy, which is basically sort of a miscarriage very early on, and then I had a ectopic pregnancy in October, so those were kind of back to back."
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"So it was a struggle for sure. But with how we treated the ectopic pregnancy, I was forced to wait to try again so it afforded me the opportunity to just focus back on work and not stress too much about trying to get pregnant."
"And it's so cliché, but everyone says it'll happen when you're not trying or when you don't try so hard and I was like, 'Yeah okay, whatever,' but that's what happened with us," Van Dale adds.
Though the path was bumpier than expected, Van Dale says she's "very grateful" that she got pregnant quickly after deciding to try again. "Getting that positive pregnancy test this third time around, I was cautiously optimistic."
"I was trying not to get too excited until I knew for sure everything was where it needed to be and baby and I were healthy, so I'm very grateful for that," she says.
Van Dale married husband Matt Polinsky, who goes by Corey Graves in the ring, in 2022. She told her husband the exciting news on his birthday. "I told him it was a birthday present that had gotten delayed, and when he opened it, it was literally the last thing he was expecting. [It] was just a little box with a onesie that said, 'Hello Daddy,' and with a positive pregnancy test in there," shares Van Dale.
"And he was completely in shock," she says. "He had no idea."
The athlete is stepmom to Graves' three kids — daughters Lola and Lenny and son Cash — who Van Dale says are "so excited" to be older siblings. "They're constantly asking about the baby, 'How big is the baby this week?' They're always comparing it to a fruit or whatever item it is that the baby is the size of, and they're just counting down the days with me."
"I feel like they're just such good kids, and I thought I'd always wanted to be a mom, but then the older I got, I wasn't sure if it was for me," she tells PEOPLE. "And then having them around really...solidified the decision for me that I want to be a mom, I want to have a kid, and now I'm going to have four!"
As for how she's feeling, the pro wrestler says that the first trimester was the hardest part. "You hear about morning sickness, you hear you get tired and things like that, but I had no idea how debilitating it would be until it was happening to me," she says.
Now that she's out of the first trimester, Van Dale reveals she's been feeling much better. "I kind of understand why people don't talk about it because you kind of forget," she jokes. "I feel so much more myself, I have energy, I feel amazing. I've never felt this good in my life."
Van Dale, who is expecting a baby boy, says she plans to come back to the ring after welcoming her son. "I for sure plan to come back. I think it's important to show you can have a baby and still have a career, especially a very physical one at that, but I'm not going to rush."
"I really just want to take my time recovering and making sure that I feel great and ready to go back and not sort of rushing because I don't even know what to expect as far as how I'm going to feel after having a baby," she tells PEOPLE.
Since her baby boy will have wrestling in his blood on both sides — Van Dale's husband Graves is also a professional wrestler — it's not out of the question that he might one day join the WWE world. "Maybe he'll be a third generation, which would be so cool," she says, "but I would never push anything on him, whatever it is that he wants to do."
"But if he's anything like what he's like right now in the womb, I mean, he's insane. He is a maniac. He does not stop moving," she teases.
"So if that's any indication of how rambunctious he's going to be once he's Earthside, then we're in it, for sure."
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