Nikki Garcia wants to get back into the ring — she’s just got to figure out how and when.
The Total Bella star, 41, broke the news while talking about Mildred Burke, the legendary female wrestler who inspired the film Queen of the Ring, on the Thursday, March 13 episode of The Nikki and Brie Show on SiriusXM.
Garcia shared her admiration for Burke and talked about how her story mirrored her own drive to return to WWE.
“I know at one point, I will be going back to WWE to do something, right?” Garcia told her twin sister and cohost, Brie Garcia. “I don’t know when, I don’t know the story, but it’s going to happen.”
The pro wrestling sisters made a name for themselves in the WWE and on their reality TV show before they retired from the organization in 2023.
Brie Garcia and Nikki Garcia at the Los Angeles premiere of ‘Queen of the Ring’ on March 6.
Michael Tullberg/Getty
On the podcast, Nikki said her motivation to return was similar to the feeling she had after she broke her neck during the height of her wrestling career in 2015.
“It made me feel like what I did when I broke my neck,” said Nikki. “I had moments of like, “No, this isn’t going to be career ending, I’m going to come back.”
Nikki said she was moved by Burke’s resilience in Queen of the Ring. (The film, starring Emily Bett Rickards, portrays the obstacles the single mother battled in order to become the first million-dollar female athlete.) Nikki said she admires that Burke was able to accomplish so much, as she battled ageism, raising a child on her own and pushed through the mental challenges of the sport.
“It’s mind over matter,” Nikki told Brie on the podcast. “Maybe you don’t look like who the world champion is, or maybe you’re not the age of this new person that everyone’s looking at, but that doesn’t mean what you can do and conquer and achieve is over.”
Nikki added that with mental willpower, “you can conquer anything.”
The TV personality has had her own challenges as a mom.
She filed for divorce in September 2024, shortly after her husband Artem Chigvintsev was arrested on suspicion of domestic violence at their Napa Valley home. The district attorney later declined to press charges, citing a lack of evidence.
The exes, who share a 4-year-old son named Matteo, reached a settlement agreement in private mediation in November 2024.
In February, Brie Said that the shift has been difficult for her sister.
“It’s been hard because I’m a fixer, so I want to fix it for her,” she explained. “I want to do it and I’m very vocal, so I want to do it loudly and express myself. So I have to always be tame, which is hard. It’s hard because you hate seeing someone you love go through something hard.”
