It’s one of the early motherhood moments that stands out to the WWE star who, alongside her sister, has spent so much of her life hustling and juggling a million different tasks and taking on new (exciting, but demanding) challenges. And it’s just one of the ways her priorities and passions have so totally shifted since welcoming her baby boy and finding her groove as a mom.
“I realized that living more simple is definitely self-care for me,” Nikki says. “I live that hustling lifestyle and I love it. But I realized that all this stress I was carrying was just making me unhealthy in so many different ways.”
Embracing those shifts in priorities and making peace with the people they’ve grown into has been a theme for both sisters this past year — and indeed it’s been a year for the Bella twins, as they hit several life and career milestones in the wake of the global pandemic that so thoroughly disrupted everyone’s lives. That’s also why SheKnows caught up with the WWE stars at the tail end of 2020 to look back at their year and all the ways their pandemic pregnancies, births, and postpartum experiences (plus some time with life coaches and therapists) helped them reframe and reevaluate how they take care of themselves and their families.
Brie & Nikki Bella’s
Newfound Self-Care Superpower
By Katherine Speller
Photos By Nicole Marino Photography
t’s a situation that’s familiar to so many moms trying to work and parent during the global pandemic: You’re in a meeting, you’re on a video call (you’re always on a video call), and your kid needs you.
For Nikki Bella, who gave birth to her first son Matteo in late July (just a day before her twin Brie welcomed her own second child, Buddy), it was one of these moments — getting off a video call while her little one was crying in his crib — that it all really clicked for her. “He’s first,” she tells SheKnows. “And if people around me don't like that, are those people I want to be surrounded by?”
“Twenty-twenty really made me listen to me,” Brie tells SheKnows. “It's the first time that I've just had a lot of stillness in my life.” A self-described workaholic, Brie also admits to being a people-pleaser, “so I’m stressing out about making all my business partners happy, stressing about doing everything perfect for the reality show, stressing about being a hands-on mom... Like, all these things you could imagine constantly running through my head,” she says. “And 2020 taught me just to be still — and by being still you really listen to what’s inside you. I just realized, like, ‘Brie, you are more European than you know! You need your slow mornings and you need more family time than business time.’ It just kind of taught me that going hard all the time isn't healthy.”
So what does self-care look like for the slowing-down-just-slightly twins in 2021? Naturally, as athletes and new moms, it’s a mix of giving love to their bodies and their minds — prioritizing physical and mental well-being.
“Self-care to me is definitely mental and physical,” Nikki says. “I feel like mentally, when I'm taken care of, my outsides just look amazing.” Meditation helps with that, as does the life coach she works with. “I just feel like we give our cars oil changes so they never break down,” she continues, “so why not do that to our souls and our minds so we don't have these meltdowns or get into certain places that we don't want to be in?”
Brie Bella
Self-care is about what makes
you feel like the best you.
Adds Brie: “Sometimes I feel like people are like, 'I have to work out hardcore five days a week to be healthy.' But that's not necessarily true for me. Self-care is about what makes you feel like the best you.” For Brie, right now, power walking is doing the trick. “Being outside and pushing my baby and smelling the trees and the fresh air? I feel like I'm not only burning calories, but my mental health is also getting good exercise.”
That you-do-you attitude toward self-care extends to eating, as well. “When it comes to eating, I feel like every single person at one point in their life has had a really healthy week and knows what it feels like to feel like the best them,” Brie says. “And it's kind of to remind yourself of that whatever way it works for you, whether it's being healthy in the kitchen or doing it in the gym, I feel like that's self-care, just feeling the best to you — or talking to a therapist.”
Brie Bella
‘No’ is always hard for me to use. But once I started to get used to that — and realized people aren't as offended as I thought and that they totally understand— it made it become easier.
Take Me Back to the Self-Care Issue
As the WWE moms welcomed new babies in 2020,
they embraced a shift in priorities and discovered
the strength to say no.
SHOP NOW
SHOP NOW
SHOP NOW
Brie & Nikki Bella's
Self-Care Essentials
SHOP NOW
“For so long, so many people have been used to Nikki and I just going non-stop. No seasons. We don't take any breaks. So when you all of a sudden want more time for yourself, you feel like you're letting people down,” Brie says. “What we ended up realizing is we were letting ourselves down for so long — because we were putting all of our energy into so many other things that it's almost like we're trying to balance all this weight and we just didn't care about ourselves.”
Because Nikki was welcoming baby number one and going through such a huge life change, she thinks she had an easier time doing that kind of restructuring: “I was more fortunate because I had an excuse, becoming a new mom and figuring out that life,” she explains. “So people were very understanding when I was simplifying everything and not always being a part of the hustle — it was like my hustle kind of changed in a way that I knew I wanted to be the best mom ever.”
Getting comfortable with “no” was a bigger challenge for Brie. “‘No’ is always hard for me to use,” she admits. “But once I started to get used to that — and realized people aren't as offended as I thought and that they totally understand— it made it become easier.”
That’s not to say it isn’t still a work in progress: “I'm still working on stuff and there's still some stuff I want to release out of my life, just so I'm still not overwhelmed and so crazy busy,” she explains. “But it’s about getting used to using 'no' — and starting to put yourself first.”
First Things First
Inside Out
And sometimes, they both agree, self-care looks like saying ‘no’ to things that aren’t going to serve you or are just going to overwhelm you — even when it goes against all your people-pleasing, hustle-loving instincts.
A New Normal
$75
Tata Harper
Tata's Daily Essentials Kit
$16.49
doTERRA - On Guard Protecting Throat Drops
$16.99
N+B Volumizing Spray
$26.67
doTERRA - Introductory Kit
I
Take Me Back to the Self-Care Issue
Brie & Nikki Bella's
Self-Care Essentials
$26.67
doTERRA - Introductory Kit
SHOP NOW
$16.99
N+B Volumizing Spray
SHOP NOW
$16.49
doTERRA - On Guard Protecting Throat Drops
SHOP NOW
$75
Tata Harper
Tata's Daily Essentials Kit
SHOP NOW