While she portrayed a mentally unbalanced character on camera for WWE, AJ Lee said recently that no one in the company realized that she also was battling bipolar disorder in real life.
Appearing on The Dean Obeidallah Show to promote her new book, "Crazy Is My Superpower: How I Triumphed by Breaking Bones, Breaking Hearts, and Breaking the Rules", the former WWE Divas Champion shared that she was already struggling with bipolar when approached with the gimmick she described as the "Crazy Chick."
"I really felt like hiding in plain sight and letting all my aggression out," she said during the interview. "My craziest, darkest moments, my brattiest moments, in front of millions of people on live television, I got to let that all out and expose all of that while still keeping my secret."
She went on to describe portraying the character for WWE as an outlet for her own thoughts and feelings due to bipolar disorder.
"If I didn't have a healthy outlet for, I would just be at home breaking walls and doors," she noted. "So to be able to let that out and say, these are the things that I'd be ashamed of being or I'm afraid to be. These are the things I try not to be, or I'm so scared of becoming one day, and to just say 'Screw it,' let me be the worst version of myself on TV and make it fun. And people loved it. They were able to connect to that because they feel those flaws inside of them."
AJ's husband is CM Punk, the former WWE champion and headliner turned UFC fighter.
