Maria Kanellis Says AEW Extended Her Contract So She Could Recover From Surgery To Remove Tumor

Maria Kanellis says that AEW extended her contract in late 2024 so she could recover from surgery to remove a tumor.

In January of 2025, Maria would exit AEW after a run with the promotion that had her working as a manager for The Kingdom and others during her time with the company. In late 2024, Maria would undergo surgery to have a tumor removed.

While speaking to Wrestling Life Online in a new interview, Maria Kanellis would reveal that AEW extended her contract so she could recover from surgery on the tumor without concern for employment.

“So I had the tumor removed and that was in October and they extended my contract out for three months when I was still in the hospital. So I get a call while I’m in the hospital, they wanna extend the contract, thank you for the blessing of having three months of recovery to kind of get back on my feet after that. Luckily Mike still had a contract at the time and so, I had three months to recover after my surgery and I was still under contract. So, yeah, it was just really hard. It was really hard, and because of the type of tumor I had, it’s pheochromocytoma and it’s a one in a million tumor. They don’t usually find it until you’re dead. So it changes your personality. It affects your heart. It makes your blood pressure do this (gestures downwards). So you’re just angry all the time. So I think a lot of me lost my fight for really fighting backstage for what I wanted, really kind of going after what I wanted. I gained weight through it because it also, it affects your hormones. So it was just- it was a really dark time.”

Elsewhere in another recent interview, Maria spoke about not getting to accomplish everything she wanted to in AEW. You can read more about that here.

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