Most of Sasha Banks' wrestling fans know the basics about her, including the fact that
rapper Snoop Dogg is her first cousin.
After making a name for herself on the independent circuit, she eventually transformed into a
World Wrestling Entertainment superstar.
But there's much more to her story than that, and it hasn't always been pretty.
Here are some things you may not know about Sasha Banks' tragic story.
Deadbeat dad
During a candid interview on the Making Their Way to the Ring podcast, Banks claimed that
throughout her childhood she feared her father, who she claims was abusive towards her mother.
By the time she turned 2, he had allegedly left their family in the dust to start a new
life in Oregon.
Banks, her mother, and her autistic brother traveled across the United States in search
of a better life.
By the time she was 11 or 12 years old, her mom broke the news that they would be relocating
from Iowa to Oregon to be closer to her father and try to get some support from him.
"I'm like 'Help us?
He's never helped us before, why are we going there now?'"
She explained that her father, who happens to be Snoop Dogg's uncle, owned a restaurant
and a record label, yet he still never helped support his daughter.
"So he has money.
But he's never helped, he's never paid one thing of child support, anything."
Banks claimed she was, quote, "miserable [and] depressed" during that time, and it apparently
didn't take long for her mom to realize that old habits die hard.
"Finally my mom's like, 'He's not helping us,' so we packed our stuff, we left."
Life-altering decision
The family of three left Oregon and proceeded to bounce around in search of a school suitable
for her autistic brother.
Banks told the Making Their Way to the Ring podcast that her brother had experienced abuse
in some of his previous educational settings, and once they arrived in Minnesota, things
didn't get much better.
Her mother was unemployed.
They lived in a hotel room for years, and Banks said she was relentlessly teased at
school about her appearance.
When her mom finally landed a job, Banks made a bold decision at the age of 13 to quit school
and take online courses so she could become her brother's full-time caregiver, a decision
that forced her to grow up incredibly fast.
"I don't know what a childhood is.
I never had my teenage years.
I never went to prom.
I never really had a boyfriend.
I knew nothing."
Because she was willing to make such a huge sacrifice, Banks did ask her mom for one thing
in return.
"I told my mom, 'I'll do anything for this family, just give me wrestling.
Just give me wrestling.'"
Hiding her marriage
Banks is very open when it comes to talking about the struggles she faced during her childhood,
but one topic that she hasn't always been forthcoming about is her marriage to former
wrestler and WWE costume designer Kid Mikaze.
It wasn't until her March 2017 interview with Making Their Way to the Ring that she finally
let the cat out of the bag.
"You're the first one I've admitted it to.
I am married.
I just hide it because our fans are so crazy sometimes."
She's referring to those so-called "fans" online, otherwise known as trolls, who try
to contact and harass her man on Twitter.
"If you're saying he's ugly or he shouldn't be with me because of this or that.
That hurts me."
Working for pizza
Banks wasn't always making the big bucks for her show-stopping performances in the ring.
There was once a time when she was forced to take whatever scraps she was offered.
During an interview with First We Feast's Hot Ones, Banks answered a series of questions
about her life and career, and she had a thing or two to say about, in her words, "scummy
promoters," who made her early wrestling days difficult.
When asked what she doesn't miss the most about the independent wrestling circuit, she
said:
"I don't miss getting paid $25 or getting paid by just getting a slice of pizza.
It was legit.
Either you get pizza or a hot dog, or you get $25."
Those days are now in her rear-view mirror.
As of 2018, this boss was no longer trading pizza for suplexes, reportedly raking in a
salary of $225,000 a year, according to Sportskeeda.
Being 'annoying'
The WWE's Women's Tag Team Championship was established in December 2018, and Sasha Banks
and Bayley, better known as the Boss 'n' Hug Connection, became the inaugural champions
by winning an Elimination Chamber match in January 2019.
But this title might not have happened if it weren't Banks.
She told Sky Sports that Vince McMahon had to be convinced that bringing women's tag-team
titles to the WWE was a good idea.
So she and Bayley went to work.
She explained,
"It felt like the whole of last year we were asking, like we would be knocking on the door
of Vince's office every week."
She went on to say that McMahon would frequently flip-flop on his answer and change his mind
from one week to the next.
In the end, he gave the title the green-light, of course.
And the whole ordeal taught Banks a valuable lesson.
She said,
"If you're annoying enough you can make things happen and that's probably what happened,
he just got annoyed with us."
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