Among the many sacrifices that wrestlers must make is time away from home. Some spend days of the week away from family, or can only be at home for short stretches of time before going on a tour. But for others, like Drew McIntyre and many other WWE talents who grew up outside of the U.S., they sacrifice large amounts of time away from family.
McIntyre recently opened up about moving to America as part of a WWE deal during an interview with PWInsider. He described the time away from home as the “hardest” part of his job and explained how he prioritized family time in his new deal with the promotion, which was just signed a few weeks back.
“This was always the dream since I was a kid, [to] make it to WWE, and honestly, I’d never truly considered, oh yeah, you have to move to America, until I got signed,” McIntyre told PWInsider. “I was talking about this earlier during an interview, and I did all the work, I had the self-belief. I was like, I’m going to be the first ever Scottish person signed directly from Scotland to WWE, and I finally did it. I had the contract in my hand and I went wait, I have to move to America. And taking that into account, and I’m so close with my family, so close with my mother, it was very hard to be away. But they were so encouraging, kept pushing me forward, keep chasing the dream. And when you’re young, you can put yourself in that mode of just work, work, work. And when I was a kid, work, work, work, party, party, party. And you don’t think too much, but years can slip by real quickly, and I’d get home maybe once a year during that period.”
Now more than one-and-a-half decades removed from when he first signed a deal with WWE, McIntyre talked about a shift in priorities. He has focused more on family in recent years while still chasing his goals as a wrestler.
“I’ve grown up a lot more, I started thinking a lot more about back home and seeing people not with us anymore, like my mom, and my dad getting older, and my brother having my nephews, two kids, and seeing how big they get, I realize, I want to be working on my dream, I don’t want to give that up. But at the same time I want to be home more, I want to try to find that balance cause that’s where I’m at in my life now and thankfully, thanks to Nick Khan and Triple H and WWE, we got there, where I feel comfortable with my family and my wife and I feel comfortable, I’m gonna be able to give to the company and give to my family at the same time.”
McIntyre also discussed Clash at the Castle, dream opponents, and what he was thinking when heading into negotiations for a new WWE deal. You can read more details here.
