Kelly speaks candidly about the nose injury that led to her taking a break from wrestling.
It was revealed by Killer Kelly that she has been under contract to IMPACT Wrestling for the past two years. She has since signed a new deal with the company. She was offered her contract after her two matches for the company in late 2020.
The month prior to her IMPACT debut, she wrestled for Black Label Pro and GCW at Josh Barnett’s Bloodsport 3. Kelly told Pro Wrestling Illustrated that during that period when she was not signed to IMPACT, she ‘had some contact’ with All Elite Wrestling but a visa issue prevented the two parties from further engaging.
When I was in the States, here for the first time during the pandemic, I didn’t even look to wrestle. But Josh Barnett contacted me again. He said, ‘Well since you couldn’t do the Bloodsport because of the pandemic, we’re gonna do it again. Please be a part of it.’ I was like, ‘Of course. F*ck yeah.’ I was so looking forward to it and then I wrestled for Black Label [Pro] and still, I wasn’t looking for anything. I had some contact with AEW, but I didn’t have a visa. So, I couldn’t do anything but then IMPACT contacted me and they said, ‘You can come here for us to see you and whatnot’ and I was like, oh, f*ck, that’s cool. Okay. I’m not doing anything right now so, I’ll go and then I had those two matches and one thing that no one knows, that it’s gonna be exclusive. I got offered the contract right there and then. So it was literally two matches, contract, all in the same day.
In October 2021, Kelly took to social media to share that she would be taking time away from wrestling after noticing an issue with her breathing. She expanded on that in the interview and said her septum was completely broken.
The breaking point for her was when she was folding clothes and noticed that she could not breathe while doing that. She wanted to have surgery, but that specific surgery costs $100,000. She opted to go the route of a Balloon Sinuplasty. The anesthesia that was being used did not work, so she was awake for the procedure. She described it as a ‘half-an-hour of pure pain’ but she can now breath 30 to 40 percent better. A full-on surgery is still needed.
I also had my nose surgery which was a fun thing because I broke my septum. It’s completely broken. I could not breathe at all. That’s why I had those three matches and I said, okay guys, I can’t wrestle anymore because I couldn’t breathe.
Yeah [fall of 2021]. I couldn’t breathe at all. Even folding my clothes. One day, I was folding my clothes and I lost my breath. That was the day that I was like, okay, I need to check this out. Then I found out that my septum was broke, I couldn’t breathe very properly. I also found out that to fix my septum and have a full-on surgery would be $100K-plus and I was like… that is not cool. So I went [another] route. I did a Balloon Sinuplasty which is [some] very weird stuff, where I had local anesthesia, which didn’t work for me. They had to put the anesthesia three times and they couldn’t put more because it would do something harmful. I felt everything. They literally went up my nose with like a thing this size. Put a balloon up my nasal — not ‘nasal’. My septum-whatever. They blew the balloon, they sucked it all out. It was an awful experience. It was half-an-hour of pure pain, pure pain. It was awful. But then, yep, I can breathe 30 percent better, 40 percent better which is great but still, I need a surgery. So yeah, that is it.
As the conversation progressed, Kelly explained how the nose injury occurred. She said it happened at a Pro Wrestling: EVE show in September 2018. It was a four-way with herself, Charlie Morgan, Kay Lee Ray and Jordynne Grace.
Grace gave Kelly a german suplex while Kelly was giving Kay Lee Ray the same move. Ray ended up elbowing Kelly on the nose. The breathing problems first became noticeable in fall of 2021. She had matches against Kylie Rae, Leyla Hirsch and Roxanne Perez where she went on autopilot, could not breathe or think. Kelly circled back around to the story of her folding clothes and not being able to breathe. She said she almost fell over in that moment.
So I had the nose injury, it was — I don’t know. I wanna say four years ago, four, five years ago at [Pro Wrestling] EVE. I remember it was me versus Jordynne [Grace] versus Kay Lee Ray versus Charlie Morgan. It was a four-way match and Jordynne german suplexed me while I was german suplexing Kay Lee Ray and by some weird thing that happened, Kay Lee elbowed me on the nose and I started bleeding during the match, which I was like, okay. It’s just a whatever. I never checked on it, never, ever, ever. But I started slowly but surely noticing that I couldn’t breathe that well and maybe it was a mix of the medication which makes my mouth very dry with not being able to breathe properly and probably wrestling on it and getting worse and worse and worse. I went to the point where I couldn’t breathe. I did — which was my first match back? It was with Kylie Rae at Black Label [Pro] and I remember doing that match and I got to the point where I couldn’t breathe after two minutes in and I had to tell Kylie, ‘Slow down a little bit. I can’t breathe. Let me rest’ and to the point when you can’t breathe, it cuts oxygen to your brain and I couldn’t think. I didn’t even know where I was and it got worse on my match at Beyond [Wrestling] versus Leyla [Hirsch] because it was the heat, the sun, me not being able to breathe… yes [that was the beach show]. Mouth super dry and plus, the anxiety of being the main event and finally, my debut on Beyond and it was everything. Two, three minutes, beginning of the match, I don’t remember anything. It cut my oxygen completely and I don’t know, I went into robot mode and then I had my match with Rok-C, same thing happened, the two, three minutes, I was already dying and then, since I was dying, some freak accident happened and she kneed me on the eye so my eye starts swelling up and I had a big bruise so I couldn’t see from one eye, I couldn’t breathe. I was dying. I don’t how I finished that match. We went like what? 15 minutes? And I did everything that we were supposed to but I don’t know how I went, how I did it and then, after that weekend, I went to the gym, I did some squats, I felt so lightheaded. Everything was spinning around. I was like, mhm, all right, might be an issue. Then I went home, started folding laundry. I got up and I almost fell down. I couldn’t see anything. I was like, okay, I need to fix this. So yeah [Kelly laughed].
On the most recent edition of IMPACT on AXS, Kelly put Tasha Steelz in a sleeper submission. Steelz had just come from checking on Savannah Evans, who Kelly defeated via submission on the 8/18 program.
If the quotes in this article are used, please credit Pro Wrestling Illustrated with an H/T to POST Wrestling for the transcriptions.
