Nikki Bella is opening up about her whirlwind romance with Artem Chigvintsev.
In a recent interview with TooFab, the former WWE star, 36, gushed about her fiancé and baby daddy to be, getting candid about how they “fell in love so fast.”
As Artem, 37, joins the cast of “Total Bellas” this season, Nikki said she’s “excited” for people to go deep inside their relationship, witness “the ups and downs,” and how they work as a couple despite their very different upbringings.
Nikki and Artem, who were paired on Season 25 of “DWTS” back in 2017, had only been dating for a little over a year before they announced their engagement — and a few weeks later Nikki and her sister Brie Bella revealed they were both pregnant.
“Artem had been part of ‘Dancing with the Stars’ for so long and they have incredible fan base, incredible viewers, but they really only get to know the pro dancers so much cause it’s always about the celebrity they’re dancing with,” Nikki told TooFab. “So I think it’s gonna be really exciting for people this season to really get to know Artem, to really see how different we are. I mean he was raised in Russia like in a small town. Like we couldn’t have been raised more different, look at life more different but then yet are so compatible.”
“I feel like what Artem and I have gone through this past year are what a lot of couples would go through over like three or four years,” she continued. “Just even from job loss and the stress and anxiety that brings into any relationship and just so much, so many things but also crazy, heavy, romantic and passionate.”
According to the former WWE star, the cameras were rolling “a lot” as their romance grew and teased that we’ll see it all go down on-screen.
“In most situations, like your first year together, it’s just like incredible when it’s mainly dating and Artem and I, we just fell in love so fast,” she said. “And then when we got engaged for me I was like, ‘Yay.’ And then you come home and kind of come off the ramp. I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, you think this was really quick? I don’t know. [I was] kind of freaking out.”
“And then I found out I was pregnant and it’s just — it was a lot,” she recalled. “You’ll see that this season and you’ll see the ups and downs.”
When asked what she’s learned about herself from her relationship with Artem, Nikki said, “For me it’s definitely, it’s compromise. I feel like, you know, I’ve kind of realized over time that I do have high standards.”
The E! star said always having Brie around has been both a “pro and a con” when it comes to her relationships.
“I realized things that when [a boyfriend] starts to not make me happy, I maybe don’t fight as hard as I should, but I realize that I’m okay. Like I don’t always need to have a man around. And I’ve kind of realized that about myself,” she explained, adding that she has a “high standard of expectation” from having a high-work ethnic. “But at the same time I like to be spontaneous and romantic and I love love and I want to be adventurous.
“And so I’ve really learned like that I need a compromise more,” Nikki continued. “I have to sacrifice who I am and like I want to live, but I have to understand who people are and not try to change them. And Artem has really shown me that. And I think him being Russian and just like opening up my eyes to –we’re just raised really differently and we look at life really differently and accepting that has had me look back at all my past relationships [and] accepting someone for who they are.”
“I think I live on this constant wild love roller coaster ride,” she concluded, joking, “Hopefully, maybe one day like, you know, my love just goes straight… like a train ride.”
Season 5 of “Total Bellas” premieres Thursday at 9 p.m. ET on E!
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