Life After Divorce 'I'm Finding More Moments of JOY

Following the most difficult few months of her life, Nikki Garcia sits down with Us in her first interview post-divorce to talk about heartbreak, healing and staying strong in the darkest of times

- ANDREA SIMPSON & ISLEY ZEGAS

NIKKI GARCIA THOUGHT she'd finally found her happily ever after. In early 2019, shortly after calling off her engagement to fellow WWE super-star John Cena, Garcia reconnected with her Season 25 Dancing With the Stars partner, Artem Chigvintsev, for what would become a whirlwind romance. By November, the two were engaged and soon welcomed their son, Matteo, now 4. “Artem is the first person I’ve been with where I feel like I can be Nicole and never fear he’s going to leave me for it,” Garcia, 41, said at the time, calling Chigvintsev, 42, “the sweetest soul you’ll ever meet.”

They wed in the summer of 2022 and seemed to have a solid marriage, with Garcia often making headlines for her TMI confessions about their chemistry in the bedroom. “He gets very embarrassed,” the Total Divas alum once playfully told Us of her openness. “He hates it!” But last August — just days after their second wedding anniversary — police were called to the pair’s Napa Valley, Calif., home following an alleged altercation between Garcia and Chigvintsev. The Russian professional dancer was arrested and booked on felony domestic violence. (The Napa County District Attorney’s office ultimately declined to file charges.)

In the weeks that followed, Garcia filed for divorce from Chigvintsev, and the two submitted temporary restraining orders against each other. In her filing, Garcia detailed multiple previous physical altercations with Chigvintsev, including the August incident in which she claimed that he’d “tackled me multiple times and pinned me to the ground while our child was present.” The two went on to settle their divorce and agreed to “drop the domestic violence restraining orders against each other in an effort to move on with their lives and effectively coparent their son,” Garcia’s rep told Us in a statement at the time.