Xavier Woods has discussed what he learned from his achilles injury that kept him out of in-ring action for a year and how fatherhood has changed his life.
Woods suffered the injury to his achilles during a match against The Revival on WWE Live Event on October 21st, 2019. In his first match back in October 2020, Woods and Kofi Kingston claimed the WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship by beating Cesaro and Shinsuke Nakamura.
Speaking to Chris Van Vliet on his Insight podcast, Xavier Woods discussed what he had learned from his injury and how becoming a father has changed his perspective on life.
Woods explained:
“I guess [I learned] to not stress things I could not control. I am a big perfectionist and a big control freak. Before I tore my achilles, I was at a birthday party with my 3-year-old at a trampoline park. We were doing flips and it was so much fun. We were planning to do it every Saturday. The next week I tore my achilles, I immediately thought I can’t go to that trampoline park. Then it’s I can’t dance in the kitchen with my kids, the third thing was not being able to wrestle. That’s how much having kids has affected me.”
“Before it was I want to wrestle everywhere and I want to have my name in lights and help change the industry. That was my focus and my motivation. I realized that my motivations changed when my kids were born. You feel that when you see them, it’s a crazy experience. But to have a life-changing injury happen to you, everything rushes forward for you. This is what is most important, it’s cool to see that change happen.”
For Woods, the return to wrestling was welcome but he came to realise it was not the primary thing in his life anymore:
“By the time I was jogging again and playing with the kids, it hit me that I would be able to wrestle again. Some months later I got to come back to wrestling and everything felt great. Learning that wrestling is not the be-all and end-all is the biggest takeaway. I filled up my diary with conventions to keep me busy. I had surgery on the Thursday and did a convention on the Saturday.”
Xavier Woods also discussed Vince McMahon’s reaction to his trombone playing antics when Woods unleashed his brass companion Francesca on the world.
Credit: Insight with Chris Van Vliet