Kriti Mehrotra
The world of wrestling is pure entertainment for many individuals across the globe, no matter the ages. However, in the past few years, the fact that every aspect of it is entirely scripted has come to the limelight thanks to productions such as Netflix’s ‘Wrestlers’ and Netflix’s ‘WWE: Unreal.’ Instead of it adversely affecting the industry, though, it has only attracted more people to it, owing to how well the characters are portrayed by the real people, making us wonder more about them. Amongst them is, of course, none other than The American Nightmare, Cody Rhodes, who is actually a family man through and through.
Cody and Brandi Rhodes Met Through Wrestling
It was in March 2011 when former figure skater, broadcast journalist, and model Brandi Alexis Reed signed a development deal with WWE following a tryout, just for it to turn her whole world upside down. She was assigned to work at Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW), which soon led her to the world of NXT wrestling, where Dusty “The American Dream” Rhodes held various positions. The latter was actually training her when he spoke about her to his son Cody “The American Nightmare” Rhodes, with neither of them knowing he was talking about his future wife. Dusty wanted to run a promo for Brandi based solely on her striking green eyes, and soon she and Cody met, too.
Brandi was still in her rookie year when she and Cody began dating, and although she was a bit hesitant about dating a co-worker at first, they both knew they had something special. “I feel that we ended up spending every day together after that; every day that we could,” she once said. According to reports, their first date was at a Waffle House, their second was at Cracker Barrel, and their third was at the Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios. It was during the latter that she realized he really cared and that she was hooked too because he took notice of her interests and made her feel special. After all, although she is a horror fanatic, no one had cared enough to take her or agreed to go with her here before. The duo spent the entire weekend together, and it was the start of something new.
From the moment Brandi and Cody realized they had something really special, they knew what they wanted their future to look like, resulting in them getting engaged in November 2012, a little over a year after they first started dating. Less than a year later, on September 12, 2013, the couple tied the knot in a beautiful ceremony at the Swan House and Atlanta History Center, after which they settled in Georgia for good. From there, she went on to do wonders as a wrestler turned ring announcer, making history as the first Black woman ring announcer at WrestleMania in 2015, while her husband continued making strides. They both left WWE in 2016, but he returned in 2022 after they welcomed an adorable daughter into their lives, Liberty Iris Rhodes, on June 18, 2021.
Cody and Brandi Rhodes Are Still Happily Married
While it’s true that Cody and Brandi have been through their fair share of ups and downs, they are still happily head over heels in love and dedicated to one another as well as their little family. In fact, while he credits her for his return to the WWE after 6 years, she credits him for her healing from postpartum depression, meaning they really have stood by their vows of being together through thick and thin. Neither of them has ever really gone into the details about how exactly they helped the other, but they have said it involved a lot of compassion, selflessness, respect, and mutual understanding. In other words, it involved love, and that is fortunately in their life in abundance, which is all that really matters in the long run.
However, former WWE Champion Cody once said that his wife deserves the Championship almost more than he does because she has unwaveringly supported his work and grind. Brandi once stated, “The second he said (he wanted to go back to WWE), I was like, ‘I don’t know why we haven’t had this conversation earlier.’ … How can you realize your dream when you’re not at the place that your dream is at? So, yeah, you should talk to (WWE). If this is what you want to do, you should do it 100 percent.” She has also really been open about her postpartum depression in the hopes that other struggling parents would feel less alone.
Coming to Cody and Brandi’s current standing, while he is thriving in the world of wrestling as a babyface, she is still working in the fitness industry. While she is no longer associated with wrestling despite her and Cody having played significant roles in the creation and early years of All Elite Wrestling (AEW), she is now an entrepreneur. She runs her own yoga studio by the name of Naked Mind, all the while also raising their young daughter. Moreover, they have made visiting the Halloween Horror Nights a yearly tradition, they spend as much time together as possible, and they even attend all possible social events together, making it clear they are stronger than ever today.
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