Kaitlyn has opened up about the difficult decision to leave WWE in January 2014, revealing that even close friends AJ Lee and Big E did not know she planned to ask for her release.

Speaking on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, the former Divas Champion recalled arriving in Baltimore after a frustrating travel day. She had already been considering her future, but returning to the city where she said her WWE journey began helped her make up her mind.

“Now, being in Baltimore, the day that I asked for my release, it was like this horrible travel day. I didn’t even get travel that week. Someone knew in Talent Relations, they weren’t going to bring me to TV, and I’m like, oh my God!” Kaitlyn said. “Finally got there, and I obviously wasn’t on the show, wasn’t booked. I looked around and I was like, ‘Oh my God, I debuted here, and it was this full circle moment.’ And kind of gave me this permission, because I had been thinking about it, asking for my release, because I was so unhappy.”

Kaitlyn approached Mark Carano in Talent Relations to explain how she felt. Rather than immediately proceeding with her request, WWE asked her to sleep on the decision.

“So I went to Talent Relations, and Mark Carano was sitting there, and I told him. He’s like, ‘Okay, can you sleep on it?’ I was like, okay. I think SmackDown was in Philly or somewhere, and they were like, sleep on it. I think he had gone to talk to Hunter, and that was the kind of feedback. I did, and I felt horrible and awful the next day. But still, I was standing by my decision, and I didn’t tell anybody. I didn’t even tell AJ, and I was really close with Big E then too.”

Although she remained certain that she needed to leave, Kaitlyn admitted she later regretted keeping the decision from people who mattered to her.

“I didn’t tell anybody because I didn’t want it to be a big deal. I just wanted to leave. I just wanted to be done, and that is one of the things I kind of regretted because I cared about a lot of people there, but I needed to remove myself. I just needed space.”

Her farewell match brought her face to face with AJ Lee on the January 8, 2014 episode of Main Event, taped in Philadelphia. Kaitlyn lost the match before taking a superkick from Tamina, who was aligned with AJ at the time.

Looking back, Kaitlyn remembered the emotions surrounding her departure more clearly than the match itself.

“So they gave me one last match, it was on Main Event, and it was against AJ. I don’t even remember the match, but I was so sick to my stomach all day, and AJ of course was very upset, and she was trying to be supportive and her and Tamina were kind of paired up at that time. So we had the match and then I just took a really brutal super kick to the face from Tamina and that was it,” Kaitlyn said. “I hated it because I felt so sick, and I just wanted to leave, and I was sad.”

Kaitlyn had won the Divas Championship in 2013 before losing the title to AJ at Payback that June. She eventually returned to WWE for the 2018 Mae Young Classic, defeating Kavita Devi in the opening round before being eliminated by Mia Yim.

During a June appearance on TMZ Inside the Ring, Kaitlyn said she had walked away with two years remaining on her WWE contract because she was “folding under the pressure.” While she expressed openness to a return in that interview, she told Van Vliet that another in-ring run is unlikely.