06.08.17.001

The following blog post appeared on LAVA's personal Facebook page in the early hours of June 8th, 2017.
It was also cross-posted to the Redemption Wrestling website.

06.08.17.001

Redemption.
It's an idea much bigger than just the name of a place I'm trying to get work.
It's a mission that has its roots deep in the soil of my heart.

First, an explanation.
In 2014, I was 22. A young MMA fighter from Stockholm.
I came to America to try my hand at pro-wrestling.
I came to America to prove myself.
Prove myself against bigger, stronger opponents than I fought as an Atomweight.

I signed to places like IWA-Seattle, ACW Wrestling, and the Epic Wrestling Organization.
Slowly, during those first few months, began to establish myself.
The fans and my peers began to take notice of what I was doing.
I was making a name for myself in a brave, new world.
And then she came along:

Delphi Mars.
The Flame Puppy.

Over the course of the next ten months, she became my everything.
We trained together, sometimes we fought side by side, we fell deeply in love.
Our souls were almost instantly one and everything was perfect.
We got a little place in Arizona. We made a life and a home together.
I was complete.

Later, in 2015, I was ruthlessly attacked in ACE, my hand broken.
At first, things were alright. Delphi took care of me, watched over me.
Eventually, however, it became clear that I needed surgery to mend my hand.
Surgery I chose to have at home in Sweden.

For the first time since we'd met, there was an ocean between us.
A divide that we never were able to recover from.

I did return to Arizona, eventually, but the long recovery, unable to fight,
It had sunk my spirit.

I was not the motivated force I had once been.
I was not the lover I had been.
I was not the fighter I had been.
I was not LAVA.

It broke parts of our relationship that I did not know how to fix.
It broke the story of Lava & Flame Puppy.
Delphi moved on. I moved home.

Back in Stockholm, I rededicated myself to MMA, to my training.
I worked so hard, so hard... so that I didn't have to feel.
There was a hole in me and I filled it with a new dynamic drive.
A need to fight, to inflict pain.
I used this new fire to become better than I'd ever been before.

It wasn't the puzzle piece that was meant to fill that spot in my soul.
But I forced it to fit anyway.

I became a champion again.
I slowly became LAVA again.
I accomplished more than I even thought I wanted to in the world of MMA.

But the thought of returning to pro-wrestling,
the thought of returning to America,
the thought of doing those things without her...
it was too much.

Delphi faded from public life.
I don't know where she is, don't know how to find her.
I don't even know if she'd want me too if I could.

But she once believed in me, and I failed her.
She believed in what I could do in America, and I didn't achieve it.
I owe her and I owe myself.
I owe the memory of what we were.

So now I return.

First, The 2017 All-Women's Invitational.
Hosted by, appropriately enough, Redemption Wrestling.
A tournament of some of the best fighting women on the planet.
A worthy challenge, a worthy goal.
A perfect place to start.

I will also make my way onto Redemptions Main Roster, but not now.
They want me, but their roster is full.
The contracts are pending, there are legalities being worked out.
But it will soon be my touring home.

But my residential base will be New York City.
And to that end, I will also fight in Vortex Wrestling.

Between Redemption & Vortex, and the AFI Tournament,
I will have an abundance of challenges.
I will have the tools of my rebirth, of my own redemption.
I will rewrite my flawed history, and do what I should have done two years ago.

I will rise: LAVA, superior, dominant, victorious.
It all begins today.