13 Things We Learned From Dark Side Of The Ring: Daffney
11. She Had Undiagnosed Bi-Polar In WWE
Here's something Shannon didn't know when she was striving to make waves in WWE.
Spruill was having trouble sleeping once WCW shut down. At one stage, she was only kipping for one hour per night, and that went on for around three months. Eek! Not good. One of her best friends, ex-independent wrestler Lexie Fyfe, appeared as a talking head on 'Dark Side' and said that Shannon started taking anti-depressants that "sent her into a spiral" around this time.
She developed a stutter, then eventually reached out to her father Quentin saying: "Something's wrong - I don't know what's happening". Later, Spruill was diagnosed as bi-polar, but she didn't have a clue that was going on when she was trying to get on with things in the developmental system. She was undiagnosed and on zero medication during that nine month spell under contract to WWE's roster.
Shannon's brother Darren told VICE that his sister didn't want to be on medicine after that, so she wouldn't take the prescription drugs given to her regularly. Naturally, that caused some problems too, but Spruill hated the vicious side effects she was getting from the meds.
Shannon: “I hate that people in my life were just powerless watching this person struggle with this thing”. They all did so because they loved her though. It was non-negotiable for Quentin, Darren and others to make sure Spruill was as OK as she could be whilst the family figured out their next move.
'Dark Side' didn't outright say this, but there's a chance things could've been different for Shannon in the WWF/WWE had she been diagnosed and been able to manage things.