John Cena, Shay Shariatzadeh’s Relationship Timeline: Photos

What he’s been waiting for! John Cena and wife Shay Shariatzadeh kept a low profile as a couple and never formally announced their engagement, which made their October 2020 wedding all the more surprising.

The actor and the engineer were initially linked in March 2019 when they were spotted holding hands after a dinner date in Canada. The relationship marked the first time Cena had been spotted on a date since his engagement to Nikki Bella ended for good in July 2018.

Cena and Shariatzadeh packed on the PDA as he dropped her off at the San Diego Airport in April 2019. The pair subsequently kept their romance alive with dates to a WWE Raw taping in July 2019 and, later that month, at a restaurant in Tampa, Florida, where they were seen kissing.

The duo took a big step into the spotlight in October 2019, making their red carpet debut together at the New York City premiere of his film Playing With Fire. They were even more flirtatious at the Los Angeles premiere of Doolittle in January 2020, locking lips for photographers on the red carpet. The outing came days after Bella announced her engagement to Artem Chigvintsev, with whom she welcomed son Matteo in July 2020.

Cena sparked engagement rumors of his own in February 2020. Shariatzadeh was seen wearing a ring on her left hand during a trip to an amusement park in San Diego. “’A happy marriage is a long conversation that always seems too short’ – Andre Maurois,” he tweeted hours after the speculation surfaced.

Us Weekly confirmed that the twosome secretly tied the knot in Florida in October 2020.

Cena’s friends support the relationship too. “[John and Shay] look incredible together,” Seth Rollins exclusively told Us in January 2020. “I have not seen him this happy in a long time. So that’s really cool.”

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Scroll down to revisit Cena and Shariatzadeh’s path to lasting love, from their first days of dating to rumors of an engagement to officially walking down the aisle: