Brooke Hogan recalled her father, the late Hulk Hogan, walking her down the aisle in a wrestling storyline. The now mom of two, was thankful that she has that cherished moment with her father since he did not walk her down the aisle for her own wedding to former NHL player Steven Oleksy.
The "Brooke Knows Best" star shared the clip from TNA Wrestling in 2013 on Instagram Friday (Aug. 8), and in the caption mentioned how much that moment has a new meaning.
"Something hit me today... it may have been for a storyline... it may have been fake. But I remember this moment like it was yesterday.... I actually teared up when I saw my daddy emerge in suit to walk me down the aisle - into a wrestling wring of all things. I actually got nervous and emotional, as if it were real... then he whispered to me 'chill out, it's a work,'" she wrote.
"But for some reason, I still felt proud. Even Dixie Carter said something about it struck an emotional chord. So although I didn't get to achieve this experience in real life unfortunately, I can try to fuse two happy memories into one - and make a happy ending of my own to hold on to..." she continued.
"I can officially say. 'My dad did walk me down the aisle one time...," she concluded.
Brooke married Oleksy in 2022, and the wrestling icon didn't walk her down the aisle nor did he attend the ceremony. He reportedly told Brooke's husband that he “doesn’t do weddings or funerals anymore." Brooke also didn't attend his wedding to his third wife, Sky Daily, in 2023.
Brooke Hogan makes an emotional Hulk Hogan tribute
Brooke and Hulk have had an estranged relationship over the years, but the eldest and only daughter of the wrestling icon paid tribute to her father on social media.
"We had a connection deeper than words, one that spanned lifetimes," she wrote in part on her Instagram page. "I am so grateful I knew the real version of him. Not just the one the world viewed through a carefully curated lens. We shared a quiet, sacred bond, one that could be seen and felt by anyone who witnessed us together. When he left this earth, it felt like part of my spirit left with him. I felt it before the news even reached us."
Brooke clarified that there wasn't one defining moment that led to their estrangement.
"We never had a ‘big fight,'" she wrote." "My father and I never ‘fought.’ It was a series of private phone calls no one will ever hear, know, or understand."
She said that she had to "protect her heart" over the last two years after previously stating that her last phone call with him was in 2023.
"I know in my heart I did everything I could," Brooke wrote. "He knew I would run through a burning building for him. And in many ways, along the path of life, I did. He knows how deeply, how hard and how purely I loved him. I am at peace knowing this."
MORE LIFESTYLE NEWS
Venus Williams explains why she would consider cosmetic surgery
Natalia Bryant resembles late Kobe Bryant in new photos
Caitlin Clark blasts Sophie Cunningham's bikini thirst trap
Colin Kaepernick gets personal life update
Why Draya Michele and Jalen Green were turning heads at courtside date night