Janel Grant told a Connecticut audience that the nondisclosure agreement at the center of her case against Vince McMahon and WWE “nearly took my life,” in remarks delivered weeks after a fall at home left her hospitalized with a concussion, broken ribs and a lung hemorrhage.
Grant accepted the 2026 Advocacy in Action Award from the Connecticut Alliance to End Sexual Violence on September 11, giving a speech built around the theme of power. She has since posted a two-part account of the morning on her Instagram, including video of the remarks.
“The power of an NDA nearly took my life,” Grant said from the podium.
In the written half of the post, Grant said it was “a miracle that I gave remarks at all.” She described still healing from “this humdinger of a concussion” and revealed how rarely she has left home. “This was the 7th time I’ve been outside this year,” she wrote.
She added that she was “overwhelmed by the realization that I almost died.”
How Grant Ended Up In The Hospital
Grant wrote that she heard audible gasps when she said “floating cabinets” and walked the room through the injuries she is still recovering from. The phrase traces back to her August Instagram post detailing the accident.
In that post, Grant said she tripped on the edge of a carpet runner around the end of July or start of August and fell into “a wooden bed frame/wall unit with floating cabinets,” then blacked out. She has no memory of the days that followed. Her next memory was being driven to the hospital, where she learned the extent of her injuries.
She credited people who “sensed I needed help” with getting her there, while writing that “everything from my bones to my bank account is still broken.”
The NDA That Moved Her Case Out Of Court
Grant sued McMahon, WWE and former executive John Laurinaitis in January 2024, accusing McMahon of sexual assault and sex trafficking. McMahon resigned as TKO executive chairman after the suit was filed and has denied the allegations.
The agreement Grant condemned from the podium is the same document that took her case out of public view. McMahon’s side pushed for arbitration based on a clause in the 2022 NDA, while Grant’s team argued she signed it under duress. In July, the parties agreed to arbitrate, and the federal lawsuit was dismissed with prejudice, with both sides’ claims and defenses moving behind closed doors.
Grant’s line about the NDA wasn’t a figure of speech. At a Capitol news briefing in February, she said she was alive “by a series of miracles” and described a suicide attempt in the aftermath of the June 2022 Wall Street Journal report that exposed the agreement. She has since pushed Connecticut lawmakers to limit NDAs that silence survivors of workplace sexual assault.
If you or someone you know is struggling, call or text the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.
