John Cena Says Love 'Just Found Me' When He Met Wife Shay Shariatzadeh

John Cena shared the story of how he met his wife while watching the 2019 Super Bowl in Canada with a friend

John Cena is recalling how he "shouldn't have been there" when he first met Shay Shariatzadeh.

During an appearance on SiriusXM's The Howard Stern Show Wednesday, the Argylle actor, 46, shared that he met Shariatzadeh — his wife of nearly four years — at a Vancouver bar in British Columbia, Canada, while watching the New England Patriots play in Super Bowl LIII on Feb. 3, 2019.

"I wasn't looking, but damn, man, it just found me," Cena, a Massachusetts native, said of how he found love after begrudgingly venturing out from his Vancouver apartment after a friend invited him to watch the championship game at a bar.

"So we watched the game, and then the table sitting right across from us — this group of five people walked in," he said. "Man, I stopped watching the game. I didn't even know it was over."

Cena said that he noticed Shariatzadeh, 35, while she was there with her friends and did not drum up the courage to talk to her until one of her friends asked to take a photograph with the actor and WWE star.

"I was such a dick, I was so bad. Here I am — hell this was half a decade [ago] — I'm 40 and I'm too scared to approach this girl," he recalled, when Stern asked how Cena introduced himself.

Related: Who Is John Cena's Wife? All About Shay Shariatzadeh

"So I got a picture with her, and then she brought by my wife-to-be over, we have our first fan photo, which we hang proudly where we hang our hats. It's awesome," Cena told Stern.

"I asked her for her number and she gave me her number, and I didn't wait like the two days [to reach out]," he continued. "I left the restaurant and on my walk home I [texted], 'It was so nice to meet you, you're beautiful, I'd like to get to know you more if you have any free time coming up I'll make time for you.' She's like, 'You want to go out this weekend?' I said, 'Sure.' "

Cena was first spotted spending time with Shariatzadeh in March 2019. Their relationship began roughly one year after Cena and his ex-fiancée, Nikki Bella, called off their wedding just weeks before they were scheduled to tie the knot in 2018.

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

While speaking with Stern about Shariatzadeh, Cena told the talk show host that he decided to propose after just one year of dating.

"And I would have done it in three months," he said of when he knew he wanted to marry her. "It might have been a little weird, yes. I don't want to speak for her, but she didn't say no when I asked."

Related: John Cena Strikes Out in Hilarious Baseball Debut for the Savannah Bananas: 'Unforgettable Experience!'

The couple got engaged some time after Cena finished filming his 2021 movie The Suicide Squad.

He recalled during his Howard Stern Show appearance that he had to ask permission to leave the movie's set in Panama early in order to pull off his planned proposal, only to wind up popping the question while he and Shariatzadeh were at home together just before Valentine's Day 2020.

"It was beautiful and I had the ring in my pocket because I was afraid I'd lose it in my bag, by chance, and I [decided to] ask her right now," he recalled of the moment he proposed. "So I blew all the special plans and just said 'Hey, there's no better moment,' because there wasn't — it was so beautiful, still, we were both so open and it just happened right there."

For more People news, make sure to sign up for our newsletter!

Read the original article on People.