Swimming

I started swimming competitively when I was 5 years old. I quit when I was 20. That’s a decade and a half of laughs, team sleepovers, pasta dinners, hotel hot tubs at away meets, tough practices, losing races, getting yelled at, being alone for hours in your head, tears, heartbreak, injuries, panic attacks, and suicide attempts. Yeah, you read that last part right. I’d like to start by thanking HBO for producing The Weight of Gold and addressing the stigma of mental illness –  it has given me the courage to speak up about something that until recently I had a very hard time explaining.

2% of female athletes get the opportunity to play NCAA Division I sports – I was lucky to be one of those women and even luckier that it paid for my education. What they don’t tell you is that in a way you’re becoming an adult a littler earlier than your peers. Your sport at this level, is your job. You are paid to show up and preform, forget about academics, your money comes from athletics. Starting in high school I had experienced “episodes” during practices – I would feel extremely overwhelmed, scared, hopeless, genuinely fearing for my life and I’d cry and cry and cry (imagine doing underwaters whole sobbing – it isn’t easy). My friends and even coach joked, saying I sounded like a loon, and they would know a practice was getting difficult when they heard the “loon call.” I was having panic attacks – they started when I was 14. I hadn’t even hit puberty at age 14.

I tried to quit a few times before then, but every time I would for a month I’d feel extreme guilt and shame. I was given this talent, how dare I give that up! How dare I let my parents down! How dare I let my teammates down! How dare I let myself down! Many high schoolers are stressing about their crush or who they’d go to prom with – trust me I stressed about those things, but I also stressed about having to wake up the next day and get in the pool and work harder and swim faster or I would be nothing.

I guess I worked hard enough though, I was offered a full tuition scholarship to swim for a Division I program at a school in Western NY. I was scared – I remember signing my NLI and coming home that night after the press conference sobbing, literally feeling like I sighed my life away. I’d like to get things straight – I loved the girls I swam with in college, I still keep in touch with many – unfortunately some hold a bitter grudge towards the “quitter”. I don’t blame them, we were taught to be ruthless and cut throat. I had a coach at one point that loved pinning us against each other, breaking up friendships and creating enemies. These girls didn’t know then – I never told most of them. The concept of mental illness in athletics was a taboo – it was seen as “you’re not strong enough” and “why can’t you just tough it out?” Would you say those phrases to the college freshman in her dorm room with a handful of pills calling her bestfriend to say goodbye because she simple couldn’t do it anymore – the idea of ceasing to exist was better than being a quitter. I was given a blessing in disguise my freshman year of college – I wasn’t sleeping, I could barely keep down food even though I gained 20 lbs at the start of school, I was extremely weak and so my body wasn’t able to preform and I got injured. To most athletes you’d assume they’d be devastated. I was ashamed for sure, I felt alienated and I felt guilty that oftentimes I wasn’t in the pool with my girls struggling through the grueling practices – but it saved my life. If I kept swimming and got back on the emotional roller coaster ride that year, I would have taken my life. I finished my freshman year, swimming at our conference championships – not doing very well but still saying “I did it”.

We had a coaching change going into my sophomore year. Regardless of my deteriorating mental state, I always liked to think I was an optimist, and one that loved a fresh start. I came into sophomore year excited about the new coach that the school had allowed us to help interview and hire. He would ultimately be the straw the broke the camel’s back – and for that I should thank him if we ever speak again (unlikely). I actually swam the fastest times of my career my sophomore year. I came back with a vengeance to make up for my disaster of a freshman year – trying to burry the suicide attempt deep in my brain. To dull one vice, I picked up another: an eating disorder. I lost the 20lbs I gain and was the strongest I’ve ever been in my life but I looked in the mirror and hated myself. I just accepted this was what life was supposed to be – miserable. I hated how I looked, I hated my “job” (swimming), I hated waking up everyday, I hated going through life – but hey! I was alive! The panic attacks at this point had gotten much worse, I would sustain one throughout all of practice and usually 2 or 3 a night trying to fall asleep before morning practice just to start the cycle over again. However, I had gotten very good at concealing them so no one knew. Mirrored goggles – great invention. I’d scream underwater each lap, hoping to expel whatever demon was inside me, crumpling my lungs and sucking away any energy and happiness I had, sadly it didn’t help. I needed to talk to someone, but I didn’t have time for therapy between class and practice and homework.

I was told I had an attitude problem. My new coach said I had a bad influence on the team during practice – my “jokes” about wanting to die during practice weren’t helping the morale. I was called in for weekly meetings to discuss my attitude – each time rather than asking me what was wrong, I was reprimanded and told to shape up. He saw my tears as weakness not as the cry for help I desperately wish he could uncover.

Sophomore year season ended with a handful of disappointing racing and being pulled from the 400 freestyle relay, which resulted in a semi-public panic attack at the hotel that night, that thankfully my mother saw for the first time ever – my head was full of thoughts of walking away and “never coming back”.

I can go on and on, but the point here is that the only thing that will help, is acknowledging the problem. Three years after ending my career I have finally sought help and am starting to address all the emotions and thoughts the sport to this day I still love with all my heart caused. There is truly not a day that I don’t think about swimming, some days there are great memories, other days painful. I hope my story, while I’m sure is one of WAY too many, can at least help someone in the sport going through something way too similar to ask for help. It will get better, I promise.