Plain and Simple.
I'm done with gymnastics.
Too much drama, politics and fear.
I wish it didn't have to end this way.
Ironic as it is.
2 weeks before state I decide I can no longer continue on mentally.
For the past three years I have gotten injured 2 weeks before my state meet.
This is the first year I have stayed healthy and yet I found the will-power to give up, instead of push on as I've done year after year.
I'm not proud of what I've chosen to do, but it's for the best.
I guess I was never meant for gymnastics anyway...
I made the final decision late last week that I would finish out this month and then be done. I don't even have enough motivation to continue 'til end of season. I would like to go further into this topic, but unfortuantly, due to the "politics" and naysayers of this community, saying too much would either get me nailed for "slander" or my head ripped off. Neither seem appealing. Unfortuantly, you "can't say it, how it is" in gymnastics.
I have watched so much drama unfold in every gym I've ever been at. I was mostly unaware of it until I become a coach and since then my love for gymnastics has been increasingly thwarted. It's so sad because it is really such a beautiful sport that is slowly becoming more robotic and political, day in and day out. I no longer want to be a part of it. I had wanted it more than anything for years and never got the right training to get me to my highest goals and dreams. It's sad and unfair, but I s'pose that's the way life is.
Your blog today makes me sad. Not surprised, but sad just the same. I am not surprised because the same thing is happening all over the country at gym after gym. It seems that gymnasts rarely get the training and coaching they deserve. They go to the gym day after day and year after year and have no chance to live out their dreams through no fault of their own. I started my web site, GymnasticsZone.com exactly because of gymnasts like you, but 7 years later, there has been little effect. I am still working to provide information to gymnasts and coaches and am making real progress on the web site, but unfortunately, not in time for you or thousands of other gymnasts of your generation. You have a talent for writing. I do enough of it to know. I wish in some ways you would change your mind, stay in the sport, keep writing about it but regardless of what you do in the future I wish you all the best in whatever you may do. - john
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