LIFE CHANGES
April 2020
March 12, 2020. My life changed. Well, not my whole, entire life, but heck a real big chunk of it. I am a member of the 2019 National Championship Women’s Gymnastics team and this year I am a member of the 2020 team who had a lofty goal to repeat that same thing and win the title. It would have been our fifth title in gymnastics history here at OU. I have been a part of one national championship team and I wanted to be involved in another this year, but that did not happen. Things happen, people get hurt, people get sick, people die, seasons are canceled, stores are closed, schools close, people move home, and life changes. I know my story is so tiny compared to others but it has a huge effect on me and my teammates. On that beautiful and sunny Thursday afternoon, our whole season fell apart and it felt as if the rug had been pulled out from under us. The sounds of my whole team sniffling and crying were just heart-wrenching. The truly hard part about this was that no one knew it was going to happen. No one knew our season was going to be canceled. No one knew that Senior Night was our last time to compete with that team and give it our all. No one knew I was going to compete my most favorite floor routine of all time for the very last time. The idea of not knowing was what really tore us apart as a team. We all expected at least six more weeks with each other to be together as a team and support each other doing our favorite sport.
I think the seniors took it the hardest. Their last couple weeks of being a gymnast and a part of a team were ripped away from them and there was nothing they could do to get it back or make them feel whole. A lot of them felt as if they could not control the future and that was understandable. You think you are leaving that night for a trip to Minnesota for a meet but really you are leaving the next day to go home and do school there. The end of your college career gets cut short. All I know is these girls made an impact on me and even though they did not get to finish the gymnastics career they wished for, it taught me much more than life is just gymnastics.