Anyone else loving the Olympics?

Every two years, I fall under the spell of the Olympic experience. I love it all…the gripping stories of the athletes’ journeys to this worldwide stage, the tragic, heart-wrenching losses and the breathtaking victories. I cry non-stop, mostly tears of inspiration. Particularly after watching our gold medal winning women’s gymnastics team compete, I felt compelled to share an excerpt from Chapter 3 of I See You as an important reminder to all of us to do as the title of the chapter tells us, and “Stop giving so much!” Here’s the first few pages of the chapter: Right after Simone Biles decided to withdraw from the 2020 Olympic games in Tokyo because of concerns about her mental and emotional health, I was scrolling through Facebook and came upon a compelling post written by an eighth-grade English teacher from Utah named Byron Heath. The post had gone viral—shared over 500,000 times—and had been discussed on television as well. In his post, Heath describes proudly sitting down with his two young daughters to get them ready for the Olympics by showing them a video of one of his favorite Olympic memories: the vault pass gymnast Kerri Strug did on one leg in 1996. In case you aren’t familiar with the story, the US gymnastics team had a significant lead over the Russians heading into the final rotation of events; however, if the team’s performance on the vault was poor, it would open the door for the Russians to potentially take the medal. Four American gymnasts vaulted before Strug, all struggling to land without any extra steps and hops that result in deductions from their scores. Then the exceptionally talented Dominique Moceanu unexpectedly fell not once but twice, earning a very low final score. Kerri Strug’s vault was the final chance for the American team to secure a definite victory over the Russians. On her first attempt, Strug landed awkwardly, fell, and violently twisted her ankle.

I vividly remember sitting on the edge of the couch in my basement watching the dramatic scene that unfolded next. Obviously in significant pain, Strug limped slowly back to the starting line while looking over at Béla Károlyi, the famous US team gymnastics coach. He looked into her terrified eyes and said, “We got to go one more time. Shake it out.” Strug wiped her tears, turned to face the vault, took a deep breath, and ran the length of the mat as if for a few seconds the injury had never happened. She catapulted herself off the springboard on her hands and into the air, executed her numerous twists and turns and flips and then she stuck the landing perfectly, raising her arms proudly, then collapsing in pain moments later. The entire country, including me, stood from our couches to cheer and celebrate this brave victory over the Russians.

According to his story on Facebook, almost twenty-five years after this historic victory, Heath’s young girls did not respond as he originally had when they watched the scene unfold. They didn’t applaud Strug’s bravery as he expected they might; rather, they expressed deep concern, asking why she jumped again if she was so obviously hurt.

Heath continues, “I made some inane reply about the heart of a champion or Olympic spirit, but in the back of my mind, a thought was festering: ‘She shouldn’t have jumped again.’”

Horrified, I realized after reading this young father’s post, that I, too, had always celebrated Strug’s injured vault as one of the greatest moments in US Olympic history. I watched every interview she did in the weeks following the Olympics, talked about it with friends and family, and raised Strug up as an American hero.

If you get the chance, I’d encourage you to find a video of the vault and watch it again. Should we have celebrated Kerri Strug’s accomplishment? Or was what happened actually deeply damaging and misguided? Did anyone consider the physical and emotional health of a young girl, or were we just swept up in our insatiable national desire to win? Did it so fit our overarching narrative that women should sacrifice themselves for the good of others that we didn’t even notice or question our celebration of her pain?

The part of the story no one ever talks about, and that fewer people even know is that the injury sustained in that vault forced Strug’s retirement from gymnastics at the young age of eighteen. Heath continues in his post:

[Kerri Strug and Dominique Moceanu] were top gymnasts literally pushed to the breaking point, and then put out to pasture. Coach Karolyi and Larry Nassar (the serial sexual abuser) continued their long careers, while the athletes were treated as a disposable resource.

Today Simone Biles—the greatest gymnast of all time— chose to step back from the competition, citing concerns for mental and physical health. I’ve already seen comments and posts about how Biles “failed her country,” “quit on us,” or“can’t be the greatest if she can’t handle the pressure.”

The subtext here is: “Our gold medal is more important than your well-being.”

Let that sink in for a moment. Is any athletic accomplishment, even on a global scale, more important than a human being’s health and well-being? Simone Biles didn’t feel she could safely perform her routine without endangering herself. So, with one very public, brave, and controversial choice, Biles said to all of us, “My physical and emotional health are more important than any medal. My value is not rooted in my ability to perform a routine with my body for your enjoyment and feeling of victory.”

As a former collegiate athlete and recovering overachiever, I won’t say her decision didn’t feel a touch uncomfortable. After all, Biles had trained with such incredible focus and intensity for so many years in preparation for this one moment, and she also wasn’t just any gymnast, but the greatest female gymnast of all time. Sponsors, television networks, teammates, and an entire nation were counting on her to be a highlight of the Olympics, on the biggest stage available to gymnasts, at a nationally televised event that happens only every four years. At her age, she might not have another opportunity of this magnitude. This was it. This was everything she had been training for her entire life! And what did she do? She walked away. (I think it’s important to note here that three years later, Biles is back and competing at the highest levels again because she had the courage to walk away when she did.) The more I wrestled with my own response to her decision, the more I realized that the reason it was so difficult to digest is because it challenged every single woman, including me, to consider this: if Simone Biles could say no, under that kind of pressure and in that kind of a worldwide spotlight, then don’t we all have permission to do the same under virtually any circumstance? With one decision, Biles taught us all that whether in the board room, within familial relationships, or on the balance beam, women should not be asked to destroy themselves to meet the needs of everyone else.