All of a sudden, it’s like swimming was a job. This makes sense, I guess, when you talk about what it means to turn professional, but I wasn’t expecting to feel this way. And it’s not like swimming was ever a chore . . . oh, no, I love it too much for it to ever be any kind of a burden or a grind! It’s just that when you strip away the fun and the friendships and all the team-building elements that attach to the sport, it can be a lonely pursuit. And the loneliness takes some getting used to. It does. Again, I love my Colorado Stars teammates to the moon and back, but we go our separate ways after practice, move about in our own orbits. We’re at a different stage in our lives, a different place in our lives, and while on the one hand I was totally ready to embrace those differences, it wasn’t so easy to check in with my friends at school and see that life at Cal was going on without me. We talked all the time, and kept plugged in to each other through social media, but it felt to me like I was missing out, big-time. And I was—absolutely, I was. It’s like all my friends were living my college dreams without me, while I was mostly treading water.
But I was also moving forward, big-time. I was back at home, living with the most amazing parents on the planet (sorry, I’m a little biased!), devoting myself completely to the hopes and dreams I’d set out for myself when I was a little girl.
This new world of mine would just take some getting used to; that’s all.
Our Moment of Trial
2016 OLYMPIC TRIALS—OMAHA, NEBRASKA
MOM: As far as Dick and I could tell, the runup to the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio was going pretty much as planned, but as we look back there were signs of trouble. We tend to take a sunny view in our house, so we told ourselves things were going swimmingly—forgive me, but I’m afraid Missy’s love of puns is contagious. Of course, that sunny view was almost always rooted in reality, and here we could see that Missy was working hard, laser-focused, in the best shape of her swimming life. Missy hoped to qualify in four individual events—the 100-meter and 200-meter freestyle and the 100-meter and 200-meter backstroke. There was every reason to look forward to another strong Olympic showing. But then we got to Omaha.
Missy knew something wasn’t right before we did, but she wasn’t letting on. Not just yet. It worked out that her room was next to ours at the Hilton, but that didn’t guarantee we would see her at all during the meet. We were used to that by now. She would eat with the athletes every day, or with her coaches. That was just as well. We had a ton of family with us—C.J., Linda, Doug, Deb, Harry and Harry’s brother, my “uncle” Roy. We all got together for dinner at our hotel on Sunday night, just before the start of the meet, while Missy was off doing her thing with the other swimmers.
When we did see Missy, though, it was business as usual. She seemed excited, confident, eager to get the meet started, and for her first swim that Monday morning, there was no reason to think she was “off” in any way—no reason that I could see, at least. She’s since told me she was stressing out, not happy with her times, off her game, but in the middle of competition she just tried to breathe deep and power through. And her father and I, we fell into our familiar routines. We got to the pool early so I could sit with my sister and watch the warm-ups. We visited with friends and family. We hoped like crazy for a happy result.
Missy came in fifth in her 100-meter back prelims, which was nothing unusual. Remember, her whole strategy, for years and years, was to hold a little something back in those preliminary swims, putting in just enough effort to advance to the next round. The idea was to make it to the semifinals with a little something in reserve, and then on to the finals with another little something in reserve. But now, in hindsight, I can see that she was cutting it a little close. In the semifinals that first night, she came in seventh, which put her in one of the outside lanes for the finals the next day—not exactly where she wanted to be.
Still, I didn’t really think anything of it, until she called later that night and asked me to come to her room. She just wanted me to hold her while she cried. It had been a long time since I’d seen her so vulnerable, so unsure of herself. It broke my heart—and took me completely by surprise. For a long time, we didn’t speak. I could only hold her, and try to comfort her, and try not to break down in tears myself. After a while, she looked at me and asked, “What happens if I don’t make it, Mama?”
Oh my goodness, that was just about the last thing I expected to hear from this strong, self-assured young woman. But she was shaken. And now, so was I. Clearly, this wasn’t the time for me to hesitate as a parent, or to join Missy in her uncertainty, so I fought back my own tears and told my daughter what I knew to be true, what I thought she needed to hear. I said that I knew she would be disappointed if she didn’t make the Olympic team, but that there was nothing she could ever do to disappoint her father or me. I told her she was already a winner, as an Olympian and a woman. I also said that if missing out on the Olympics this time around was the worst thing to happen in her life, she’d be very fortunate. I offered to spend the night, but she said that she needed to get up in the morning feeling like it was a new day. So I hugged her, told her I loved her, and told her how proud I was of her.
I went back to our room next door with a heavy, heavy heart. I knew how devastated Missy must have been feeling. Dick could see straightaway that something was wrong, so I filled him in, best I could. We both knew how devastated Missy must have been feeling. How alone. She had wanted to have the opportunity to defend her Olympic title, and she had worked so hard to get to this point. It was all close enough to touch, right there, within reach, but to her it felt so far away, and now we were separated by this one thin wall in the Hilton, unable to comfort each other, support each other, lift each other, the way we always had.
I don’t think I slept much that night—I probably didn’t sleep at all. I kept thinking of Missy, what she was going through. I was most upset by a reference she made to the Bible. A lot of times, she’ll tuck what she’s feeling into a story or a psalm, and I’ll have to scramble to catch her meaning. This time, she’d said that she felt like Job, one story from the Bible I knew pretty well, but I let Missy tell it to me all over again. I listened to her hurt, her confusion. She told me how Job was dedicated to God but that Satan had challenged God and made a kind of bet with him to prove that Job’s devotion wasn’t genuine, and that Job wouldn’t love the Lord so much if God took away his many blessings. As a result, Job’s family was killed and Job became very ill. He was put through every imaginable hardship, every conceivable struggle, and yet through it all he remained faithful to the Lord.
It was the ultimate test of faith, and here it felt to Missy like she was going through her own trial. Missy’s faith was so important to her and had helped her persevere through so much, and as she retold this story, I worried that she would start questioning that faith. No, her struggles weren’t life and death, like Job’s. The people she loved would continue to love her, be there for her. But her hopes and dreams were now more and more out of reach.
Meanwhile, whatever faith I had was definitely being questioned. I was so proud of the woman Missy had become, was becoming still. I had seen the way she had dedicated her life to doing good. I had witnessed how she had used her swimming success as a platform to reach out to others in need and become a good role model. So as I tossed and turned that night, I found myself praying, in my own way. Wondering. Questioning the Lord about why he was allowing my little girl to struggle in this way. My little girl who had put everything she had into her training, put her life on hold to make it back into an Olympic pool. I didn’t understand it. And it just about killed me that she was right next door and I couldn’t hold her in my arms.
Missy started her 200 free with prelims on Tuesday morning and tied for seventh with a 1:58.61. In the semis that night she moved to fourth with a 1:57.33. She had a lane in the finals for Wednesday night, and Dick and I were overjoyed. We could only assume that Missy was thrilled, too.
That whatever doubts she’d been feeling the night before were now behind her. We didn’t know it at the time, but Missy was still stressing down on the pool deck. She still wasn’t where she wanted to be, wasn’t swimming like she’d hoped for, like she’d trained for. Twenty minutes after the 200 free, she swam in the finals of the 100 back. I’m sure she was hoping to be an outside smoker, but it was not to be. She was eighth at the final turn and finished in seventh place. The defending gold medalist in this event, and she didn’t even qualify. Didn’t even come close. Her disappointment was mine, ours. But she was not defeated. She congratulated the top two finishers, now rookie Olympians.
I could see the disappointment in her expression and just wanted to hug her. I got an opportunity that night when she asked me to come back to her room. This time, she wanted me to stay over. She worried she wouldn’t be able to sleep. I didn’t tell her I hadn’t slept a wink the night before. I just held her until she finally drifted off after several hours of tossing and turning.
On this second night, I did manage to sleep, but only fitfully. Mostly, I lay there next to Missy and tried to imagine what she was facing, what she was thinking, looking ahead to these Olympic Games, knowing that she now had all these people counting on her, pulling for her. It wasn’t her new sponsors she was worried about, I don’t think. It wasn’t NBC, or any of the media people who’d been covering her all these years. It wasn’t her friends or family. She was always very good about compartmentalizing all of that, and shutting out all these other distractions. And it wasn’t even her teammates, because in a setting like this, Olympic trials, every swimmer is out for herself. The whole teammate thing comes later. In that moment, it’s just about going best times and winning a spot on the team.
No, I had to think it was her little fans she didn’t want to disappoint. I’m sure there was a part of her that didn’t want to let down all those other people. That’s just who Missy is. But letting down her fans . . . that was a whole other level of worry. All these little kids, thousands of them, back home in Colorado—all around the country, even. (All around the world!) Missy never set out to be a role model, but the way she lived her life, the way she carried herself, the way she competed . . . it was natural that all these girls (and boys, but mostly girls) started looking up to her. I had to think this was what had Missy so worried during trials. To worry what it would mean if she didn’t make the team. Not because of what it would cost her, but because of what it would cost them.
It was enough to make me cry. And I did. I lay there, watching Missy sleep, thinking, My little girl, knotted up inside over the thought that she couldn’t be a role model to these kids. And I couldn’t help thinking, She’s just a kid herself.
NINE
RIO
I’ll let you in on a little secret: this book-writing business is like a long-distance swim. A really long-distance swim. You set out with a plan for the race, but you can’t always know how things will go.
As this book was taking full and final shape, we thought the thing to do was leave room for a final chapter about the Games of the XXXI Olympiad, in Rio. The Olympics seemed to offer a natural endpoint, although if you’ve read through to this point you know my goal isn’t to recount my triumphs in the water. That, to me, would be really, really boring—probably to you, too. Clearly, this is not a typical athlete’s memoir. It’s more about the pieces we’ve put in place as a family that have allowed me to pursue my career as a swimmer and to look ahead to life beyond the pool. Still, we felt it was important to put a ribbon on our story with an update from Rio, since for the last four years these games have been our focus. My focus. It made sense to want to let readers know how it all went down.
Never in a million years did I think it would go down—I mean, really, really, down.
Now, in the goes-without-saying-but-I’ll-say-it-anyway! department, I was hoping for a great Olympic meet. We’d set things up so I’d have a good shot to build on the success that found me in London in 2012. That’s why I came home from school, spent a year training with my longtime coach Todd Schmitz and my trainer Loren Landow, put the rest of my life on pause so I could devote my full attention to these games and work myself into the best shape of my life. But as you now know, Rio didn’t exactly go as planned. (How’s that for the understatement of the year?) Oh, I fought my way onto the team, qualified in three events, but if I’m being completely honest (and again, the thing about this book-writing business is that it forces you to be completely honest!), this just wasn’t my Olympic year. Not even close, it would seem.
I could tell at trials. Everyone could tell, looking back, but when I was down there in that pool, struggling to find my rhythm, my mojo, I could tell most of all. I was having panic attacks for the first time in my life. Loren, my trainer, would sit with me and talk me through these uncertainties, and help me to meditate. I don’t think I would have gotten through that week in Omaha without his help. Without those meditations, my throat would close, I couldn’t breathe, and I’d start to shake uncontrollably. I couldn’t explain it, couldn’t understand it . . . but there it was. And all I could think was, What is happening? This isn’t me. This isn’t me.
Thank God my parents were there in the same hotel, right next door. I’d call my mother to come give me a hug, or to come for a sleepover . . . anything to quiet the raging uncertainty inside my head.
I hated that the sport I’d loved so much, that had given me so much, was making me feel the way I was feeling during trials. So unsure of myself. So off my game. So unlike . . . me. Diving in for the 100 back that first morning, I knew. I was able to swim into the semifinals, but something was off, wrong, weird. I couldn’t put my finger on it then, and here I am, almost two months later as I write this, still trying to sort through what was going on. Go ahead and look at those trial results and you’ll see that I battled my way into the finals, but I knew I didn’t have it in me to qualify in that event. Remember, all along, I’ve talked about how the thing to do is put out just enough to make it to the semifinals, just enough to make it to the next round. It’s all about conserving energy for the finals, that’s the key, especially when you’re swimming multiple events. But here I put everything I had into that semifinal swim and could manage only the seventh-best time. It might have been enough to put me in the pool for the finals, but it wouldn’t get me to Rio, not in the 100 back. I didn’t feel like I had control of my body, if that makes any sense. My stroke, my timing . . . it was all just a little beyond my grasp. I couldn’t get my body to do the things it was trained to do, and it wasn’t because I was tired or distracted or injured. It’s just that there was no there there. I was able to get to the finals on muscle memory and straight athletic ability, but there was no way I could swim myself onto the team, not against these great competitors.
I guess you could say I was done before the finals even started—and before I could even get my head around the idea of not qualifying in an event I’d won four years earlier, I had to worry about swimming the 200-meter freestyle.
I wish I could remember where my mind went during those low, low moments, but I do know this: there’s not a thing I would have done differently. Not a thing I could have done differently. All I could do, really, was fight through whatever doubts I was facing and keep swimming. And that doesn’t just mean how I handled the unfamiliar pressures during trials—and, later on, during the Olympics. No, I’m also referring to the buildup to the games. I did everything I possibly could. I worked harder than I’d ever worked before. I found a way to balance the responsibilities that came with going pro, and working with great sponsors, with the demands of training—getting up at four o’clock in the morning if that’s what it took to get the work in. I made all these great gains in the weight room, added extra yoga classes, new strength-training routines, physical therapy sessions to keep myself right and whole. I was even seeing a nutritionist, and cooking and preparing my own meals, taking extra care to put on
ly the healthiest foods into my body.
It was a yearlong grind.
DAD: Right here, Missy’s hit on one of the missing ingredients in her approach, this time out. It’s in the language she uses to refer to her training. She calls it a grind, and if you know anything about Missy, if you look back and try to understand the successes she’s had in the pool, it comes back to the joy she felt that first time she hit the water. This was a child who always had so much fun at practice, so much fun with her teammates. Even in London, she swam with such ease. Didn’t have a care in the world. She was so loose, so comfortable, and she was out there having fun, breaking records. But this time out, she just couldn’t get in rhythm. She’d left all her friends behind at Cal, did everything right to put herself into position to compete. On paper, she made all the right moves. But looking back, I think there was a missing ingredient. I don’t think we left any room for joy in her swimming. It became a job, and it was a job she was good at, but she wasn’t swimming with abandon. She wasn’t loose, like she’d always been. And when I talked to her after Rio, and heard in her voice how genuinely excited she was to get back to Berkeley, to the friends she’d left behind, the life she’d left behind . . . that’s when I knew. Technically, she’d had it all covered. Her mother and I, we thought she was making the right decision, coming home to train. We supported her, completely. We were convinced she had the best possible coaching, the best possible conditioning. She ate right, lived right, all of that. But there wasn’t a whole lot of fun in her life, coming home each night, living with these two old folks. The pure joy of living, that’s what was missing.
Relentless Spirit Page 23
