by Lucinda Ruh
We were to go back to San Francisco that morning. This incident would have a domino effect and was the start of the collapse of many cards. The doctor told us I would need to rest for a few weeks and drink more water. Resting was out of the question so water was the only answer. I became obsessed with water and made sure I had a big bottle with me wherever I went. I would freak out if I did not. Flying back to San Francisco the body and cell memory of what happened was alive and I was frightened and scared that I could in any moment faint again. I was in terror over this for years to come.
For about two years after this incident I would not be able to enter a restaurant. I would have the biggest anxiety attacks. It is ironic how I recalled then that one time in school in Japan my classmates had a conversation about how they had fainted. I remember thinking to myself that I would like to experience that one day. They had made it sound so cool. Be careful what you wish for.
During the summer in San Francisco a Chinese coach came to train at the same rink as I with his two students. They all stayed in the same apartment complex as well. One student was high up in the ladies rankings and the other was a promising talent in the male category. He and I became very close friends. I took a huge liking to their coach and longed to be trained like he was training them, with such stillness and knowledge. He looked like a Chinese guru. He looked so wise, so kind, so understanding. He made me miss Asia even more and I longed to be taught by him. We had a beautiful connection as his eyes spoke volumes but we did not speak. The three of them spoke only Chinese with a few English words here and there.
Sometimes my mother drove them back to the apartment with us. The coach would often see me in the gym and had a huge questioning look on his face as he watched me. His look was full of puzzlement as to what in the world I was doing in there for so many hours. He looked more confused and sad for me than I was for myself. He would shake his head and continue on his way. I felt he disagreed with my training and I had a gut feeling he was right, but he was not my coach and I was to follow my teacher’s orders. I felt at home around the Chinese coach and his students. I looked at how he trained them and I tried copying what they did. His training method seemed so beautifully created. He was truly a guru. Every word he spoke and every gesture he made was like a Chinese painting with no misplaced or rushed strokes, only those of brilliance leaving a beautiful painting. I was tearful when they left at the end of the summer.
In Japan I felt the training work had been tough but sophisticated and elegant, whereas here it was tough, rough, and bad. My skating did not improve much throughout the summer of 1997 in San Francisco, and actually I felt it just got worse. I was doing a lot of ballet training to add to everything else and I started having severe Achilles tendonitis. It mostly came from the weight training I was doing and the heavy load I carried and put on my shoulders and back as I worked my legs. To make matters worse, I did not have it on one foot but on both! They were so inflamed that the doctors were afraid they were both about to rip. I went through therapy, but it wasn’t helping much because my team and I would not let me rest. Some days it was so severe I could not walk but I would try as much as I could to skate through the pain. When on the ice, I would manage somehow to put it in the back of my mind with all the rest of my issues, and only when the skates came off would the pain reality hit.
One day I got on the ice and started to warm up. I started with a single axel and to my astonishment I could not even pull in. I suddenly had excruciating pain that started in my back and went into my groin and then went all the way down my leg to my toes. I tried again and again, not accepting that I was in pain, but it got worse and was unbearable. It was the most pain I had ever had. I felt tears well up in my eyes. After all the things I had been through in this Olympic year, I did not want to now have to go through more injuries. This was impossible, I thought. I stayed on the ice and tried to do other things, but to no avail. The pain was getting worse and worse. My whole leg was getting numb, plus my Achilles tendons started to flare up as well as I tried to avoid the back pain. I did not want to get off the ice and have to tell my mother what was happening. I knew she would be furious with me.
Ever since I started skating my mother always had the utmost rage when something was wrong with me, whether from some sickness or an injury. I would feel so guilty that I was sick. My mother would become so angry with me because she did not want me to be sick, and anger was her way of showing she was worried and felt so sorry for me. But by now my mother really frightened me, and I had so much fear about telling her because I did not want her upset. I only wanted to make her smile and laugh. That was my job. But I also knew she would be the only one to help me and she was the only one with my best interest so I had to confess. I apologized that I was in pain and cried.
We went to the doctor right away to take X-rays and the result was that I had pinched a nerve in my back and had sciatica. The pain was intense and I could barely walk because of my back. I couldn’t cross my leg in front of the other when I was in so much pain. I was devastated. My whole leg was tingling and I couldn’t bend backward or forward. The doctor suggested a lot of therapy and rest.
Now, for an Olympic training year rest was impossible. Would a back brace help? We then resorted to many therapies both traditional and alternative along with painkillers. My mother drove me constantly everywhere for this therapy and that therapy. I was amazed that she could drive on the huge freeways that we were not used to because in Japan everything was very narrow. The wide freeways with cars speeding by frightened my mother and I felt it, too. Sometimes we had to go into the emergency lane where my mother could stop the car. She would have heart palpitations and I would be scared for her life. She would be white and shake all over while taking a Valium to calm her nerves.
Unfortunately I couldn’t help my mother with driving since I never had taken my driver’s license test. We waited in the emergency lane as I tried to comfort her until my mother courageously continued on. A mother is the strongest person. A true mother like mine would do anything for her child.
To top it off, because of the weight training my right shoulder was bothering me a lot and I could barely lift my right arm. But with all the other serious injuries we were already consumed with I did not mention this one and just dealt with it somehow. As my injuries got worse my coach thought I was faking it, so she wouldn’t give me any lessons. Her husband also refused to believe me and he did not even talk to me except to mention that I must continue to do my bike rides and weights. I was puzzled. I apologetically said that it would be impossible since it hurt both Achilles tendons, my back and groin, and the pain would go down my leg. He bluntly said that then I must do the bike lying down, basically putting the bike on the floor and riding upside down with my legs in the air. It was absurd to us but my mother and I tried and I was still in pain.
He suggested then that he would accept my being that lazy if I would swim every day. But swimming as well made my body hurt all over. Again, just to rest and let my body heal was not an option. We resorted to my wearing swim water training vest and running in the water for an hour a day. That hurt too, but oh well, I had to do something. I couldn’t just do nothing and rest and rehabilitate. Rehabilitation was boring, an act of laziness and showed your weaknesses.
Because my injuries were so severe and debilitating we had no choice but to cancel all the competitions leading up to my Swiss Nationals. I would do as much as I could and take my time to rebuild so I could be ready for the Nationals and then the 1998 Olympics and the World’s Championship. Having such great results on the world stage I had already given Switzerland a ladies spot for the Olympics and it was quite certain they would send me. I was now skating with a back brace and that seemed to help a little. Axel jumps hurt the most so I did not do many of them. I skated with pain all over my body but the Olympic dream was too huge to waste. I could skate in pain for that. It would be a good trade. I was broken in pieces but the Olympic dream would put me back together agai
n.
I paced myself a little more and by the end of the year 1997 we headed to Switzerland for my Nationals. I wasn’t a hundred percent in shape but ready enough to win and show them I was the lady for the Olympics. We had agreed that I would compete with the brace on under my costume because that was how I was training and I wasn’t fully healed yet. So I am not sure what led my coach to do this, but on the day of the competition she told me I would have to remove the back brace. Well, that was not a bright idea. She probably did not want the judges to see my weakness. I did as told, but during my program I felt very weak without the brace and my back started to give way and I panicked. I was in first place after the short program, but the long program was the next day and I was in a lot of pain from the day before.
Again in practice I had the brace on and during competition I took it off. I actually skated pretty decently, but fell on just one jump when my back felt too weak and I felt no support without the brace. The other girl had done one more jump than I had but my spins and artistry were so much farther ahead than hers that we all thought it was a no-brainer.
To our huge shock the judges placed me second and the other girl won. Knowing the Swiss and what they had done to me over all these years, I knew then and there that this was their way of not sending me to the Olympics and I was devastated. My Olympic dream was crushed. I did not want to go on the podium. I wanted to disappear. The pain and sadness of this day will live in me forever. We would have understood what happened if the competition had been fairly judged, but no one understood what had happened except the girl who won and the demonic judges. They are truly devilish. It was a scam from the beginning. We even have a tape of this incident where we see two judges on the panel giving each other the thumbs up when they placed the other girl first. It was the tipping of the scale by these judges that caused me to be second.
I was crushed and so were my family and coach. The other girl was sent to the European competition, and the Swiss rule was that she would have to place in the top twelve to be sent to the Olympics. Not to my astonishment, she didn’t even qualify in the top twenty-four. I mean what did they expect? She never had qualified so why would she this year? The whole thing was baffling. Actually, it was more disgusting. It was a game to the judges; it was personal and it had nothing to do with my skating. It crushed me to pieces in other ways than the injuries had. Now, nothing could put me back together again. However, no matter what I was going through in my life, I always did keep a little burning light of hope and trust in God in my soul and this is what would keep me going.
After all, my name is Lucinda, which means light, so I was destined to keep this in my heart. I was lucky I had that then. Otherwise I would have thrown my skates out the window. It was said that my American coach and the American federation and even the IOC called in to the Swiss federation to try to persuade them to send me to the Olympics. But they could not change the narrow-minded mentality of the Swiss federation delegates. They were stuck in the valley in between the mountains grazing on their luscious grass and nothing could be done. They couldn’t see over the mountains. They wasted a spot. They just did not send any girl at all! It was absolutely ridiculous. There is no better word for it. They had ruined a girl’s dream just like that, and then, they did not even give another girl a chance. In the end I would have felt better if they had sent the other girl. Or even the third-place girl or the last-place girl, but I felt like everyone was just begging them to send a female skater. For God’s sake, it’s the Olympics and you have a spot. Why not take it? Don’t they have pride in their athletes? Apparently, not at all.
To add to my disgust, they did send their dance team and male skater who were all far less successful than me on the international stage, just because of their parents’ and coaches’ and judges’ personal “behind the scenes” connections! It was despicable. I truly don’t know how these people live with themselves and I truly don’t know how I was able to face these people again. My parents confronted one of the delegates on a later date but he dismissed the fact coldly and my parents are not the type to fight for their rights or mine, and they backed down. In order for justice to be served maybe other skaters’ parents, coaches, or agents might have set the record straight, but in my case nothing was done but having trust in life and God and that life would continue. My parents never wanted to succumb to what they thought were lesser actions and they’d rather walk away and walk the road of silence.
I did not watch anything of that 1998 Olympic Games. It was tearing me apart. For the first time I really let myself feel my sadness and I drowned in it. The Swiss again had somehow without an ounce of guilt asked me to go to the World Championships held right after the Olympic Games, and reluctantly I went. My coach wanted to go for herself not because of me. I wanted to stay home. I was training terribly and was just in too much pain emotionally and physically from my back. But like a good student I followed orders. I was embarrassed to skate at the world stage in the condition I was in and hurt that my coach would even push me to do it. To see all the Swiss federation again after they had been to the Olympics without me did not help the situation. Neither my heart nor my body was in it. Although not skating well, I competed and fought until the end and placed horribly. It felt embarrassing.
I had never in my life questioned myself about whether I wanted to stop skating until right after that World Championships. Even so, on returning to California I kept on going to the rink to train. You have to understand that skating and the ice rink was all I knew and it felt more like a home then where I slept. Without going there every day my sense of purpose in life was lost. All my injuries were still prominent and I was in knife-like pain throughout my body. I did not rest. I expressed all my anger and hurt on the ice. This period was very tough for me and I was very depressed. With the injuries, beatings, coach problems, and federation problems, I wanted not to quit, but to have everything stop around me. I was still too afraid to voice any of my feelings.
But my body wasn’t afraid. It was speaking for me but that did not seem to catch any one’s attention. Not even mine. All my senses had shut down. I felt like a lost cause. I would break down constantly and I was physically exhausted. I was so depressed that my mother wouldn’t leave my side in fear that I would hurt myself even more and do something cowardly to myself. I could hardly get out of bed.
Instead of seriously contemplating whether I should continue to skate or take a break, the answer to what my cure should be was to get another coach. My worldwide reputation of success in spins held us back the most from my deciding to take a break. Because my unique spins were one-of-a-kind there was no way that I believed I should save my body and not spin. I must spin — more and better than anyone else for my whole life. My spins brought me so much joy, so how could I not spin! I longed to be back in Asia and maybe even with the Chinese coach that had come to our rink in San Francisco the year before, and had talked with us at the World Championships. We decided to try to contact him, and through one of his students, we were told that all was arranged with the Chinese federation as well. I would be able to train with the national team. The Chinese coach promised he could cure all my injuries and make me land all the jumps.
That conversation kept us alive and we felt we could do this one more time. For the sake of skating we could. We would pack and up, leave and go to China. Nothing would stop us from taking us away from the skating world. We must, must continue. Even if it were to be the far end of the world or on top of the tallest mountain we would be there. Nothing else mattered because skating would cure all. We thought if I could skate we would be all right. It was “we” who decided, “we” who skated. It was us in our own world for our own sake.
For what? I didn’t know then. Now I know it was for the pursuit of our happiness. I was trying to make my mother happy and she was trying to make me happy. It might sound weird that this was what it was, but it was. But happiness starts within you and usually the only bird we cage is the most beautiful one.
8
Chinese Dumplings
(HARBIN, BEIJING)
A bad word whispered will echo a thousand miles.
There comes a time and place in your life when you don’t know anymore whether to trust the people that you are surrounded with. My mother and I were at that stage in California and it was truly time to leave. I was broken into many pieces emotionally and physically. We felt the Chinese coach would be the one who could bring me back to health and to my potential. I don’t know how my father agreed to everything my mother and I decided, but he gave us all the means and everything he could. I loved and missed him so much that I wanted to show my appreciation to him through my skating. He loved us so much by giving us all his trust. He knew how much I loved skating and anything would be possible for his little girl’s dream.
But China? So far away? And not Beijing or Hong Kong or Shanghai, but all the way up north near the Russian border in Harbin! I mean it isn’t just every day that you get to move to China. I was thrilled to go back to Asia and I felt in my bones that the coach would be able to teach me to perform miracles. Without the high hopes that I had for this Chinese coach I would probably have stopped skating. We thought that by our just taking off into oblivion we showed how focused we were on skating and, oh boy, were we focused. We saw one goal and one goal only and put all our eggs in one basket. That was for sure to bite us in the back.
A week before leaving for China in June of 1998, I was invited to do a prestigious farewell show of a famous pair-skater team and was delighted. They requested that I do a program with only spins. Tons of spins, one after another. I was happy. I loved to do that. I could have done only that for my whole skating career. I loved spinning forever, using the force around me to create all kinds of positions. I went to faraway places in my mind and became whatever I wanted — a bird, an animal, an emotion, a rainbow, even the mountains or an ocean. I used all my imagination to transform into all things and levitate in spirit and soul. I sometimes would literally leave my body and see myself spin. It was glorious. It was my trance, my meditation. I changed my spins all the time, never doing the same move twice. While doing a program I just did what I felt with the music. I immersed myself into the character and let my spirit guide me. I never knew what I would do next. I could never have skated with a partner, as I did not like skating to the rules. I skated freely. Spinning was my haven.
