SIMONE BILES IS NOT ALONE
I swam in the Olympics and struggled with similar issues. Athletes’ mental health matters — it’s time to start talking about it.
After the news of Simone Biles’ decision to withdraw from the team finals at the Olympics broke, a lot of people asked me about athletes and their mental health. I’m open about mental health, and I’ll be the first one to admit that my mental health as a high-level athlete was not always healthy. In fact, it was largely filled with anxiety and a few bouts of depression.
There was always immense pressure, obligations, strict schedules, grueling workouts, rarely any days off, and minimal time with family.
I’ll be clear: No one forced me, and I feel proud of my experiences as an Olympic swimmer. (Farrell won a bronze medal in the 2012 Olympics.) But on the same note, I am so competitive, and became so engulfed by the sport, that there simply wasn’t life outside of it. I didn’t know a life without swimming in my daily schedule. Between school and training, I was “working,” and working intensely, more hours in a day than I do now. After so many years of doing that, you can’t just walk away. There are times when you don’t even know how, or if you can. So, you continue, just as you always have. You eat, sleep, train, repeat. Day in and day out, waiting for the few opportunities to properly rest for championships, and perform, hopefully well, but even that isn’t a guarantee.
I’ve said it before, but I find it imperative to say it again: Athletes’ mental health matters just as much, if not more, than physical health. There needs to be more done to prioritize it. Too many coaches are either too blind to see it, or too blind to see that without that mental component, the physical will never be as strong. The two are intertwined.
There are times where you can take care of both simultaneously. Then, there are times where you can only take care of one, and that one needs to be your mental health — and your mental health above all else.
There is life after sports. In the moment, it’s hard to imagine, or picture, but there is. Yes, that life will be different, and that will take getting used to. Old triggers and stressors may linger. I know I catch myself feeling that way from time to time, and I retired six years ago.
Either way, these Olympic Games are historic for a number of obvious reasons. Sadly though, I think that the internal mental struggles that this round of Olympians will face will also be historic — not to mention those who missed the Olympics last year and couldn’t make it this year, or those who made it back, qualified, and then tested positive, and had to quarantine at the Games. They’re struggling, too.
The world comes together for the Games. They come together to enjoy and share something that connects people from every single corner of the globe. But, don’t forget the cliché that it is not every four years, it is every day. Every single day. And so I’m speaking out to say that something needs to be done. More needs to be done.
Athletes may possess certain abilities that others do not, but they still have the same emotions and needs as everyone else. Just because it seems glamorous, doesn’t mean it is. All that glitters isn’t gold, and the same goes for everything bronze.
I’m not ashamed that I experienced these types of emotions. I am open about my mental health because I want to stand up for all athletes and their mental health. Mental health in general. Let’s talk about it. Let’s normalize it. Let’s prioritize it.
Margaux Farrell, morning anchor at Fox61, set state records at Amity High School and swam the 4x200 relay for France as a dual citizen in the 2012 Olympics, taking home a bronze medal.