 |
|
|
|
|
June 13th, 2012
07:24 AM ET
Gymnast reveals 'dark side' to Olympic journeyEditor's note: In the Human Factor, we profile survivors who have overcome the odds. Confronting a life obstacle – injury, illness or other hardship – they tapped their inner strength and found resilience they didn't know they possessed. In her memoir, "Off Balance," in stores this week, 1996 Olympic gymnast Dominique Moceanu opens up about her life outside the spotlight. This is an exciting time for me – with the release of my new memoir, "Off Balance," I’m finally able to reveal the entire story of my life. Most people may know me as the youngest U.S. gymnast in history to win an Olympic gold medal (at the age of 14) and as a member of the historic 1996 US Women’s Olympic Gymnastic team (also known as “the Magnificent Seven”), the first and only American women’s team to take gold at the Olympics. Of course, to achieve the pinnacle of any field, a lot of sacrifices have to be made. I had my share of sacrifices both in and out of the gym. My relationships with the two primary male figures in my early life - my stubborn and volcanic father and my internationally known coach, Bela Karolyi (who coached me during the Olympics) have been written about by various media outlets but never from my perspective. When you are in the media spotlight as a 14 year old, most think you are having the time of your life - meeting celebrities, going on post-Olympic tours, making magazine covers, Wheaties boxes and photo shoots. For me, however, there was also an untold, dark side. One of the many lessons I’ve learned from my life and career and the hardships I’ve overcome is that my purpose cannot be defined by the color of a medal around my neck. I realized years after I achieved success that what really matters in life is that I recognize my worth as person, not just as a gymnast. For me, gaining control of my life, becoming a mother and having a healthy home life has helped me achieve the balance I craved as a child. I’ve also learned to be open to new challenges and ready for the unexpected. Four years ago, I was happily married, completing my education and about to give birth to my firstborn when I received the biggest bombshell imaginable. I discovered I had a younger sister, born without legs and given up for adoption at birth by my parents. Fortunately, because I had reached a good place in my life, I was able to see the beauty in welcoming this wonderful person into my family. Getting to know my “new” sister has been a tremendous blessing and one of the best experiences of my life.
Next entry »Pop Warner changes practice rules for safety
« Previous entryWhat is histrionic personality disorder?
|
  About this blog
Get a behind-the-scenes look at the latest stories from CNN Chief Medical Correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Senior Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen and the CNN Medical Unit producers. They'll share news and views on health and medical trends - info that will help you take better care of yourself and the people you love.
 |
|
|
|
I've admired her since watching her on the Olympic stage in 1996. I'm interested to read her memoir. I'm so glad she's in a good place in her life.
Good for her! I can't imagine a life of flashbulbs and expectation at 14. I could barely tie my shoes at 14.
Who?
Don't be such a troll.
Good Luck to All of Them.
OMG, a teenage girl had body image issues? How unusual an dark.
Don't be such as ass! Yes, we all know most teenagers, especially girls, have body image ssues, but for the majority they are not under the national/international spotlight. Can you at least empathise what it must be like dealing with a negative body image and being in the spotlight at age 14.
This article says almost nothing, I wanted to read about her vomiting into a tub in her closet and never going through puberty.
I watched Dominique change from a person who looked like she loved what she was doing into a person with great sadness in her eyes. How awful for someone so talented and gifted to be abused and develop low self-esteem. She has been through more than she should have had to endure, but I am glad she has been able to deal with her past so that her present is much happier. I wish her only happiness with her family in the future, and I'm sure her children's lives will be better as a result of their mother's background and special perspective.
Big deal. Obviously she hasn't learned that everybody has a rough time as a teenager.
Is this serious? Such a rough life.
whocares,Clay,Starbelly,ORLY?, and Paulo. You are all very sad people.
You have to start this life so young that 'consent' really isn't possible, then commit and go on with it for years more. Then you are fifteen and too old to compete, so you retire. Whoa.
I am glad everything has worked out for her.
This book reminds me of another excellent book about the dark side of elite gymnastics and figure skating: Little Girls in Pretty Boxes. It'll be interesting to hear Dominique's story from her own perspective...the career of an elite gymnast is so brutal, as to be successful at that level you have to be small, light, shaped like a boy, and fearless. That's why people like Nastia Liukin (22), Alicia Sacramone (24) and Shawn Johnson (20)...all Olympians from 2008...aren't good enough to make the team this year. Johnson is retired, and Liukin performed poorly at the national championships recently.
That's also why the Chinese gymnasts snuck in a few athletes under the minimum age requirement of 16 in the last Olympics: because in this sport, the most successful athletes are 14 to 16 years old. Puberty is the beginning of the end, like it or not. I can see how this sets the athletes up for lots of physical and mental problems not only while they're still competing, but after they retire...most kids don't make it, yet still drop out of regular school to train 8-10 hours per day. Gymnastics is all they are, and they're lost when they can't compete anymore. It's really sad and fascinating.
This is indeed a sad story. I remember the young woman who did the vault on a broken ankle to win the team gold. Although I cannot remember her name, I remember thinking, "this child is jeopardizing her lifetime ability to WALK to win a gold medal for the team." I remember her coach, Karolyi, carrying her after she managed not to kill herself completing that second vault.
WHERE were her parents? WHERE was her coach's head in allowing this child to take such a risk? In boxing (which I think is a ridiculous sport), they do stop the fight if it looks like either boxer is going to be permanently injured.
That young lady was not a stranger–she trained and lived less than 50 miles from me in Plano, TX. Now she has a gold medal for her team. At 20, would it have been worth it if she couldn't walk for the rest of her life, or if she walked with a limp?
The world of elite sports with children has gotten out of control. At least the football players who are suing the NFL and/or their teams for repeated head trauma were adults who made choices. They knew the risks. What 14 year old does?
The gymnast you are thinking of is Kerri Strug. Also, at 20, she is not a child. She is an adult. Her parents are irrelevant at this point. I'll agree that her coach is to blame (he is the coach, after all), but when you are competing in a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and your 6 other teammates are counting on you in a team event, sometimes you just gotta do it.
Also, a broken ankle does not mean you'll never be able to walk again. Recovery is slow, but with much therapy, you will be able to walk normally again.
Some things to note: she didn't break her ankle. She suffered a 3rd degree lateral sprain (essentially she tore a couple of ligaments)–not really a threat to her ability to walk. As for her parents, they were there in the stands watching. But, as Mary says, that is irrelevant as she was 18 at the time and was more than capable of making her own decision about the second vault. She knew the risk just as much as those adult football players you mention do... She asked Karolyi if they needed a second vault from her and, at the time, they did if they wanted to guarantee a gold. Strug would later say to the media "This is the Olympics, this is what you dream about from when you're 5 years old. I wasn't going to stop." She wanted it just as badly as her coach...
I remember this young lady. The thing I remember most isn't that she won a gold medal with a broken ankle, it's that she sued her parents for emancipation because her father blew through all of HER money. I say good for her for finally being ready to tell the story from her point of view.
Houstonian, the young lady with the injury was one of Ms. Moceanu's teammates, Kerri Strug.
They put her sister up for adoption because she had a birth defect? What, they didn't want her if she couldn't be a gymnast? That's just awful.
Unfortunately, giving up children with birth defects used to be pretty much standard practice among eastern Europeans. When the USSR fell apart, there were many exposes about the children left abandoned in squalid orphanages due to defects, especially missing limbs. While she and her siblings were born in the US, her parents were from Romania, where this was pretty common.
Ironically, the sister who was given up for adoption due to her missing legs went on to do gymnastics.
Blah blah blah. . .my parents were mean . . blah blah . . .body image issues . . blah blah . . . "then I found out I have a sister born without legs who was put up for adoption and I never knew she existed. The end." Wait– what?? Why did this story end right when it was getting interesting?
to get you to buy the book, of course.
What kind of monster parents give up a child because she is born imperfect? I was reading this wondering what was so hard about Moceanu's life (hey, my mother destroyed my psyche, too, but at least you were supported in some way), when I got to that bombshell. Your parents must have been cold as ice.
The drive to be perfect should only come from within, and the obsession to be perfect should be tempered by the people who love and support you, especially the adults in your life. It's pitiful when parents forget their roles and foster obsession, and it's abominable when the paid adults in one's life push your obsession to new heights. It's not normal for little girls or teenagers to work out so hard they hurt themselves or stunt their own development. It's not courageous, it's not brave, it's not heroic. It's time everyone acknowledged that.
I know life have it's ups and downs. But we have the option to stay up or down.
Not when you are a child with strict parents.
Shilling...be honest...you have never experienced the bleakness of Clinical Depression. Hope u never are expected to pull urself out of that nightmare.
Ability and drive in a child is the parent's meal ticket.
And having experienced clinical depression, and cutting myself, while being physically abused for years, I can see where she had problems with what people told her and how people treated her. My grades never suffered during this time, and I would continually get praise for high grades and being smart. But I was also being beaten daily and told I was garbage.
Sometimes the ones who aren't quite able to make it are better off.
"When you are in the media spotlight as a 14 year old, most think you are having the time of your life – meeting celebrities, going on post-Olympic tours, making magazine covers, Wheaties boxes and photo shoots."
Really? I think it's part of the skewed body image/world view that would make a person think this.
I think whenever people look at the TV and see child stars they think "that kids life must be a hell of stage parenting and nonstop drilling/rehearsing/studying/performing".
I don't think ANYbody looks at those kids and thinks it's rainbows and candy. But, maybe I'm wrong.
I think this book took a LOT of courage to write. It not only exposes some of the deepest secrets of gymnastics training by the most famous coaches in the sport, but also revealed personal family secrets, which are usually "kept" in the family, making it even harder to write. Dominique was manipulated by fear, obligation and guilt by her phony and abusive coaches, who only perpetuated the abuse by getting her father to punish her even more at home. This young woman had NO ONE who had her back until she met her Aunt Janice and husband Mike. For those of you who have negative or snide comments, you should think twice before posting. When was the last time your childhood and teen years were being lived on the worlds tv? Dominique has been through a lot in her young life. One experience she did not write about, was her comeback in 2000 at 19. She lost her 2nd chance at olympic gold when she was injured at the Olympic Trials. That had to hit hard after getting so close to the Olys again after her very public emancipation and the dark place she went through following it. She went on to experience her familys home burning down, lost her father to cancer, and then discovered a sister she never knew for 20 years! Come on, I don't know many people who have been through that much before their 30th birthday. And even I have been through a lot myself. Dominique is a very brave young woman and I am so glad she shared her story with the world, exposing the TRUTH for all to see. I hope now she can move on with her life and live in love and happiness with her angel of a husband and two adorable children. I'm so glad she found someone who treats her with the love and respect she longed for all of her life.
Wow, awesome weblog format! How long have you ever been running a blog for? you made running a blog look easy. The entire glance of your web site is wonderful, as well as the content material!
Helpful information. Lucky me I discovered your site accidentally, and I am surprised why this accident didn't took place earlier! I bookmarked it.
Woah this blog is fantastic i like studying your posts. Stay up the great paintings! You realize, lots of individuals are looking round for this information, you can aid them greatly.
You can definitely see your skills within the work you write. The sector hopes for more passionate writers such as you who are not afraid to say how they believe. At all times follow your heart.
Fantastic publish, very informative. I ponder why the other specialists of this sector don't notice this. You should proceed your writing. I'm confident, you have a great readers' base already!|What's Taking place i am new to this, I stumbled upon this I've found It positively useful and it has aided me out loads. I hope to give a contribution & aid other customers like its helped me. Good job.
Great post. I used to be checking constantly this weblog and I am inspired! Extremely helpful information specially the closing phase 🙂 I care for such info much. I was looking for this particular information for a long time. Thanks and best of luck.
I beloved up to you will obtain carried out right here. The sketch is attractive, your authored material stylish. nonetheless, you command get got an edginess over that you want be handing over the following. sick undoubtedly come more until now again as precisely the same nearly a lot incessantly within case you shield this increase.
Nice weblog here! Also your site a lot up very fast! What web host are you the use of? Can I am getting your associate link for your host? I desire my site loaded up as quickly as yours lol
Thank you for any other informative website. The place else could I get that type of information written in such an ideal way? I have a project that I'm simply now operating on, and I've been on the glance out for such information.
Awesome issues here. I'm very happy to look your article. Thanks a lot and I'm taking a look ahead to contact you. Will you kindly drop me a e-mail?
I feel that is among the such a lot vital information for me. And i am happy reading your article. However should remark on some normal things, The website taste is wonderful, the articles is in point of fact excellent : D. Excellent process, cheers
I do agree with all the ideas you've offered on your post. They're really convincing and will certainly work. Nonetheless, the posts are very short for starters. May just you please prolong them a little from subsequent time? Thanks for the post.
Hi there, simply changed into aware of your blog through Google, and located that it's truly informative. I am going to watch out for brussels. I will appreciate if you happen to continue this in future. Many people will probably be benefited out of your writing. Cheers!
Hello There. I found your blog the usage of msn. That is an extremely well written article. I'll make sure to bookmark it and come back to read more of your useful information. Thank you for the post. I will certainly return.
Thanks a lot for sharing this with all people you actually recognize what you're talking about! Bookmarked. Kindly also consult with my website =). We may have a link exchange agreement among us
You're really a just right webmaster. The website loading velocity is amazing. It seems that you're doing any distinctive trick. In addition, The contents are masterwork. you've performed a fantastic task in this matter!
Thank you for any other informative site. The place else may just I get that type of info written in such a perfect approach? I have a project that I'm simply now running on, and I've been at the glance out for such info.
Valuable information. Lucky me I discovered your web site by chance, and I am shocked why this accident did not happened earlier! I bookmarked it.
Hello There. I discovered your blog the usage of msn. This is a really smartly written article. I'll make sure to bookmark it and return to learn extra of your helpful information. Thanks for the post. I'll certainly comeback.
Hey There. I discovered your weblog using msn. That is an extremely well written article. I'll be sure to bookmark it and return to read more of your useful info. Thanks for the post. I will definitely return.
I'm really impressed with your writing talents and also with the format on your weblog. Is this a paid topic or did you modify it your self? Either way stay up the excellent quality writing, it's uncommon to see a great weblog like this one these days..
Great beat ! I would like to apprentice whilst you amend your web site, how can i subscribe for a weblog web site? The account aided me a acceptable deal. I have been a little bit acquainted of this your broadcast provided bright clear idea
It is truly a great and useful piece of information. I am glad that you just shared this useful information with us. Please stay us informed like this. Thanks for sharing.
hi!,I really like your writing so so much! proportion we be in contact extra approximately your article on AOL? I require an expert in this area to resolve my problem. May be that is you! Taking a look ahead to peer you.
Hi there, simply was alert to your weblog thru Google, and located that it is really informative. I'm gonna be careful for brussels. I will appreciate in the event you proceed this in future. Many other people will probably be benefited from your writing. Cheers!