The Human Library
Being Cut From the Team
A college athlete, four years later.
What happened
I got cut. Not injured, not retired on my own terms — cut, in a meeting that lasted maybe ten minutes, from a sport that had organized my entire identity since I was nine years old. I didn't know how to be a person who wasn't an athlete, and suddenly I had to find out, immediately, with no warning and no plan.
What I wish people understood
That it wasn't just about the sport. It was the team, the routine, the version of myself I liked best, and the future I'd been building toward for a decade — all gone at once, without any of the closure an injury or a graduation would have given me.
What helped
Letting myself actually grieve it instead of immediately trying to "find my new thing." A coach from a rival program, of all people, who reached out just to say he was sorry and that he remembered what it felt like. Eventually, therapy — specifically finding someone who understood athlete identity, not just generic loss.
What didn't help
People telling me it "wasn't that deep" because it was "just a sport." Being encouraged to stay busy before I'd let myself feel anything. My own instinct to perform being fine within a week because I didn't want to seem dramatic about it.
What I know now
That I am not just the thing I used to do, even though it took losing it to actually believe that. I built a new sense of who I am — slower than I wanted, faster than I expected.
One thing I want someone else to hear
You're allowed to grieve something even if other people don't understand why it hurts this much. It was your whole life. Of course it hurts like it was.