Okay so, I fell in love with St. Scholastica the first time I toured it. I mean it's hard not to, the school is a castle! Everything I saw I loved and the more I learned the more in love I fell! I liked the school so much, that even when the tour guide said they didn't have a ski team, I still liked it. That winter I found out they really do have a ski team, and a good one at that, and my obsession with the school was complete.
St. Scholastica has been my top choice school for over two years now and I'm excited to say that I've been accepted there!! Not only will I be there studying physical therapy, but I'll also be skiing for them on the developmental team!! They have an amazing physical therapy program and I'm really excited that they think I'm academically acceptable for their program haha. I'm going to have to make sure to constantly study. Instead of getting a dorm I'll just set up shop in the library! Speaking of which, their library is amazing! I love a good library.
Now while I'd like to go on about the school, this post is really me venting about the skiing. See I told my mother that I had talked to Chad (the head ski coach) and that I would be skiing for them next winter. I'm skiing for my dream team, the team I've been following for two years, the team I obsess over. Her response? She tells me that I shouldn't ski.
At first she was saying that I shouldn't ski because of my asthma. Then she told me that I shouldn't ski because I should have a normal college experience. That I should enjoy college. Okay, I'm going to break this down and explain why her response upsets me. Cause yes, this post is all about me me me.
Asthma. I'm not going to lie, I have terrible asthma. Like I don't know how I'm still alive asthma. It's cold and exercise induced, plus I have VCD (vocal chord dysfunction) which is also cold/irritant induced. So basically skiing could maybe, possibly kill me. I don't know, the doctor hasn't said anything and I take plenty of medications and precautions. Precautions such as wearing this mask when I ski, keeping an inhaler on me at all times, immediately going inside after a race, carrying back up inhalers, and making sure everyone knows where at least one of my inhalers are. Then when I'm racing I make sure there's someone at the finish with an inhaler. Really though, in the winter my biggest problem is the coughing. I've literally broken blood vessels in my face coughing. Other than that it's during the summer when I have the worst attacks.
The reason this upsets me is that if she wants me to give up the one thing that truly makes me happy because of my asthma, why can't she give up smoking? I've grown up around her second hand smoke and the doctor agrees that that's most likely why I developed asthma in the first place! If she's so worried, she should first consider putting down the death stick.
I don't know what she means by "normal college experience". Because if it's what I think she means, then she is not parenting correctly. I know that when she was my age she was a partier. I also know that a lot of my "friends" who have gone off to college spend a lot of time partying-not all of them, but a majority. Then from what I've seen from doing PSEO at ICC, there's a lot of partying going on. So is she telling me to go get drunk? I don't like partying like that, and prefer movies nights to drunken nights. There's more fun in it. Plus, I don't know what "normal" is. I'm Juli, I do whatever I want and it usually has nothing to do with whatever everyone else is doing.
And lastly I'd like to address the part about me enjoying college. First off, if I quit skiing for the normal college experience, I'm not going to enjoy it because that's not who I am. I've been in sports since preschool. I started competing in first grade, and I haven't stopped since. I enjoy sports. I love working out. I love doing a super hard workout that leaves you barely breathing and questioning your ability to move ever again. I love competing. I love being at that start line watching the clock tick down to your start as your heart hammers away. I love the feeling after you cross that finish line and you're barely able to make it out of the shoot. I love the becoming a family with the team. To think that I won't enjoy college because I'm skiing, just goes to show how little you know me.
Then there's the mere fact that she suggested that I stop skiing. That's preposterous!! Ever since I started skiing in seventh grade it's been my life. No matter what's going on in life I know that has long as I can ski it'll be all right. Just went through a bad breakup? Ski it off. Love of your life just left the country forever? A couple of really hard workouts will help. Just spent six hours studying for that chem final and still know you're going to fail? Go for a ski. Seriously, skiing makes me feel good inside. Even roller skiing lifts my spirits. Plus it gives me time to think. Like if I'm having troubles in life, I'll just go for a long ski and mull things over. The act of skiing just frees up my brain and makes thinking so much easier.
There's like a million reasons why I love to ski and none of them are coming out right. I guess all I can say is that skiing, and ski racing is such an important part of not only my life, but of who I am. If you ask my friends they'll describe me as this weird person who's obsessed with skiing. Literally, I talk about skiing all the time. And if not talking about it then I'm actually doing it.
I kept sending screenshots
of this sprint to everyone. Lol,
that's not what was meant by
"lung for the finish"
So I guess what really upsets me is that my own mother doesn't know me well enough to understand that for me, to quit skiing would be the same as to quit breathing. At first you're okay, but then you die.
Okay, I'll just leave you with this picture of my one true bae being all cute and stuff.
"No"
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