00:00:08
Speaker 1: Welcome to Mind Over Mountain with me, Cheryl Strayed. This week, my guest is Paralympic swimmer, Christy Raleigh Crossley. In our conversation, Christy and I talk about their career as a collegiate swimmer, the accidents that led to life-altering injuries, and a dream that finally came true in Paris at the Paralympics in 2024. Let's listen to our conversation. Christy Raleigh Crossley, welcome to Mind Over Mountain.
00:00:34
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
00:00:37
Speaker 1: I'm glad to get this opportunity to chat with you. And before we started talking and recording, you said that you've had many lives like so many of us, but you really have.
00:00:48
Speaker 3: You've been an elite swimmer.
00:00:51
Speaker 1: For a long time in really two worlds, in the non-disabled world and now as a para-athlete. Can you take us back to the beginning? Where did your relationship with swimming begin? How did you fall in love with it?
00:01:05
Speaker 3: And how did you... start to take it seriously.
00:01:09
Speaker 2: So it's so funny. I'm in the process of actually writing my memoir. And so I'm literally have all of these memories, like right on the cusp of like, having just put them down on paper. And for me, so my father, he was an all American swimmer in college, he was great. He had records, you know, until I was a elite athlete. But We did all the sports and we grew up doing soccer, baseball. I was on the Little League All-Star team when I was 10 with all the boys. I was on a boys basketball team. We did all the sports. But swimming, it was definitely watching the 1996 Olympics. I remember we had met Beth Bosford before she went to swim. So I was very excited. involved in watching her race her backstroke, but Amy Van Dyken, who has now become somebody that I look up to as a wheelchair advocate, and watching her swim and race and win the 100 butterfly in Atlanta was just like, I want to do that. I want to be an Olympian. I want to win the 100 butterfly. And I was 10, and it was like, okay... What sport do you want to do? And I was like, swimming. It's all year round because I had to pick between swimming and soccer. I was good at both. And it was really, I decided at 10 that this was going to be my life. And then I was already a state champion. We were bouncing around teams. And when I was 14, I ended up winning YMCA nationals. All of the things that I wanted to do my freshman year of high school, I succeeded in. In doing like it was like all my high school goals happened the first year. So we just made a move to Florida. I went to a prep school down here and it was we were full in. You know, I was that crazy kid that moved twelve hundred miles away from their family to pursue their sport. So it was I mean.
00:03:17
Speaker 1: Right.
00:03:17
Speaker 3: So your family didn't move. You moved yourself.
00:03:20
Speaker 2: So my first year was just me. My sophomore year, I went to swim camp. And I, the summer before sophomore year, and I asked my parents, can I stay the summer? And then I was like, can I stay here? And they had been looking at boarding schools for me. And they were like, I guess. So I moved in with a host family and I lived with them until the mom got cancer. And it was just too much for her to have me come the next year. So we had a split household where one parent was living in New Jersey and then one parent was living here in Florida. And our family kind of just figured it out and made it work.
00:03:57
Speaker 3: So you guys made a lot. I mean, not just you made a lot of sacrifices.
00:04:00
Speaker 1: Your family did big time. And your dreams did come true. Like you said, by the time you're a freshman in high school, you're like, okay, all those goals that I set for myself, I've already achieved them.
00:04:15
Speaker 3: What happened?
00:04:16
Speaker 1: How did you make your way to college? What level were you working at and swimming at at that point?
00:04:23
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:04:23
Speaker 2: So in high school, the focus obviously was let's make an Olympic team. Let's do that. Let's make division one roster. So I was a heavily recruited swimmer coming out of high school. I looked at schools like University of Florida, University of Kentucky, UCLA, I was in love with. And then I ended up at Florida State University. And so the high school goals became like, okay, let's, let's go to college. And then in college, it was, I want to be the best swimmer And that started off my freshman year winning the ACC's individually and then going on and as a freshman getting ninth at NCAA's. And yeah, so it was just we kept progressing forward and forward and we were hoping to make it onto that Beijing Olympic team. But unfortunately, a drunk driver prevented that from happening and we had to. Step away, regroup, figure out a new life and go on.
00:05:32
Speaker 3: Make a new plan. So tell me about that. It was 2007. And you tell me about the accident and what changed your trajectory.
00:05:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it was 2007. And I was there was a lot of stuff that was going on in my family's life, in my personal life, stuff that I was dealing with that had happened to me. It was a lot. And I had this wonderful college boyfriend. His name was Nick. His name is Nick. Still Nick. He was a cheerleader.
00:06:09
Speaker 3: Still Nick. He's still Nick. He was a.
00:06:12
Speaker 2: Cheerleader for Florida State. And he was very much an escape from swimming. And we were off. He was this big, you know, big, strong man. And we were off at a friend's. was doing a promotional thing for one of the bars in Tallahassee. And we went to go support our friends. We weren't, we weren't a part of it. We were there to kind of work and help with like the staffing and stuff on the drive home. We were pulling up to a light that was, that has was turning red. And as we slowed down, we were going about, I think 30, 35 miles an hour and, And suddenly we were just hit from behind. And I later came to find out because a former Florida State teammate who had gotten released from the team prior, he was in that car. He was one of the passengers and he posted about on Facebook because this was in 2007 when people were just posting anything and not realizing the internet was forever. And he posted, oh, we got into this crazy car accident last night and I messaged him and was like, Hey, like what happened? He was like, Oh my God, it was crazy. We were going between like night, like 70 and 90 miles an hour. And like, we just slammed into the back of this car. And I was like, Oh, that's crazy. Who do you know who you hit? And he was like, no, I have no idea, but they took them off in an ambulance. I was like, it was me. And he knew in that instant, like, Oh wow. Cause I was at that time, like I didn't swim well at NCAAs, but I was fifth in the country at the time. In my best event. And it's the year before the Olympics. And it's like, he was a swimmer. He knew, like, oh, this is bad. Like, we just... Right.
00:08:00
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, just on the human level, it's bad.
00:08:04
Speaker 1: But he knew, too, what an impact this would have on your ambitions to make the Olympic team.
00:08:11
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:08:11
Speaker 2: And it was... It was devastating. It was a loss of identity. I was told, listen, you're never going to swim as well as you did before. I had all of these, um, discs bulging in my neck. I mean, I still have them. They still are continuing to cause more and more problems. Um, as they like close in on the spinal cord, it's, it's not a good situation in my neck, but that all started back in 2007. And so we were told, like, listen, swimming's not going to really happen. And so I just was like, OK, I guess I'm going to be a college kid. And I was hanging out with the cheerleaders. I would just go to cheerleading practice and just watch them. And I was like the cheerleader of the cheerleaders. And I worked in bars.
00:08:57
Speaker 3: Somebody's got to cheer the cheerleaders on.
00:08:59
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:09:00
Speaker 3: So at this point, you were like 20 or 19? I was 20 years old.
00:09:02
Speaker 2: And so that was like that year of college was just... it was, if it wasn't for Nick, um, I, I don't know what would have happened. Like he definitely kept it my world centered after having lost that identity. Um, and he was definitely the person that I needed in my life at that time. And, you know, they say that people come into your lives when you need them and then they leave when you, you no longer do. And, um, He was very supportive of me when I decided that I wanted to go back to swimming after the 2008 Olympics. I watched all my friends break world records like Rebecca Soni broke a world record. I'd been swimming with her since we were little kids and I just I wasn't done with the sport. And so I packed up in a week and moved to Baltimore and Nick supported me. We tried to do the long distance thing. It did not work. We were far too young for that. But I do credit him so much for being the person that I needed to get through that time because I wasn't at a place where I could be the person that I needed.
00:10:16
Speaker 1: I can imagine, as you said, you're not only watching the Olympics and knowing that you had set your sights on this for years and you wanted to be there and you weren't there, but you even had that kind of intimacy with actually knowing some of the people who were competing in the Olympics in the sports that, in this very sport that you had, you know, there's never any guarantee, but you had a good shot at, right? And a lot of people watching that would have spiraled down even further into a sense of despair and doom. And instead for you, it was an inspiration. You're like, I'm not done. I'm getting back in the pool, whatever it takes. Take us inside that, the psychology of that. What made you feel motivated rather than defeated by watching someone else's dreams come true, the dream that you had had?
00:11:11
Speaker 2: I guess it was because I had already spiraled so far and I was already at the bottom. And so to see the you know, the dream that I had had that had taken me, you know, away from all my family and friends, you know, it was still like, I had, I had faith in myself. I, I was a very, very, I don't want to use the word egotistical, although it is a very fitting word for who I was back then, but I was a very self-confident individual. And I had this delusional thought that like, it didn't matter what somebody had said. I was going to figure out a way to do it because I mean, my dad was always like, no one's going to tell you, no, you're going to figure out a way to do it. And that's how I was raised by him. And it was always, there's, there's a solution to every problem. I'm a, I'm a math nerd. And so it's like, I love to solve problems. And it was just like the next problem to solve. And I didn't up until that point, I didn't realize that I still wanted it. So I think that it was this whole like reigniting of the fire of like watching these friends do it. And and and also I think maybe there's something to be said about, you know, they say that like deja vu is not really deja vu. It's just you experiencing a part of your life that hasn't happened yet. And so like, it's like our lives, we've already lived all these lives. And so things that you dream about and that you like really feel are possible are things that have already happened in another timeline for you. And so you just have to get yourself to that point. So I had, I guess this just deep understanding that one day i would i don't want to i don't want to get emotional that one day i would eventually you can get emotional be on top of that podium and you know watch the flag rise and hear the star spangled banner being played for my accomplishments so like i don't it was just like this internal pull of like you've got to go you've got to go do this um.
00:13:32
Speaker 1: Yeah So you went to Baltimore. What, what was in Baltimore? What was that next step in your climb over the mountain?
00:13:49
Speaker 2: So it's the swimming world is a very small world. So it's like, yes, like people are like, Oh, Katie Ledecky. Like people know these Olympians names, but like for us, it's like, it's a very small world. Like these are the people that we see. I mean, my daughter ran over Katie Ledecky's foot with my wheelchair one time during a race. Like We live in a very, very small world. We all knew that after Beijing, Michael Phelps would be coming back to Baltimore, which is where he had grown up. He had purchased the team with Bob Bowman, and they were going to go back to MBAC, and there was going to be this collegiate post-grad thing um group that was gonna train for London there and so I knew that this was happening I had a distinct cousin that lived in Baltimore who had a spare room and it was like yeah come over here and and we'll figure this out and we'll do it and I I packed up my life into the Toyota 4Runner that my dad had bought for me and drove to Baltimore without ever talking to the team. And I walked into the pool one day and I was just like, hey, can I swim here? And they were like, uh, I guess we can see. And I was at this point, I hadn't swam in over a year and a half. I was probably 30 pounds overweight and North Baltimore Aquatic is known for putting out distance swimmers, like 400 IMers. I mean, that's Bob Bowman's specialty of like those distance. And here I am a sprinter, not at all what they're expecting. And they're like, yeah, I guess we could figure out if it works. And I worked very hard with my coach, Paul Yetter. And we got to a point where he was like, okay. And he said something to me that to this day sticks. He's he said, Christy and Paul, Paul himself is also an Olympic coach. He was Katie Hoff's coach. He coached her to her gold medals. Um, he said to me, Christy, I think you're the greatest swimmer that nobody knows about. And at, you know, 21, 22, like that hit me so hard. And I was just like, for a coach to have that much confidence in you and be ready to buy all in, like I was all into, um, Hmm.
00:16:21
Speaker 3: That's, that's amazing.
00:16:22
Speaker 1: What did it feel like to, to have to rebuild your body again? You know, that you, that you've, you're not in the swimming shape that you'd been in, frankly, for, since you were a kid, right? How, how was that to, to get back in there and get back, get your body and your swimming back?
00:16:40
Speaker 2: So if we actually rewind, um, a couple of months before I did that, I was home for my sister's high school graduation. And I was hit by a car as a pedestrian.
00:16:54
Speaker 3: And so I.
00:16:55
Speaker 2: So a second car accident, right? Second car accident, yes. So I ended up on the hood of the car after there was this whole... It's a very elaborate story, but the gist... I went after somebody because they had attacked my friend and I. They got in their car as they were pulling away. I was on the phone with 911. They hit me. I ended up on the hood of the car. They turned, I went 10 feet in the air and came down on my head and I was still on the phone with 911. And I said, I just put the phone. I said, I was just hit by a car. We're also going to need an ambulance. And then I handed the phone to my best friend as I was still laying in what I found out was a pool of my own blood.
00:17:42
Speaker 3: And, um, Yeah, it was crazy.
00:17:45
Speaker 2: The cop who showed up on scene, I started just rattling off. I was like, this is the car. This is the make the model. I said, you'll find my handprint on the front windshield. He was wearing a white undershirt and gray basketball shorts. And the cop was like, how.
00:18:03
Speaker 4: Do you know this?
00:18:03
Speaker 2: And I was like, I was on the hood. I was on the windshield of the car. And he was like, oh my God, he was, and he looked at my friend. He was like, what do you guys do? And we were ocean lifeguards at the time. And she was like, we're ocean lifeguards. Like we're so used to having to give that information.
00:18:19
Speaker 3: During like mass casualty or.
00:18:21
Speaker 2: Like emergency events that like, it was just second nature for me to rattle it off. But now I look back and I'm like that, that must've been an insane moment for that cop to like, have this person just laying. And I was also evaluating myself. I was like, I can feel my feet. I'm wiggling my toes.
00:18:38
Speaker 1: Right.
00:18:41
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
00:18:41
Speaker 1: And also to be on the phone with 911 as you yourself then need 911. So that's also then in the, in the rear view mirror, by the time you're, you're standing there in Baltimore out of shape saying like, Hey coach, sign me up. You have had these two accidents that have harmed you.
00:19:03
Speaker 3: Both psychologically and physically.
00:19:04
Speaker 1: These accidents are what eventually led you to the paraswim world.
00:19:11
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:19:11
Speaker 2: And so we didn't know the extent of it. And I swam that entire time at North Baltimore. And then when I went back and swam collegiately again with my sister, I swam that whole time with this paraswim. blood tumor growing in my brain that we just didn't know about. And I was just progressively getting more and more disabled. But when we look back, I'm very fortunate to, like I said, people come into your lives and give you the lessons that you need to learn because getting myself in shape in Baltimore, the things that Paul taught me there and the, like this thought of like, it doesn't matter where I am today. I know where I can get, because by the end of the, not even a year with Paul, I was already going faster times than I was going when I was at Florida state. So I was already faster. I was, I was at that point ranked in the world. And I was like, if I can do this in 10 months, like who, I can I can do this like this is something that I knew the blueprint then for what to do. It wasn't this idea of like pushing yourself to the limit. It was like Paul would be like, I think you're done for today. And I would think I still had more to left to go. And he'd be like, no, you're done. And then there was some drills that he had me doing that would like shock my system to put me in like glycogen deficit so that I could just cut body fat only and retain muscle. And like he had so much science behind it. And he got me in shape so fast that when I would go back to swimming, because that's a repetitive thing in my life is I've stepped away. I've come back. I've stepped away. That's first step back in with Paul. in 2008 showed me that it didn't matter if it was a short amount of time I would be able to do great things and that's how I ended up only training for 13 weeks and winning NCAAs after I had my first daughter like it's how I came back to para swimming I just I knew that I would be able to do it if I just stayed dedicated and followed the things that I had learned from Paul in 2008. So that really was super, super important to go from like being super out of shape to then obviously being ranked in the world.
00:21:37
Speaker 3: And it's a powerful thing.
00:21:38
Speaker 1: Like you said, it's like once you, there are certain experiences we have in life where it's like, oh, I've learned this about my capacity or my ability to overcome or to, you know, I might not look like I'm going to be able to get there at this moment, but I trust that I will be able to and my body knows that it can. And that's like something that never goes away. And it sounds like that's something that you have over and over again learned pulled out of the hat to lead to your success.
00:22:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like I said, as I'm writing my memoir, it's where we keep going through these reoccurring themes. And I joke, it's like the Taylor Swift song. I think I've seen this film before. And it's like, You already know how it can go either good or bad. And so you take the lessons learned from there of like when you've made a mistake and then it happens again in your life to go, oh, wait, no, no, no. I'm not going to let this happen. And I think that for me, my life has changed. been cyclical in so many ways that like, I've been able to really go, this is the exact same lesson. Whereas other people, you know, have to discern applying lessons. I've been super fortunate that I get the same lesson just handed to me over and over again.
00:22:59
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of us do.
00:23:01
Speaker 1: And so much of life is like paying attention and Because sometimes you get handed the lesson and you keep not learning what you're meant to learn.
00:23:11
Speaker 3: And it doesn't lead to success.
00:23:13
Speaker 1: It leads to a kind of repeated failure or a kind of downward spiral.
00:23:17
Speaker 3: And you've gone up and up and up.
00:23:19
Speaker 1: I want to, you know, you have had this really, like, as I said, when we first started, you have had many lives. And I want to kind of fast forward a bit to your career as a para swimmer. I know along the way, we will talk about this more in a little bit, but like you're also a mother. As you said, you had your first child when you were really still a collegiate athlete.
00:23:45
Speaker 3: Is that right?
00:23:46
Speaker 2: So I had my oldest when I was 23. I had left college and unfortunately, it was a very awful marriage. And when I left my marriage, I moved in with my sister. And my sister was competing for Rowan University on the swim team. And so it was just an opportunity to swim with my sister again. And it was awesome because I had moved away from her when I was only 15. And so we missed a lot of a lot of our like growing up together. And so it was this opportunity to swim with her. And we got to be on relays together and we had school records together. But I swam for, like I said, 13 weeks. It was just like, hey, you're going through a divorce. Why don't you come move in with us and swim? And so I swam spring semester and... It was great. It was fun.
00:24:45
Speaker 3: It was what I needed.
00:24:47
Speaker 1: But at the same time, you still have your eye on the prize, right? You still want to be an Olympian. Are you still or is that that gets set aside by motherhood and specifically single motherhood?
00:25:00
Speaker 2: In that time, that was not on my wavelength at all. It was swimming wasn't even on. Like I said, it was it was them saying to me, hey, my sister's coach being like, hey, I could get you in school. I can get you accepted. Do you want to come? And it was like, okay, well, there's this thing that I can do.
00:25:18
Speaker 3: It's swim fast.
00:25:18
Speaker 2: And like, this is a chance for me to give some stability to my daughter because she was so young and I wanted her to be around my sister and family and all of that stuff and make the transition easier. I mean, she was so used to it being just the two of us during the days always. So it wasn't that big of a change for her. But it was this opportunity to go back to school and, you know, get a new degree and try to better my life in that sense. So like for a lot of swimmers in particular, the pull is to get your college education. You know, now there's so much with the NIL deal where kids can actually make money. But back then it was just this is a way to get a degree and it's an opportunity. And so let's take it. And so I saw it there. But I at that point in my life, I had given up on that dream. I had it was not something that was thinking to me. And it was actually something. Unfortunately, it was said to me at that point, like our family, you know, sacrificed so much. And what? Look at you. You didn't even make the Olympics. And, you know, that was. there was this evil that was just there always hovering over my career. And at that point, I just wanted to be a mom. My sole focus was her. And I didn't see at that point that there was a possibility of doing both. I was single. There was no support systems really in place for it. When I was swimming, there were instances where I was being made to feel bad about it there was sabotage going on it was just it was not a healthy situation in that structure to be able to still think about that um but it just my focus was being a mom and even now right now I swim before my kids wake up like who I am as a swimmer like yes they'll pop on videos with me They come to meets occasionally. They love to do commercials and that stuff when we get the opportunities. But my swimming box closes before my children wake up. And it's the way that I figured out that it's possible. And that's how we do it. So like my focus is always going to be on my children and being their mom. And swimming just gives me opportunities to give them the life that they deserve. And that's how I've really viewed it now. Yes, it's my dreams, but I do it for them. I do it so that they can, you know, see the world, have cool experiences, pay the light bill, you know, things like that.
00:28:13
Speaker 3: All that stuff.
00:28:14
Speaker 1: But yeah, now you have three kids, but how did you find your way back then?
00:28:19
Speaker 3: You know, you're back there. You're like, okay, the dream didn't come true.
00:28:22
Speaker 1: My family is being mean to me about it, or maybe not your whole family, but at least some members of your family. And now I have to essentially focus on something else. But here you are talking to me as quite a champion swimmer, a para swimmer.
00:28:40
Speaker 3: How did you find your way to.
00:28:44
Speaker 2: So once I married my now ex-husband there, he didn't like me being out in the world. Like he didn't like me working. He wanted me to be home with the kids, taking care of the kids. But I knew I needed something. And so I was like, hey, like he was he was a gym guy. guy so he understood me wanting to work out so I would be like oh I want to go swim again I think I want to swim again I think this is what I want to do is a way for me to be able to get out of my house um and it was it that was really I had figured it out in 2016 that I still did want it because there was those years where I just didn't and in 2016 is when things started to like go pretty south. It was the first year of our marriage, but it started, that's when the cracks started to show in what was happening. Because you don't know coercive control when you're first getting into it. It's something that builds. But we were watching the Olympics and my son, he took his first steps during the Olympics. We were watching track and field and he started walking towards the TV. And it was very, very early because he's born in September. So this was he was like nine and a half months. He was born premature. He was born at 34 weeks prematurely. So for him to hit a milestone like that so far ahead, I was just like, oh, that's so awesome. And just those Olympics, watching it with my kids, I was like, okay, maybe I do want to still do this. And then as things got worse in the marriage, that was my way to say like, oh, I'm going to go swim. I'm going to try to make the Tokyo Olympics. And I was training for the Tokyo Olympics when I had my injury. So when I had my brain injury in 2018, I was already training. I would, I didn't tell anybody. It wasn't this like, you know, wasn't announcing it on social media.
00:30:48
Speaker 3: I was just.
00:30:49
Speaker 2: Quietly training every day, getting ready for your dream for yourself.
00:30:55
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:30:55
Speaker 2: Cause you have to be in the testing pool for two years. Like you have to be available to be in the testing pool. So I like quietly, you know, got my USA swimming registration redone. And like, I was preparing to make that re-entrance in January of 2019. And December of 2018 is when everything really got started.
00:31:23
Speaker 1: Right.
00:31:23
Speaker 3: You had a brain injury. You were hit in the head by a big chunk of ice, I understand.
00:31:29
Speaker 2: Yes.
00:31:31
Speaker 3: Tell us what happened. What did that lead to?
00:31:35
Speaker 2: So we, um, my oldest daughter, that was her first year that she was going to do race skiing. And so we lived about 40 minutes from the mountain where we lived in Jersey city. And so I had taken the kids out of school to get our season passes done on the first, the opening day. So like I picked them up early from school as a Friday and we went to the mountain and we got our passes process. They got their pictures taken. And we just didn't want it. We wanted to beat the crowds. And so there was still time. So we went outside and there was snow. I say that very loosely. And we were having a little like snowball fight. It was very sweet, cute. And my son, he had just turned three. He didn't know any better. He is on the autism spectrum. He's also he has ADHD. So he has low tone in his wrist. So his ability to pack a snowball at three, it was not happening. And so here is his sister and I packing snowballs, throwing them at each other. He took his enormous strength that he has because he's a super, super strong kid. And he picked up. this boulder of ice. And when I say boulder, it was like this big and he picked it up and he just dropped it on my head. And I was like, ow, that really hurt. Like, dude, you can't do that. But I didn't, I wasn't unconscious, nothing like that. I didn't think it was serious. And then we started to drive home. I was like, okay, we're going to head home. So we started to drive home before the sun went down and I'm driving down the mountain and And all of a sudden my right eye starts twitching. And I later found out that like all of your nerves are cross body. So like everything in the right controls the left, except for your eyes. So the fact that it was my right eye that was twitching makes sense. My right eye started to twitch and I was like, oh, that was really weird. And I remember like thinking about it. And then like my left arm was just getting heavier. And I just felt this like, pull again that pull of like you have to go here and I just needed to get home and so my focus was solely on getting home and so I got home and um I called my ex-husband husband at the time and I was like hey we're coming here but something's wrong and so we get out of the car and I went to unload the um ski stuff from the back of the car and I pulled it out of my Tahoe trunk And I had it in my right arm. And then I went to put it in my left arm and the bag just dropped to the floor. I had no strength whatsoever in my left arm. And I was like, this is really weird. And so I knew that I needed to go to the hospital. My husband at the time was never somebody who would go to the hospital with me. I was always driving myself to the hospital or if you know, there was some other medical stuff that had happened, like, and I would have to take myself. And so that was just a normal thing, but I knew I couldn't drive. So I called up one of my friends and I was like, Hey, can you drive me to the hospital? She came and she picked me up. And she said that driving there, I was talking. And then all of a sudden I stopped and she just looked at me and I couldn't. And I remember trying to get words out and I couldn't, and it was very weird. I didn't know what was happening. And I just walked into the hospital and I was like, something's wrong with my left side. I don't know. I, I, uh, something's wrong. And I didn't tell them that I had gotten hit in the head. That wasn't what I had said to them. I was just like, something's wrong. And cause I didn't think it was that bad. I didn't think that the, the impact was that bad, but obviously I didn't know that there was a blood tumor in my brain and he hit me right where the blood tumor was and my brain was bleeding. And I had no idea. So like, When your brain's.
00:35:35
Speaker 1: Bleeding, obviously you're... And to be clear, it was a blood tumor that had been there from the previous car accident.
00:35:43
Speaker 2: It had been growing, they believe, since the car accident. Yes. And it's actually, it's what killed the runner Flojo. So she had the same malformation in her brain. Hers ruptured in her sleep and she died. And so it was this ticking time bomb that we didn't know about. And... So my, bless my son's heart, you know, he'll, he'll tell people, he's like, yeah, I hit her in the head. And I'm like, but you saved my life. You know, we always look at the positive of the thing. Like, yes, it caused me to have a brain injury, but if I didn't, like, it was still there. It was still growing. We look back on like the videos from me swimming at NCAAs in 2012, you know, And I'm walking up to the block and you could see my left foot has foot drop. I'm dropping my arm on the left side. Like there was already neurological showings, but I was a clumsy person. So like me falling all the time and running into things and not feeling things and having pain in that side I just I always attributed it to something else. Also, there was this element of growing up an athlete like suck it up. If it's not killing you, then keep going. And that was like how I was raised. So we just kept pushing forward. So I'm blessed that we found it. But it ended up being a situation where. you know, it needed to be removed. My quality of life wasn't going to be the best. I was super fortunate that my good friend from college at Florida State is one of the greatest neurosurgeons in the country. And I was able to call him and he was at Harvard Mass General at the time. And I was like, hey, Myron, like, this is what they're telling me. And he was like, you need to get into brain surgery. This is what we're going to do. He walked me through exactly how brain surgery works, the mapping of the brain, the cutting open of the skull. Like he just, he gave it to me all. So when I finally got into my surgeon's office at NYU and they were like, well, we think surgery would be an option. I was like, cool. When? And they were like, What? Because they're looking at me. I'm by myself in this appointment. And they're like, this girl's agreeing to brain surgery, like after five minutes, like you don't need to think about it. I was like, no, it's a problem. We remove it. And that's it. It's that thing. Like there's a problem.
00:38:01
Speaker 3: We solve it. Correct me if I'm wrong.
00:38:03
Speaker 1: So you had this surgery and got that tumor removed.
00:38:06
Speaker 3: Thank goodness. But then you were.
00:38:09
Speaker 1: Left with physical disabilities caused by this surgery or by the injury to begin with. Then that's what led you to be classified as a para-athlete. Is that correct? It's not the brain injury itself. It's the physical impairments that resulted.
00:38:28
Speaker 2: So for me, my brain injury, when they removed that part of my brain, it left me with what's called hemiparesis. So the left side of my body is not as strong as the right. So I have a lot of muscle atrophy. on my left side because those neurotransmitters just don't work anymore. Those pathways don't send signal to like make those muscles work properly. And then also I have what's called dystonia, which is when your muscles go into spasm. Um, it's very common. You see with people with Parkinson's where they're, they get stuck in a position of posturing, um, And then now we've actually learned that because of the posturing that I have in my arm, I now have permanent nerve damage. And so like my left hand, like I continue to lose, I continue to lose more and more function in my left hand as I lose nerves permanently. because the nerve is being stopped by my posturing. So yeah, the brain injury was the catalyst for it. And then the brain is how the brain is. And it does crazy things.
00:39:46
Speaker 1: It controls everything else. We forget that sometimes. So let's get to your career as a para swimmer. You obviously were left with physical impairments after this brain surgery. How did you decide to enter into the para world and enter into competition? Were you familiar with swimming? the Paralympics and parasports and paraswimming before this injury?
00:40:22
Speaker 2: So I was vaguely familiar. Obviously, I knew about Pastores, Oscar, being the blade runner and wanting to run in the Olympics. And so I knew of the Paralympics on that side, but even now, the Paralympics is not something that's extremely visible to many, especially here in the United States. I mean, it doesn't get the same coverage that the Olympics gets, unfortunately. As Paralympians, we don't get the same opportunities as Olympians. I mean, I know that I joke about, oh, swimming pays for the electric bill. But in all reality, it's like, we make maybe $ 1, 600 a month as swimmers. There's no real like money in it unless you're fortunate enough to have connections, to have sponsors and all of that stuff. And that just has not been the case for me. So it's, it's the peril world is not very well known. The equity is not there. And so, right. I didn't know.
00:41:34
Speaker 1: So you knew about it in like that general sense, like the big stars had entered your consciousness, but you weren't yet thinking of yourself as one.
00:41:44
Speaker 2: I knew that if you could, if you used a wheelchair at all times and right after my injury, I was not using a wheelchair. I was pushing a stroller like it was a rollator. I was, you know, I was using a cane. I wasn't at that point using a wheelchair. Things hadn't progressed. I mean, I would get told like, you should be using a wheelchair. And I would be like, F that, you know, like, that was not anything I ever wanted in my in my world. And even now, like I have family members that like, if they see me in a wheelchair, they're like, oh, she's doing it for attention. And I'm like, I'm doing it so that I could get through the day with my kids. You know, like nobody criticizes people for wearing glasses when their vision starts going at an older age, you know? So like it's, I just didn't know that I was eligible. There wasn't that visibility of people who are ambulatory wheelchair users. Like that wasn't, something that was evident invisible disability. Yeah. And I, you can't measure my disability with a measuring stick and like it. And so it's, it's a more subjective thing and that's been a whole other situation, but I just didn't know that I was eligible. And I mean, my neurosurgeon who.
00:43:05
Speaker 3: Was, how did you figure that out? How did you figure that out?
00:43:09
Speaker 2: So I figured it out because I saw another Paralympian on TV during the Olympics, during the Tokyo Olympics. And she was standing there wearing shorts. And I was like, she's not in a wheelchair. What's wrong with her? So I looked her up. And I was like, oh, okay. And then that made me look up what makes you eligible for the Paralympics. And so I immediately messaged my neurosurgeon. And like I said, he was the chief of neurosurgery at NYU, the number one neurosurgery hospital in the country. And he wasn't aware that I was eligible for the Paralympics. He knew I had been trying to swim and I wanted to go back and try to make the Olympics after brain surgery. But that wasn't within his scope of medicine. And I was like, hey, does this do I have this? Cause it sounds like I do. And he was like, yeah. And so then that, at that point it was like, oh, okay. I'm eligible. Now, what do we do to like get involved? And that became an even bigger thing because there it's not like, there's not this set like pathway into Paralympic sports. Like parents have to like figure it out themselves. And I've worked with a lot of parents now that like, they have never heard of para sports and their kids are, you know, bilateral club feet. Their kids have, you know, severe cerebral palsy. And they just, they're not told because it's not part of scope of medicine to tell kids about sports.
00:44:43
Speaker 1: It sounds like even you, I mean, you're talking about kids, but for yourself as an adult and a really honestly, an elite swimmer in this world already, um, it was a revelation for you that you could be in it. So you did reenter and pretty much from the beginning started having pretty big successes. Your first time in competition- I believe it was like in the 2023 World Championship that you, you know, went right in there and took the gold for the backstroke.
00:45:17
Speaker 3: Is that, is that, am I, am I framing that right?
00:45:21
Speaker 1: I mean, it's obviously wasn't your first time in the pool, but your first time officially as a para swimmer in a big competition like that.
00:45:29
Speaker 2: Yeah. So it, it's, I had to not think about myself as the swimmer that I was because the times that that I was swimming and like breaking American records, winning world championships. They were times that I went when I was a middle schooler. And so I was sitting here like, oh, you're the fastest there ever was. Like I have the world record in the 50 meter backstroke for the S9 classification. And it's a time that I went when I was 14. And so there's this like, you have to just put away who you ever were. And thankfully I didn't swim a lot of long distance or a lot of long course. Cause there's different, there's different lengths. There's a short course pool and a long course pool. So I know a lot of my short course times from when I was growing up. Cause that's the American system. But yeah, like I, even now, like I look at the times, like what I won, like, the Paralympics in my favorite event, the 100 butterfly. In 2024 in Paris.
00:46:47
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think maybe I went 105, maybe. That's the time that I went when I was, you know, 14, 15 years old.
00:46:58
Speaker 2: And so it's a Paralympic record. It's an America's record.
00:47:03
Speaker 3: It's an American record.
00:47:04
Speaker 2: But it's not a Christie record. And I think that that has been the part about it that's been so hard is because people don't really give validity to who I was as a swimmer before. And I'm like, you guys don't understand. Like I used to do this easily when I was a kid and it's not for lack of, cause I'm in better shape as an adult. Cause I have to be, um, than arguably I was when I was a younger kid and had distractions. Um, Different distractions, obviously. But yeah, it was a very hard thing to mentally grapple with.
00:47:49
Speaker 1: In spite of, obviously, the many, many ups and downs and challenges you faced and the in and out of the sport, you did finally find yourself in that place where your longtime dream came true at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Paralympics and you didn't just make the team. You won five medals.
00:48:11
Speaker 3: How did that feel?
00:48:13
Speaker 1: And tell me about that, essentially that fruition, the fruition of that.
00:48:17
Speaker 3: Dream, how that landed on you.
00:48:19
Speaker 2: It was this, like, it was the happiest. I like, I see pictures and I look happy and I know that I was happy and I was excited that my kids were getting to, you know, their mom just won and their mom was doing all these great things. Um, But I couldn't celebrate it because I had another task that needed to happen next. There was always another thing next happening. So it was great for that brief moment. But I think that a lot of Olympians and Paralympians they chase that high and then it is a moment and it's gone. And then they don't know how to like rebound from that. But for me, I had so much other stuff that I needed to just keep doing and keep moving forward that I don't, it's maybe a blessing that I don't remember it because then I can't be sad about like not feeling it anymore. But I know that I felt very, very proud that my kids got to see it happen and that they were there and that they were going to be proud of me and that it was something that they were going to get to like, because I know I used to be so proud of my dad. I used to go and sneak down and look at his trophies when I was a kid and I was just in awe of what he had done. So I, I hope that I could be that for them.
00:49:50
Speaker 3: Well, that brings me to this letter.
00:49:53
Speaker 1: That I have that I'd love if you could help me answer it.
00:49:57
Speaker 3: Can I read it to you? Yes, ma'am.
00:50:00
Speaker 1: Dear Sugar, My husband and I went through a lot to become parents, miscarriages, IVF, and the financial debt that came with it. And finally, our beautiful daughter was born. She's now seven and we love her more than words can express. I want to say that before I tell you why I'm writing to you. It seems like I'm breaking a taboo to even write these words that are weighing so heavily on my heart and mind.
00:50:24
Speaker 3: Sometimes I find it very difficult to be a mom.
00:50:27
Speaker 1: My daughter has always been what is referred to as high needs, colicky as a baby and temperamentally sensitive all along. A few months ago, she was diagnosed with high functioning autism. Because my husband works a job that requires more than full-time hours and regular travel, most of the parenting falls to me alone. My daughter is affectionate, fun, and smart, but she's also extremely defiant and difficult.
00:50:50
Speaker 3: A lot of the time.
00:50:52
Speaker 1: And I often find myself stressed, angry, and overwhelmed. I'm crying as I write this because I feel like a bad mom to be complaining about my beloved child, who truly is the light of my life. But on the other hand, it feels good to cry and to get these words out of my head. I love my family, but some days I feel like my idea of what my family would be doesn't match the reality I'm living.
00:51:14
Speaker 3: And I'm sad about that. Is it awful of me to be sad for that reason, sugar? It feels awful.
00:51:20
Speaker 1: How do I accept my life for what it is and be grateful for all the things in it? How do I stop feeling overwhelmed, angry, and stressed? I want to be the best mom to my daughter that I can be. I want to be a strong advocate for her. I know this will take a shift in my mindset, but I need some words of advice or support to help me make that shift.
00:51:40
Speaker 3: Thank you. Signed, Overwhelmed Mom. So, wow. I bet, I mean, I know I as a.
00:51:47
Speaker 1: Mom can relate to this letter and I don't have a high needs child. I mean, I think that I want to say first, Christy, and Christy, I am really looking forward to hearing what you have to say about it. I'm going to guess you have some things to say, but I want to say first to overwhelmed mom, you know, that like, there's absolutely no shame, no shame in being angry and overwhelmed and stressed and the situation you're in. I think that is a pretty universal experience among mothers that this is an incredibly difficult thing to do to raise children. And it becomes way more difficult when your child is high needs as yours is. And so no shame, we're here with you and we're gonna give you advice with only love and support in our hearts.
00:52:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, so like first, if I didn't have a high functioning child special needs child myself, I would also just look at it from motherhood is different than what I expected it to be. And it's okay to mourn the loss of what you thought your life was going to be. Like, that's something that I think is necessary. You need to mourn it. And I think the first step of being open and vulnerable and putting those words out there and saying the things that you feel like you shouldn't say, because you're not going to be appreciative, that doesn't negate what you're living in the lived experience you're having. You're not living how you thought you were going to be living as a mom. And you should mourn that you should mourn it. And you should let it actually pass because you have to grieve that in order to move on. And then when you move forward, understand that like, none of us have a playbook. None of us were given, you know, the instruction manual to a kid and other, some moms look like they've got it, you know, really easy and they've got it all figured out, but nobody knows what everybody else is going. All moms are frustrated at times. I think it's a.
00:53:55
Speaker 3: Universal, like we get frustrated at our kids.
00:53:58
Speaker 2: And I think that the added thing with having a special needs child is is this guilt that comes with it because you're getting angry and frustrated and you think that it's not okay because there are special needs and that that's supposed to absolve you from having feelings of it. And that's just not the case.
00:54:22
Speaker 3: You're not a bad.
00:54:23
Speaker 2: Person for getting frustrated by a child who's being defiant. That's a hard thing.
00:54:30
Speaker 1: I want to chime in and say all those feelings that overwhelm mom is having, they are the feelings that moms have, right? I remember looking around, my kids are college age now, but looking around and being like, everyone else is doing better at this than me. And And, you know, I think that there is this, we have this picture, like a lot of us, you know, that, that, you know, this is what it's going to look like. And then you arrive and you're like, wow, this is so much harder or more complicated than I thought it would be.
00:54:58
Speaker 3: And so I just overwhelmed mom.
00:55:01
Speaker 1: I hope you can really hear Christie's words of just normalizing these feelings and mourning what what you thought it would be and learning how to adapt and accept what is, which I think, Christy, you've really spoken to today and like thinking about like the different adaptations you've made over the course. of your swimming career is it's about at core, I think, right? Acceptance, like saying, okay, I had this dream or I had this vision or I had this expectation. And then what happened was different. And I'm going to, you know, repeatedly show up again and give it my best. And I just want to say, overwhelm mom, your best is not perfect.
00:55:39
Speaker 3: It's not perfection. It's not ever having negative feelings.
00:55:44
Speaker 2: Yeah. And it's, the other thing is that Don't, don't judge yourself off of how somebody else is doing because you're, you've got a whole different set of cards in your hand and you're playing to that strength. And for me as a mom, even if I didn't have a child with, you know, extra needs, I'm a mom who has extra needs. And me as a mother showing up is very different than many other moms because You know, when my son is at football, I'm not on the field. I need to stay back on the path because my wheelchair can't get up and I need to stay in the shade so that I don't overheat because I have different needs. When I'm at the playground, we go to specific playgrounds that work for me to be able to be the mom. But I don't always get to be the mom that I want to be. I don't get to be the mom that I was to my older child with my youngest child. She gets a very different lived experience and we need to not judge. Overwhelmed mom, do not judge yourself based on other moms and how they're doing it because you've got a whole separate set of cards that you're playing with and you're going to do just fine.
00:56:55
Speaker 3: I love that, too.
00:56:56
Speaker 1: And I to me, Christy, I think that's about remembering to put ourselves in the equation. And I think that, you know, the history of like being a mom is all about sacrifice.
00:57:06
Speaker 3: Right. And an overwhelmed mom. I think more than.
00:57:11
Speaker 1: Anything, what I encourage you to do is say, like, you know, your needs matter, too. And so you are overwhelmed and angry and stressed.
00:57:18
Speaker 3: And so you need some support.
00:57:20
Speaker 1: And you reached out to me, you wrote us this letter and that's great. But like reach out to other parents who have special needs kids, reach out, talk to your husband. You know, you mentioned this super full-time job he has and it's not working. Like it's not working for you not to have the parenting support you need. And maybe it can come from your husband if he can adjust his schedule. But maybe there are other sources too. Maybe there are other people you can ask for help or hire for help. And it's okay to say like, this isn't working. I matter here and I will be worn out if we continue this way. And so that is really, really important. You know, being a good mom is not just about sacrifice. It's also about like raising your hand and saying, this is what I need to be the best mom that I can be.
00:58:11
Speaker 3: And so we wish you luck. Christy, I think.
00:58:14
Speaker 1: I think we've all had to do that at some point, right? You know, all of us who are parents have had to say like, okay, this isn't working. Let's, let's, let's adapt and change. And, um, that asking for help, it always, you know, things always turn for the better. Yeah, that's right. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness. So we wish you luck over well, mom. So Christy, thank you for helping me answer that letter. And I'd love to hear as we end our conversation, what is next for you as a swimmer? Are you looking ahead to the next Paralympics or what's happening in your career and in your world? What's that next mountain you have to climb or swim over?
00:58:58
Speaker 2: Yes, so we are... just as of this past week, two years out from the Los Angeles 2028 Paralympic Games. And I am definitely still looking forward to that.
00:59:11
Speaker 3: I'm excited.
00:59:12
Speaker 2: I was in the pool this morning swimming away. I also was at track and field nationals last month where I got second place in the shot put. So Perhaps we'll be doing two sports in Los Angeles, swimming as well as track and field. We'll have to see. Very excited. Yeah, very excited to be doing it in front of a home crowd and having more of my family and friends there this time. First, though, I do have some, unfortunately, I have some medical stuff. That's going on. And I am going to be talking publicly about it. So I don't mind talking about it here. Unfortunately, we've talked about my body likes to, you know, just make these extra cells. And I was at an appointment with my oncology PA for my breasts because we have some spots that we have to watch. And we unfortunately found something new. And so I have an appointment scheduled with the surgeon so that we can go down the route of getting a double mastectomy. But we're in a situation where we've got to do it now because we do need to be recovered because L.A. is still important. So if there's other things that we have to do because of the findings, we'll do that. But we're being very optimistic and we're taking it just one step at a time. But Yeah, there's the long term of what we want in life, but I've also gotten to the point where I don't hold those in cement because I have no idea what's going to happen. So yes, I would love to be in LA, but what's most important for me is to still be here to be a mom in 2028. So that's the ultimate goal is to still be around for them. So we're going to do everything in our power to make that happen.
01:01:10
Speaker 3: Wonderful. That's, I mean, That's the truth. One step at a time.
01:01:14
Speaker 1: And Christy, I will be thinking of you as you walk through these health difficulties and set your eyes on LA 2028. I wish you all the best of luck and I've loved talking to you.
01:01:26
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. It's been an absolute pleasure.
01:01:28
Speaker 3: Thanks for listening.
01:01:30
Speaker 1: If you'd like to write me a letter seeking advice, email it to me at deardearsugar at gmail.com. And don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Happy trails, and I'll see you next week. Mind Over Mountain with Cheryl Strayed is an iHeart Women's Sports production produced by Brittany Brown and Rodney Brown of Barbara Jean Productions. Supervising producer is Kaylin West at Realm. Associate producer, Amaya Brathwaite. Our executive producers are Molly Barton, Jerry Carita, Grace Fuse, and Jessie Katz. Our theme song is composed by Gramascope Music. Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
01:02:11
Speaker 3: Happy trails. And I'll see you next week.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Mind Over Mountain with me, Cheryl Strayed. This week, my guest is Paralympic swimmer, Christy Raleigh Crossley. In our conversation, Christy and I talk about their career as a collegiate swimmer, the accidents that led to life-altering injuries, and a dream that finally came true in Paris at the Paralympics in 2024. Let's listen to our conversation. Christy Raleigh Crossley, welcome to Mind Over Mountain.
00:00:34
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
00:00:37
Speaker 1: I'm glad to get this opportunity to chat with you. And before we started talking and recording, you said that you've had many lives like so many of us, but you really have.
00:00:48
Speaker 3: You've been an elite swimmer.
00:00:51
Speaker 1: For a long time in really two worlds, in the non-disabled world and now as a para-athlete. Can you take us back to the beginning? Where did your relationship with swimming begin? How did you fall in love with it?
00:01:05
Speaker 3: And how did you... start to take it seriously.
00:01:09
Speaker 2: So it's so funny. I'm in the process of actually writing my memoir. And so I'm literally have all of these memories, like right on the cusp of like, having just put them down on paper. And for me, so my father, he was an all American swimmer in college, he was great. He had records, you know, until I was a elite athlete. But We did all the sports and we grew up doing soccer, baseball. I was on the Little League All-Star team when I was 10 with all the boys. I was on a boys basketball team. We did all the sports. But swimming, it was definitely watching the 1996 Olympics. I remember we had met Beth Bosford before she went to swim. So I was very excited. involved in watching her race her backstroke, but Amy Van Dyken, who has now become somebody that I look up to as a wheelchair advocate, and watching her swim and race and win the 100 butterfly in Atlanta was just like, I want to do that. I want to be an Olympian. I want to win the 100 butterfly. And I was 10, and it was like, okay... What sport do you want to do? And I was like, swimming. It's all year round because I had to pick between swimming and soccer. I was good at both. And it was really, I decided at 10 that this was going to be my life. And then I was already a state champion. We were bouncing around teams. And when I was 14, I ended up winning YMCA nationals. All of the things that I wanted to do my freshman year of high school, I succeeded in. In doing like it was like all my high school goals happened the first year. So we just made a move to Florida. I went to a prep school down here and it was we were full in. You know, I was that crazy kid that moved twelve hundred miles away from their family to pursue their sport. So it was I mean.
00:03:17
Speaker 1: Right.
00:03:17
Speaker 3: So your family didn't move. You moved yourself.
00:03:20
Speaker 2: So my first year was just me. My sophomore year, I went to swim camp. And I, the summer before sophomore year, and I asked my parents, can I stay the summer? And then I was like, can I stay here? And they had been looking at boarding schools for me. And they were like, I guess. So I moved in with a host family and I lived with them until the mom got cancer. And it was just too much for her to have me come the next year. So we had a split household where one parent was living in New Jersey and then one parent was living here in Florida. And our family kind of just figured it out and made it work.
00:03:57
Speaker 3: So you guys made a lot. I mean, not just you made a lot of sacrifices.
00:04:00
Speaker 1: Your family did big time. And your dreams did come true. Like you said, by the time you're a freshman in high school, you're like, okay, all those goals that I set for myself, I've already achieved them.
00:04:15
Speaker 3: What happened?
00:04:16
Speaker 1: How did you make your way to college? What level were you working at and swimming at at that point?
00:04:23
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:04:23
Speaker 2: So in high school, the focus obviously was let's make an Olympic team. Let's do that. Let's make division one roster. So I was a heavily recruited swimmer coming out of high school. I looked at schools like University of Florida, University of Kentucky, UCLA, I was in love with. And then I ended up at Florida State University. And so the high school goals became like, okay, let's, let's go to college. And then in college, it was, I want to be the best swimmer And that started off my freshman year winning the ACC's individually and then going on and as a freshman getting ninth at NCAA's. And yeah, so it was just we kept progressing forward and forward and we were hoping to make it onto that Beijing Olympic team. But unfortunately, a drunk driver prevented that from happening and we had to. Step away, regroup, figure out a new life and go on.
00:05:32
Speaker 3: Make a new plan. So tell me about that. It was 2007. And you tell me about the accident and what changed your trajectory.
00:05:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it was 2007. And I was there was a lot of stuff that was going on in my family's life, in my personal life, stuff that I was dealing with that had happened to me. It was a lot. And I had this wonderful college boyfriend. His name was Nick. His name is Nick. Still Nick. He was a cheerleader.
00:06:09
Speaker 3: Still Nick. He's still Nick. He was a.
00:06:12
Speaker 2: Cheerleader for Florida State. And he was very much an escape from swimming. And we were off. He was this big, you know, big, strong man. And we were off at a friend's. was doing a promotional thing for one of the bars in Tallahassee. And we went to go support our friends. We weren't, we weren't a part of it. We were there to kind of work and help with like the staffing and stuff on the drive home. We were pulling up to a light that was, that has was turning red. And as we slowed down, we were going about, I think 30, 35 miles an hour and, And suddenly we were just hit from behind. And I later came to find out because a former Florida State teammate who had gotten released from the team prior, he was in that car. He was one of the passengers and he posted about on Facebook because this was in 2007 when people were just posting anything and not realizing the internet was forever. And he posted, oh, we got into this crazy car accident last night and I messaged him and was like, Hey, like what happened? He was like, Oh my God, it was crazy. We were going between like night, like 70 and 90 miles an hour. And like, we just slammed into the back of this car. And I was like, Oh, that's crazy. Who do you know who you hit? And he was like, no, I have no idea, but they took them off in an ambulance. I was like, it was me. And he knew in that instant, like, Oh wow. Cause I was at that time, like I didn't swim well at NCAAs, but I was fifth in the country at the time. In my best event. And it's the year before the Olympics. And it's like, he was a swimmer. He knew, like, oh, this is bad. Like, we just... Right.
00:08:00
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, just on the human level, it's bad.
00:08:04
Speaker 1: But he knew, too, what an impact this would have on your ambitions to make the Olympic team.
00:08:11
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:08:11
Speaker 2: And it was... It was devastating. It was a loss of identity. I was told, listen, you're never going to swim as well as you did before. I had all of these, um, discs bulging in my neck. I mean, I still have them. They still are continuing to cause more and more problems. Um, as they like close in on the spinal cord, it's, it's not a good situation in my neck, but that all started back in 2007. And so we were told, like, listen, swimming's not going to really happen. And so I just was like, OK, I guess I'm going to be a college kid. And I was hanging out with the cheerleaders. I would just go to cheerleading practice and just watch them. And I was like the cheerleader of the cheerleaders. And I worked in bars.
00:08:57
Speaker 3: Somebody's got to cheer the cheerleaders on.
00:08:59
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:09:00
Speaker 3: So at this point, you were like 20 or 19? I was 20 years old.
00:09:02
Speaker 2: And so that was like that year of college was just... it was, if it wasn't for Nick, um, I, I don't know what would have happened. Like he definitely kept it my world centered after having lost that identity. Um, and he was definitely the person that I needed in my life at that time. And, you know, they say that people come into your lives when you need them and then they leave when you, you no longer do. And, um, He was very supportive of me when I decided that I wanted to go back to swimming after the 2008 Olympics. I watched all my friends break world records like Rebecca Soni broke a world record. I'd been swimming with her since we were little kids and I just I wasn't done with the sport. And so I packed up in a week and moved to Baltimore and Nick supported me. We tried to do the long distance thing. It did not work. We were far too young for that. But I do credit him so much for being the person that I needed to get through that time because I wasn't at a place where I could be the person that I needed.
00:10:16
Speaker 1: I can imagine, as you said, you're not only watching the Olympics and knowing that you had set your sights on this for years and you wanted to be there and you weren't there, but you even had that kind of intimacy with actually knowing some of the people who were competing in the Olympics in the sports that, in this very sport that you had, you know, there's never any guarantee, but you had a good shot at, right? And a lot of people watching that would have spiraled down even further into a sense of despair and doom. And instead for you, it was an inspiration. You're like, I'm not done. I'm getting back in the pool, whatever it takes. Take us inside that, the psychology of that. What made you feel motivated rather than defeated by watching someone else's dreams come true, the dream that you had had?
00:11:11
Speaker 2: I guess it was because I had already spiraled so far and I was already at the bottom. And so to see the you know, the dream that I had had that had taken me, you know, away from all my family and friends, you know, it was still like, I had, I had faith in myself. I, I was a very, very, I don't want to use the word egotistical, although it is a very fitting word for who I was back then, but I was a very self-confident individual. And I had this delusional thought that like, it didn't matter what somebody had said. I was going to figure out a way to do it because I mean, my dad was always like, no one's going to tell you, no, you're going to figure out a way to do it. And that's how I was raised by him. And it was always, there's, there's a solution to every problem. I'm a, I'm a math nerd. And so it's like, I love to solve problems. And it was just like the next problem to solve. And I didn't up until that point, I didn't realize that I still wanted it. So I think that it was this whole like reigniting of the fire of like watching these friends do it. And and and also I think maybe there's something to be said about, you know, they say that like deja vu is not really deja vu. It's just you experiencing a part of your life that hasn't happened yet. And so like, it's like our lives, we've already lived all these lives. And so things that you dream about and that you like really feel are possible are things that have already happened in another timeline for you. And so you just have to get yourself to that point. So I had, I guess this just deep understanding that one day i would i don't want to i don't want to get emotional that one day i would eventually you can get emotional be on top of that podium and you know watch the flag rise and hear the star spangled banner being played for my accomplishments so like i don't it was just like this internal pull of like you've got to go you've got to go do this um.
00:13:32
Speaker 1: Yeah So you went to Baltimore. What, what was in Baltimore? What was that next step in your climb over the mountain?
00:13:49
Speaker 2: So it's the swimming world is a very small world. So it's like, yes, like people are like, Oh, Katie Ledecky. Like people know these Olympians names, but like for us, it's like, it's a very small world. Like these are the people that we see. I mean, my daughter ran over Katie Ledecky's foot with my wheelchair one time during a race. Like We live in a very, very small world. We all knew that after Beijing, Michael Phelps would be coming back to Baltimore, which is where he had grown up. He had purchased the team with Bob Bowman, and they were going to go back to MBAC, and there was going to be this collegiate post-grad thing um group that was gonna train for London there and so I knew that this was happening I had a distinct cousin that lived in Baltimore who had a spare room and it was like yeah come over here and and we'll figure this out and we'll do it and I I packed up my life into the Toyota 4Runner that my dad had bought for me and drove to Baltimore without ever talking to the team. And I walked into the pool one day and I was just like, hey, can I swim here? And they were like, uh, I guess we can see. And I was at this point, I hadn't swam in over a year and a half. I was probably 30 pounds overweight and North Baltimore Aquatic is known for putting out distance swimmers, like 400 IMers. I mean, that's Bob Bowman's specialty of like those distance. And here I am a sprinter, not at all what they're expecting. And they're like, yeah, I guess we could figure out if it works. And I worked very hard with my coach, Paul Yetter. And we got to a point where he was like, okay. And he said something to me that to this day sticks. He's he said, Christy and Paul, Paul himself is also an Olympic coach. He was Katie Hoff's coach. He coached her to her gold medals. Um, he said to me, Christy, I think you're the greatest swimmer that nobody knows about. And at, you know, 21, 22, like that hit me so hard. And I was just like, for a coach to have that much confidence in you and be ready to buy all in, like I was all into, um, Hmm.
00:16:21
Speaker 3: That's, that's amazing.
00:16:22
Speaker 1: What did it feel like to, to have to rebuild your body again? You know, that you, that you've, you're not in the swimming shape that you'd been in, frankly, for, since you were a kid, right? How, how was that to, to get back in there and get back, get your body and your swimming back?
00:16:40
Speaker 2: So if we actually rewind, um, a couple of months before I did that, I was home for my sister's high school graduation. And I was hit by a car as a pedestrian.
00:16:54
Speaker 3: And so I.
00:16:55
Speaker 2: So a second car accident, right? Second car accident, yes. So I ended up on the hood of the car after there was this whole... It's a very elaborate story, but the gist... I went after somebody because they had attacked my friend and I. They got in their car as they were pulling away. I was on the phone with 911. They hit me. I ended up on the hood of the car. They turned, I went 10 feet in the air and came down on my head and I was still on the phone with 911. And I said, I just put the phone. I said, I was just hit by a car. We're also going to need an ambulance. And then I handed the phone to my best friend as I was still laying in what I found out was a pool of my own blood.
00:17:42
Speaker 3: And, um, Yeah, it was crazy.
00:17:45
Speaker 2: The cop who showed up on scene, I started just rattling off. I was like, this is the car. This is the make the model. I said, you'll find my handprint on the front windshield. He was wearing a white undershirt and gray basketball shorts. And the cop was like, how.
00:18:03
Speaker 4: Do you know this?
00:18:03
Speaker 2: And I was like, I was on the hood. I was on the windshield of the car. And he was like, oh my God, he was, and he looked at my friend. He was like, what do you guys do? And we were ocean lifeguards at the time. And she was like, we're ocean lifeguards. Like we're so used to having to give that information.
00:18:19
Speaker 3: During like mass casualty or.
00:18:21
Speaker 2: Like emergency events that like, it was just second nature for me to rattle it off. But now I look back and I'm like that, that must've been an insane moment for that cop to like, have this person just laying. And I was also evaluating myself. I was like, I can feel my feet. I'm wiggling my toes.
00:18:38
Speaker 1: Right.
00:18:41
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
00:18:41
Speaker 1: And also to be on the phone with 911 as you yourself then need 911. So that's also then in the, in the rear view mirror, by the time you're, you're standing there in Baltimore out of shape saying like, Hey coach, sign me up. You have had these two accidents that have harmed you.
00:19:03
Speaker 3: Both psychologically and physically.
00:19:04
Speaker 1: These accidents are what eventually led you to the paraswim world.
00:19:11
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:19:11
Speaker 2: And so we didn't know the extent of it. And I swam that entire time at North Baltimore. And then when I went back and swam collegiately again with my sister, I swam that whole time with this paraswim. blood tumor growing in my brain that we just didn't know about. And I was just progressively getting more and more disabled. But when we look back, I'm very fortunate to, like I said, people come into your lives and give you the lessons that you need to learn because getting myself in shape in Baltimore, the things that Paul taught me there and the, like this thought of like, it doesn't matter where I am today. I know where I can get, because by the end of the, not even a year with Paul, I was already going faster times than I was going when I was at Florida state. So I was already faster. I was, I was at that point ranked in the world. And I was like, if I can do this in 10 months, like who, I can I can do this like this is something that I knew the blueprint then for what to do. It wasn't this idea of like pushing yourself to the limit. It was like Paul would be like, I think you're done for today. And I would think I still had more to left to go. And he'd be like, no, you're done. And then there was some drills that he had me doing that would like shock my system to put me in like glycogen deficit so that I could just cut body fat only and retain muscle. And like he had so much science behind it. And he got me in shape so fast that when I would go back to swimming, because that's a repetitive thing in my life is I've stepped away. I've come back. I've stepped away. That's first step back in with Paul. in 2008 showed me that it didn't matter if it was a short amount of time I would be able to do great things and that's how I ended up only training for 13 weeks and winning NCAAs after I had my first daughter like it's how I came back to para swimming I just I knew that I would be able to do it if I just stayed dedicated and followed the things that I had learned from Paul in 2008. So that really was super, super important to go from like being super out of shape to then obviously being ranked in the world.
00:21:37
Speaker 3: And it's a powerful thing.
00:21:38
Speaker 1: Like you said, it's like once you, there are certain experiences we have in life where it's like, oh, I've learned this about my capacity or my ability to overcome or to, you know, I might not look like I'm going to be able to get there at this moment, but I trust that I will be able to and my body knows that it can. And that's like something that never goes away. And it sounds like that's something that you have over and over again learned pulled out of the hat to lead to your success.
00:22:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like I said, as I'm writing my memoir, it's where we keep going through these reoccurring themes. And I joke, it's like the Taylor Swift song. I think I've seen this film before. And it's like, You already know how it can go either good or bad. And so you take the lessons learned from there of like when you've made a mistake and then it happens again in your life to go, oh, wait, no, no, no. I'm not going to let this happen. And I think that for me, my life has changed. been cyclical in so many ways that like, I've been able to really go, this is the exact same lesson. Whereas other people, you know, have to discern applying lessons. I've been super fortunate that I get the same lesson just handed to me over and over again.
00:22:59
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of us do.
00:23:01
Speaker 1: And so much of life is like paying attention and Because sometimes you get handed the lesson and you keep not learning what you're meant to learn.
00:23:11
Speaker 3: And it doesn't lead to success.
00:23:13
Speaker 1: It leads to a kind of repeated failure or a kind of downward spiral.
00:23:17
Speaker 3: And you've gone up and up and up.
00:23:19
Speaker 1: I want to, you know, you have had this really, like, as I said, when we first started, you have had many lives. And I want to kind of fast forward a bit to your career as a para swimmer. I know along the way, we will talk about this more in a little bit, but like you're also a mother. As you said, you had your first child when you were really still a collegiate athlete.
00:23:45
Speaker 3: Is that right?
00:23:46
Speaker 2: So I had my oldest when I was 23. I had left college and unfortunately, it was a very awful marriage. And when I left my marriage, I moved in with my sister. And my sister was competing for Rowan University on the swim team. And so it was just an opportunity to swim with my sister again. And it was awesome because I had moved away from her when I was only 15. And so we missed a lot of a lot of our like growing up together. And so it was this opportunity to swim with her. And we got to be on relays together and we had school records together. But I swam for, like I said, 13 weeks. It was just like, hey, you're going through a divorce. Why don't you come move in with us and swim? And so I swam spring semester and... It was great. It was fun.
00:24:45
Speaker 3: It was what I needed.
00:24:47
Speaker 1: But at the same time, you still have your eye on the prize, right? You still want to be an Olympian. Are you still or is that that gets set aside by motherhood and specifically single motherhood?
00:25:00
Speaker 2: In that time, that was not on my wavelength at all. It was swimming wasn't even on. Like I said, it was it was them saying to me, hey, my sister's coach being like, hey, I could get you in school. I can get you accepted. Do you want to come? And it was like, okay, well, there's this thing that I can do.
00:25:18
Speaker 3: It's swim fast.
00:25:18
Speaker 2: And like, this is a chance for me to give some stability to my daughter because she was so young and I wanted her to be around my sister and family and all of that stuff and make the transition easier. I mean, she was so used to it being just the two of us during the days always. So it wasn't that big of a change for her. But it was this opportunity to go back to school and, you know, get a new degree and try to better my life in that sense. So like for a lot of swimmers in particular, the pull is to get your college education. You know, now there's so much with the NIL deal where kids can actually make money. But back then it was just this is a way to get a degree and it's an opportunity. And so let's take it. And so I saw it there. But I at that point in my life, I had given up on that dream. I had it was not something that was thinking to me. And it was actually something. Unfortunately, it was said to me at that point, like our family, you know, sacrificed so much. And what? Look at you. You didn't even make the Olympics. And, you know, that was. there was this evil that was just there always hovering over my career. And at that point, I just wanted to be a mom. My sole focus was her. And I didn't see at that point that there was a possibility of doing both. I was single. There was no support systems really in place for it. When I was swimming, there were instances where I was being made to feel bad about it there was sabotage going on it was just it was not a healthy situation in that structure to be able to still think about that um but it just my focus was being a mom and even now right now I swim before my kids wake up like who I am as a swimmer like yes they'll pop on videos with me They come to meets occasionally. They love to do commercials and that stuff when we get the opportunities. But my swimming box closes before my children wake up. And it's the way that I figured out that it's possible. And that's how we do it. So like my focus is always going to be on my children and being their mom. And swimming just gives me opportunities to give them the life that they deserve. And that's how I've really viewed it now. Yes, it's my dreams, but I do it for them. I do it so that they can, you know, see the world, have cool experiences, pay the light bill, you know, things like that.
00:28:13
Speaker 3: All that stuff.
00:28:14
Speaker 1: But yeah, now you have three kids, but how did you find your way back then?
00:28:19
Speaker 3: You know, you're back there. You're like, okay, the dream didn't come true.
00:28:22
Speaker 1: My family is being mean to me about it, or maybe not your whole family, but at least some members of your family. And now I have to essentially focus on something else. But here you are talking to me as quite a champion swimmer, a para swimmer.
00:28:40
Speaker 3: How did you find your way to.
00:28:44
Speaker 2: So once I married my now ex-husband there, he didn't like me being out in the world. Like he didn't like me working. He wanted me to be home with the kids, taking care of the kids. But I knew I needed something. And so I was like, hey, like he was he was a gym guy. guy so he understood me wanting to work out so I would be like oh I want to go swim again I think I want to swim again I think this is what I want to do is a way for me to be able to get out of my house um and it was it that was really I had figured it out in 2016 that I still did want it because there was those years where I just didn't and in 2016 is when things started to like go pretty south. It was the first year of our marriage, but it started, that's when the cracks started to show in what was happening. Because you don't know coercive control when you're first getting into it. It's something that builds. But we were watching the Olympics and my son, he took his first steps during the Olympics. We were watching track and field and he started walking towards the TV. And it was very, very early because he's born in September. So this was he was like nine and a half months. He was born premature. He was born at 34 weeks prematurely. So for him to hit a milestone like that so far ahead, I was just like, oh, that's so awesome. And just those Olympics, watching it with my kids, I was like, okay, maybe I do want to still do this. And then as things got worse in the marriage, that was my way to say like, oh, I'm going to go swim. I'm going to try to make the Tokyo Olympics. And I was training for the Tokyo Olympics when I had my injury. So when I had my brain injury in 2018, I was already training. I would, I didn't tell anybody. It wasn't this like, you know, wasn't announcing it on social media.
00:30:48
Speaker 3: I was just.
00:30:49
Speaker 2: Quietly training every day, getting ready for your dream for yourself.
00:30:55
Speaker 3: Yeah.
00:30:55
Speaker 2: Cause you have to be in the testing pool for two years. Like you have to be available to be in the testing pool. So I like quietly, you know, got my USA swimming registration redone. And like, I was preparing to make that re-entrance in January of 2019. And December of 2018 is when everything really got started.
00:31:23
Speaker 1: Right.
00:31:23
Speaker 3: You had a brain injury. You were hit in the head by a big chunk of ice, I understand.
00:31:29
Speaker 2: Yes.
00:31:31
Speaker 3: Tell us what happened. What did that lead to?
00:31:35
Speaker 2: So we, um, my oldest daughter, that was her first year that she was going to do race skiing. And so we lived about 40 minutes from the mountain where we lived in Jersey city. And so I had taken the kids out of school to get our season passes done on the first, the opening day. So like I picked them up early from school as a Friday and we went to the mountain and we got our passes process. They got their pictures taken. And we just didn't want it. We wanted to beat the crowds. And so there was still time. So we went outside and there was snow. I say that very loosely. And we were having a little like snowball fight. It was very sweet, cute. And my son, he had just turned three. He didn't know any better. He is on the autism spectrum. He's also he has ADHD. So he has low tone in his wrist. So his ability to pack a snowball at three, it was not happening. And so here is his sister and I packing snowballs, throwing them at each other. He took his enormous strength that he has because he's a super, super strong kid. And he picked up. this boulder of ice. And when I say boulder, it was like this big and he picked it up and he just dropped it on my head. And I was like, ow, that really hurt. Like, dude, you can't do that. But I didn't, I wasn't unconscious, nothing like that. I didn't think it was serious. And then we started to drive home. I was like, okay, we're going to head home. So we started to drive home before the sun went down and I'm driving down the mountain and And all of a sudden my right eye starts twitching. And I later found out that like all of your nerves are cross body. So like everything in the right controls the left, except for your eyes. So the fact that it was my right eye that was twitching makes sense. My right eye started to twitch and I was like, oh, that was really weird. And I remember like thinking about it. And then like my left arm was just getting heavier. And I just felt this like, pull again that pull of like you have to go here and I just needed to get home and so my focus was solely on getting home and so I got home and um I called my ex-husband husband at the time and I was like hey we're coming here but something's wrong and so we get out of the car and I went to unload the um ski stuff from the back of the car and I pulled it out of my Tahoe trunk And I had it in my right arm. And then I went to put it in my left arm and the bag just dropped to the floor. I had no strength whatsoever in my left arm. And I was like, this is really weird. And so I knew that I needed to go to the hospital. My husband at the time was never somebody who would go to the hospital with me. I was always driving myself to the hospital or if you know, there was some other medical stuff that had happened, like, and I would have to take myself. And so that was just a normal thing, but I knew I couldn't drive. So I called up one of my friends and I was like, Hey, can you drive me to the hospital? She came and she picked me up. And she said that driving there, I was talking. And then all of a sudden I stopped and she just looked at me and I couldn't. And I remember trying to get words out and I couldn't, and it was very weird. I didn't know what was happening. And I just walked into the hospital and I was like, something's wrong with my left side. I don't know. I, I, uh, something's wrong. And I didn't tell them that I had gotten hit in the head. That wasn't what I had said to them. I was just like, something's wrong. And cause I didn't think it was that bad. I didn't think that the, the impact was that bad, but obviously I didn't know that there was a blood tumor in my brain and he hit me right where the blood tumor was and my brain was bleeding. And I had no idea. So like, When your brain's.
00:35:35
Speaker 1: Bleeding, obviously you're... And to be clear, it was a blood tumor that had been there from the previous car accident.
00:35:43
Speaker 2: It had been growing, they believe, since the car accident. Yes. And it's actually, it's what killed the runner Flojo. So she had the same malformation in her brain. Hers ruptured in her sleep and she died. And so it was this ticking time bomb that we didn't know about. And... So my, bless my son's heart, you know, he'll, he'll tell people, he's like, yeah, I hit her in the head. And I'm like, but you saved my life. You know, we always look at the positive of the thing. Like, yes, it caused me to have a brain injury, but if I didn't, like, it was still there. It was still growing. We look back on like the videos from me swimming at NCAAs in 2012, you know, And I'm walking up to the block and you could see my left foot has foot drop. I'm dropping my arm on the left side. Like there was already neurological showings, but I was a clumsy person. So like me falling all the time and running into things and not feeling things and having pain in that side I just I always attributed it to something else. Also, there was this element of growing up an athlete like suck it up. If it's not killing you, then keep going. And that was like how I was raised. So we just kept pushing forward. So I'm blessed that we found it. But it ended up being a situation where. you know, it needed to be removed. My quality of life wasn't going to be the best. I was super fortunate that my good friend from college at Florida State is one of the greatest neurosurgeons in the country. And I was able to call him and he was at Harvard Mass General at the time. And I was like, hey, Myron, like, this is what they're telling me. And he was like, you need to get into brain surgery. This is what we're going to do. He walked me through exactly how brain surgery works, the mapping of the brain, the cutting open of the skull. Like he just, he gave it to me all. So when I finally got into my surgeon's office at NYU and they were like, well, we think surgery would be an option. I was like, cool. When? And they were like, What? Because they're looking at me. I'm by myself in this appointment. And they're like, this girl's agreeing to brain surgery, like after five minutes, like you don't need to think about it. I was like, no, it's a problem. We remove it. And that's it. It's that thing. Like there's a problem.
00:38:01
Speaker 3: We solve it. Correct me if I'm wrong.
00:38:03
Speaker 1: So you had this surgery and got that tumor removed.
00:38:06
Speaker 3: Thank goodness. But then you were.
00:38:09
Speaker 1: Left with physical disabilities caused by this surgery or by the injury to begin with. Then that's what led you to be classified as a para-athlete. Is that correct? It's not the brain injury itself. It's the physical impairments that resulted.
00:38:28
Speaker 2: So for me, my brain injury, when they removed that part of my brain, it left me with what's called hemiparesis. So the left side of my body is not as strong as the right. So I have a lot of muscle atrophy. on my left side because those neurotransmitters just don't work anymore. Those pathways don't send signal to like make those muscles work properly. And then also I have what's called dystonia, which is when your muscles go into spasm. Um, it's very common. You see with people with Parkinson's where they're, they get stuck in a position of posturing, um, And then now we've actually learned that because of the posturing that I have in my arm, I now have permanent nerve damage. And so like my left hand, like I continue to lose, I continue to lose more and more function in my left hand as I lose nerves permanently. because the nerve is being stopped by my posturing. So yeah, the brain injury was the catalyst for it. And then the brain is how the brain is. And it does crazy things.
00:39:46
Speaker 1: It controls everything else. We forget that sometimes. So let's get to your career as a para swimmer. You obviously were left with physical impairments after this brain surgery. How did you decide to enter into the para world and enter into competition? Were you familiar with swimming? the Paralympics and parasports and paraswimming before this injury?
00:40:22
Speaker 2: So I was vaguely familiar. Obviously, I knew about Pastores, Oscar, being the blade runner and wanting to run in the Olympics. And so I knew of the Paralympics on that side, but even now, the Paralympics is not something that's extremely visible to many, especially here in the United States. I mean, it doesn't get the same coverage that the Olympics gets, unfortunately. As Paralympians, we don't get the same opportunities as Olympians. I mean, I know that I joke about, oh, swimming pays for the electric bill. But in all reality, it's like, we make maybe $ 1, 600 a month as swimmers. There's no real like money in it unless you're fortunate enough to have connections, to have sponsors and all of that stuff. And that just has not been the case for me. So it's, it's the peril world is not very well known. The equity is not there. And so, right. I didn't know.
00:41:34
Speaker 1: So you knew about it in like that general sense, like the big stars had entered your consciousness, but you weren't yet thinking of yourself as one.
00:41:44
Speaker 2: I knew that if you could, if you used a wheelchair at all times and right after my injury, I was not using a wheelchair. I was pushing a stroller like it was a rollator. I was, you know, I was using a cane. I wasn't at that point using a wheelchair. Things hadn't progressed. I mean, I would get told like, you should be using a wheelchair. And I would be like, F that, you know, like, that was not anything I ever wanted in my in my world. And even now, like I have family members that like, if they see me in a wheelchair, they're like, oh, she's doing it for attention. And I'm like, I'm doing it so that I could get through the day with my kids. You know, like nobody criticizes people for wearing glasses when their vision starts going at an older age, you know? So like it's, I just didn't know that I was eligible. There wasn't that visibility of people who are ambulatory wheelchair users. Like that wasn't, something that was evident invisible disability. Yeah. And I, you can't measure my disability with a measuring stick and like it. And so it's, it's a more subjective thing and that's been a whole other situation, but I just didn't know that I was eligible. And I mean, my neurosurgeon who.
00:43:05
Speaker 3: Was, how did you figure that out? How did you figure that out?
00:43:09
Speaker 2: So I figured it out because I saw another Paralympian on TV during the Olympics, during the Tokyo Olympics. And she was standing there wearing shorts. And I was like, she's not in a wheelchair. What's wrong with her? So I looked her up. And I was like, oh, okay. And then that made me look up what makes you eligible for the Paralympics. And so I immediately messaged my neurosurgeon. And like I said, he was the chief of neurosurgery at NYU, the number one neurosurgery hospital in the country. And he wasn't aware that I was eligible for the Paralympics. He knew I had been trying to swim and I wanted to go back and try to make the Olympics after brain surgery. But that wasn't within his scope of medicine. And I was like, hey, does this do I have this? Cause it sounds like I do. And he was like, yeah. And so then that, at that point it was like, oh, okay. I'm eligible. Now, what do we do to like get involved? And that became an even bigger thing because there it's not like, there's not this set like pathway into Paralympic sports. Like parents have to like figure it out themselves. And I've worked with a lot of parents now that like, they have never heard of para sports and their kids are, you know, bilateral club feet. Their kids have, you know, severe cerebral palsy. And they just, they're not told because it's not part of scope of medicine to tell kids about sports.
00:44:43
Speaker 1: It sounds like even you, I mean, you're talking about kids, but for yourself as an adult and a really honestly, an elite swimmer in this world already, um, it was a revelation for you that you could be in it. So you did reenter and pretty much from the beginning started having pretty big successes. Your first time in competition- I believe it was like in the 2023 World Championship that you, you know, went right in there and took the gold for the backstroke.
00:45:17
Speaker 3: Is that, is that, am I, am I framing that right?
00:45:21
Speaker 1: I mean, it's obviously wasn't your first time in the pool, but your first time officially as a para swimmer in a big competition like that.
00:45:29
Speaker 2: Yeah. So it, it's, I had to not think about myself as the swimmer that I was because the times that that I was swimming and like breaking American records, winning world championships. They were times that I went when I was a middle schooler. And so I was sitting here like, oh, you're the fastest there ever was. Like I have the world record in the 50 meter backstroke for the S9 classification. And it's a time that I went when I was 14. And so there's this like, you have to just put away who you ever were. And thankfully I didn't swim a lot of long distance or a lot of long course. Cause there's different, there's different lengths. There's a short course pool and a long course pool. So I know a lot of my short course times from when I was growing up. Cause that's the American system. But yeah, like I, even now, like I look at the times, like what I won, like, the Paralympics in my favorite event, the 100 butterfly. In 2024 in Paris.
00:46:47
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think maybe I went 105, maybe. That's the time that I went when I was, you know, 14, 15 years old.
00:46:58
Speaker 2: And so it's a Paralympic record. It's an America's record.
00:47:03
Speaker 3: It's an American record.
00:47:04
Speaker 2: But it's not a Christie record. And I think that that has been the part about it that's been so hard is because people don't really give validity to who I was as a swimmer before. And I'm like, you guys don't understand. Like I used to do this easily when I was a kid and it's not for lack of, cause I'm in better shape as an adult. Cause I have to be, um, than arguably I was when I was a younger kid and had distractions. Um, Different distractions, obviously. But yeah, it was a very hard thing to mentally grapple with.
00:47:49
Speaker 1: In spite of, obviously, the many, many ups and downs and challenges you faced and the in and out of the sport, you did finally find yourself in that place where your longtime dream came true at the 2024 Paris Olympics. Paralympics and you didn't just make the team. You won five medals.
00:48:11
Speaker 3: How did that feel?
00:48:13
Speaker 1: And tell me about that, essentially that fruition, the fruition of that.
00:48:17
Speaker 3: Dream, how that landed on you.
00:48:19
Speaker 2: It was this, like, it was the happiest. I like, I see pictures and I look happy and I know that I was happy and I was excited that my kids were getting to, you know, their mom just won and their mom was doing all these great things. Um, But I couldn't celebrate it because I had another task that needed to happen next. There was always another thing next happening. So it was great for that brief moment. But I think that a lot of Olympians and Paralympians they chase that high and then it is a moment and it's gone. And then they don't know how to like rebound from that. But for me, I had so much other stuff that I needed to just keep doing and keep moving forward that I don't, it's maybe a blessing that I don't remember it because then I can't be sad about like not feeling it anymore. But I know that I felt very, very proud that my kids got to see it happen and that they were there and that they were going to be proud of me and that it was something that they were going to get to like, because I know I used to be so proud of my dad. I used to go and sneak down and look at his trophies when I was a kid and I was just in awe of what he had done. So I, I hope that I could be that for them.
00:49:50
Speaker 3: Well, that brings me to this letter.
00:49:53
Speaker 1: That I have that I'd love if you could help me answer it.
00:49:57
Speaker 3: Can I read it to you? Yes, ma'am.
00:50:00
Speaker 1: Dear Sugar, My husband and I went through a lot to become parents, miscarriages, IVF, and the financial debt that came with it. And finally, our beautiful daughter was born. She's now seven and we love her more than words can express. I want to say that before I tell you why I'm writing to you. It seems like I'm breaking a taboo to even write these words that are weighing so heavily on my heart and mind.
00:50:24
Speaker 3: Sometimes I find it very difficult to be a mom.
00:50:27
Speaker 1: My daughter has always been what is referred to as high needs, colicky as a baby and temperamentally sensitive all along. A few months ago, she was diagnosed with high functioning autism. Because my husband works a job that requires more than full-time hours and regular travel, most of the parenting falls to me alone. My daughter is affectionate, fun, and smart, but she's also extremely defiant and difficult.
00:50:50
Speaker 3: A lot of the time.
00:50:52
Speaker 1: And I often find myself stressed, angry, and overwhelmed. I'm crying as I write this because I feel like a bad mom to be complaining about my beloved child, who truly is the light of my life. But on the other hand, it feels good to cry and to get these words out of my head. I love my family, but some days I feel like my idea of what my family would be doesn't match the reality I'm living.
00:51:14
Speaker 3: And I'm sad about that. Is it awful of me to be sad for that reason, sugar? It feels awful.
00:51:20
Speaker 1: How do I accept my life for what it is and be grateful for all the things in it? How do I stop feeling overwhelmed, angry, and stressed? I want to be the best mom to my daughter that I can be. I want to be a strong advocate for her. I know this will take a shift in my mindset, but I need some words of advice or support to help me make that shift.
00:51:40
Speaker 3: Thank you. Signed, Overwhelmed Mom. So, wow. I bet, I mean, I know I as a.
00:51:47
Speaker 1: Mom can relate to this letter and I don't have a high needs child. I mean, I think that I want to say first, Christy, and Christy, I am really looking forward to hearing what you have to say about it. I'm going to guess you have some things to say, but I want to say first to overwhelmed mom, you know, that like, there's absolutely no shame, no shame in being angry and overwhelmed and stressed and the situation you're in. I think that is a pretty universal experience among mothers that this is an incredibly difficult thing to do to raise children. And it becomes way more difficult when your child is high needs as yours is. And so no shame, we're here with you and we're gonna give you advice with only love and support in our hearts.
00:52:32
Speaker 2: Yeah, so like first, if I didn't have a high functioning child special needs child myself, I would also just look at it from motherhood is different than what I expected it to be. And it's okay to mourn the loss of what you thought your life was going to be. Like, that's something that I think is necessary. You need to mourn it. And I think the first step of being open and vulnerable and putting those words out there and saying the things that you feel like you shouldn't say, because you're not going to be appreciative, that doesn't negate what you're living in the lived experience you're having. You're not living how you thought you were going to be living as a mom. And you should mourn that you should mourn it. And you should let it actually pass because you have to grieve that in order to move on. And then when you move forward, understand that like, none of us have a playbook. None of us were given, you know, the instruction manual to a kid and other, some moms look like they've got it, you know, really easy and they've got it all figured out, but nobody knows what everybody else is going. All moms are frustrated at times. I think it's a.
00:53:55
Speaker 3: Universal, like we get frustrated at our kids.
00:53:58
Speaker 2: And I think that the added thing with having a special needs child is is this guilt that comes with it because you're getting angry and frustrated and you think that it's not okay because there are special needs and that that's supposed to absolve you from having feelings of it. And that's just not the case.
00:54:22
Speaker 3: You're not a bad.
00:54:23
Speaker 2: Person for getting frustrated by a child who's being defiant. That's a hard thing.
00:54:30
Speaker 1: I want to chime in and say all those feelings that overwhelm mom is having, they are the feelings that moms have, right? I remember looking around, my kids are college age now, but looking around and being like, everyone else is doing better at this than me. And And, you know, I think that there is this, we have this picture, like a lot of us, you know, that, that, you know, this is what it's going to look like. And then you arrive and you're like, wow, this is so much harder or more complicated than I thought it would be.
00:54:58
Speaker 3: And so I just overwhelmed mom.
00:55:01
Speaker 1: I hope you can really hear Christie's words of just normalizing these feelings and mourning what what you thought it would be and learning how to adapt and accept what is, which I think, Christy, you've really spoken to today and like thinking about like the different adaptations you've made over the course. of your swimming career is it's about at core, I think, right? Acceptance, like saying, okay, I had this dream or I had this vision or I had this expectation. And then what happened was different. And I'm going to, you know, repeatedly show up again and give it my best. And I just want to say, overwhelm mom, your best is not perfect.
00:55:39
Speaker 3: It's not perfection. It's not ever having negative feelings.
00:55:44
Speaker 2: Yeah. And it's, the other thing is that Don't, don't judge yourself off of how somebody else is doing because you're, you've got a whole different set of cards in your hand and you're playing to that strength. And for me as a mom, even if I didn't have a child with, you know, extra needs, I'm a mom who has extra needs. And me as a mother showing up is very different than many other moms because You know, when my son is at football, I'm not on the field. I need to stay back on the path because my wheelchair can't get up and I need to stay in the shade so that I don't overheat because I have different needs. When I'm at the playground, we go to specific playgrounds that work for me to be able to be the mom. But I don't always get to be the mom that I want to be. I don't get to be the mom that I was to my older child with my youngest child. She gets a very different lived experience and we need to not judge. Overwhelmed mom, do not judge yourself based on other moms and how they're doing it because you've got a whole separate set of cards that you're playing with and you're going to do just fine.
00:56:55
Speaker 3: I love that, too.
00:56:56
Speaker 1: And I to me, Christy, I think that's about remembering to put ourselves in the equation. And I think that, you know, the history of like being a mom is all about sacrifice.
00:57:06
Speaker 3: Right. And an overwhelmed mom. I think more than.
00:57:11
Speaker 1: Anything, what I encourage you to do is say, like, you know, your needs matter, too. And so you are overwhelmed and angry and stressed.
00:57:18
Speaker 3: And so you need some support.
00:57:20
Speaker 1: And you reached out to me, you wrote us this letter and that's great. But like reach out to other parents who have special needs kids, reach out, talk to your husband. You know, you mentioned this super full-time job he has and it's not working. Like it's not working for you not to have the parenting support you need. And maybe it can come from your husband if he can adjust his schedule. But maybe there are other sources too. Maybe there are other people you can ask for help or hire for help. And it's okay to say like, this isn't working. I matter here and I will be worn out if we continue this way. And so that is really, really important. You know, being a good mom is not just about sacrifice. It's also about like raising your hand and saying, this is what I need to be the best mom that I can be.
00:58:11
Speaker 3: And so we wish you luck. Christy, I think.
00:58:14
Speaker 1: I think we've all had to do that at some point, right? You know, all of us who are parents have had to say like, okay, this isn't working. Let's, let's, let's adapt and change. And, um, that asking for help, it always, you know, things always turn for the better. Yeah, that's right. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness. So we wish you luck over well, mom. So Christy, thank you for helping me answer that letter. And I'd love to hear as we end our conversation, what is next for you as a swimmer? Are you looking ahead to the next Paralympics or what's happening in your career and in your world? What's that next mountain you have to climb or swim over?
00:58:58
Speaker 2: Yes, so we are... just as of this past week, two years out from the Los Angeles 2028 Paralympic Games. And I am definitely still looking forward to that.
00:59:11
Speaker 3: I'm excited.
00:59:12
Speaker 2: I was in the pool this morning swimming away. I also was at track and field nationals last month where I got second place in the shot put. So Perhaps we'll be doing two sports in Los Angeles, swimming as well as track and field. We'll have to see. Very excited. Yeah, very excited to be doing it in front of a home crowd and having more of my family and friends there this time. First, though, I do have some, unfortunately, I have some medical stuff. That's going on. And I am going to be talking publicly about it. So I don't mind talking about it here. Unfortunately, we've talked about my body likes to, you know, just make these extra cells. And I was at an appointment with my oncology PA for my breasts because we have some spots that we have to watch. And we unfortunately found something new. And so I have an appointment scheduled with the surgeon so that we can go down the route of getting a double mastectomy. But we're in a situation where we've got to do it now because we do need to be recovered because L.A. is still important. So if there's other things that we have to do because of the findings, we'll do that. But we're being very optimistic and we're taking it just one step at a time. But Yeah, there's the long term of what we want in life, but I've also gotten to the point where I don't hold those in cement because I have no idea what's going to happen. So yes, I would love to be in LA, but what's most important for me is to still be here to be a mom in 2028. So that's the ultimate goal is to still be around for them. So we're going to do everything in our power to make that happen.
01:01:10
Speaker 3: Wonderful. That's, I mean, That's the truth. One step at a time.
01:01:14
Speaker 1: And Christy, I will be thinking of you as you walk through these health difficulties and set your eyes on LA 2028. I wish you all the best of luck and I've loved talking to you.
01:01:26
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. It's been an absolute pleasure.
01:01:28
Speaker 3: Thanks for listening.
01:01:30
Speaker 1: If you'd like to write me a letter seeking advice, email it to me at deardearsugar at gmail.com. And don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Happy trails, and I'll see you next week. Mind Over Mountain with Cheryl Strayed is an iHeart Women's Sports production produced by Brittany Brown and Rodney Brown of Barbara Jean Productions. Supervising producer is Kaylin West at Realm. Associate producer, Amaya Brathwaite. Our executive producers are Molly Barton, Jerry Carita, Grace Fuse, and Jessie Katz. Our theme song is composed by Gramascope Music. Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
01:02:11
Speaker 3: Happy trails. And I'll see you next week.
