Resilience in sport Part A

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Hi, my name's beck Woodbine and welcome to Tenderness for Nurses.

I'm grateful for the person that I had the opportunity to be, so I hit it and parked it for Nellie for years.

We always have free will, we always get to choose.

We are autonomous. Hi.

Everyone, Welcome to Tenderness for Nurses. With a little bit of a twist. I'm here today interviewing my daughter Chloe. Hey.

Hello, I've come all the way from a straight to Boston to see Chloe.

But while we're here, I wanted to have a chat with her about resilience. And it's just going to be about a story, well not so much a story and instead of that happening in Chloe's life and she could have made a decision to go either way. And I felt it was a really great conversation to have around resilience but also how to manage your feelings moving forward. So what year was a Cloe that you decided to leave water Polo in Australia.

It was around I want to say twenty sixteen twenty seventeen. I was on the Australian squad at the time and was doing a lot of training as well as QS, which is the Queensland Institute's squad. So I was going back and forth between training there, training for my club, training.

Doing Australian camps, and then eventually.

I made the decision to move to the US and played America. Played water polo in America. I started at Hartwood College in Upstate, New York, and then I returned home during winter break, back home at summer break here for college, and I continue to try and make this Australian team for the world.

And that's when sort of shit hit the fan a little bit. Everything for didn't very quickly.

I came back and I didn't really feel as welcome as I would have thought into the previous squads and teams that I was training with and moving at the time. Moving to the US sort of I want to say, put you in a black list. They didn't really want the athletes going to the US to play water polo. They wanted you to stay in your home state and train for the teams. So by me leaving to come play in.

The US, I was almost like fifty to fifty.

Chances, and I was giving up my chance on making Australian squads will continue to make these teams and squads.

Why did you decide to go to the US and apply for a.

Scholarship, Well, initially it was that I it was sort of always the dream.

I remember actually being on your screen, Cipher. It was always the dream.

And then I actually did a year of university in Australia, and then I just hated it.

It just wasn't what I expected.

And I think I really wanted to be able to enjoy water polo and study at the same time, and a bonus and not having any student debt when I graduate. So I started just applying to different universities, reaching out to coaches see what I.

Could get, and a lot of people just never messaged me back. But I did have.

One coach who reached out and offered me a full scholarship up at Hartwick in New York, and I was quite happy to stay there for four years, but unfortunately my.

Program got cut about a month into turning up to the university.

So I made the move to Salem University, which is in West Virginia, of all places, where I met a very six of us six players. A coach was a new program, so we were building it from the ground up, but making that move.

From a Division one water polo team to a Division two sort of strong.

Some notes in the coaches back home head that I wasn't good enough anymore because I wasn't at that Division one standard. Although for those who may not know, Division one water polo and Division two water polo in the US, we all played during the season the same teams.

We interacted tournaments.

The only difference is when it comes to championship time, you're just playing Division two school for other than Division one schools. But if you win that championship, you end up going into the NC DOUBLEA tournament, which is fagain like any team can make it in if you win your championship. So then when we eventually made it into NC Double a's, we were playing I think the first half like Wagner and the next was UCLA. So we were playing those big teams regardless of whether we were a D one.

School or a D two school.

You came home that summer break and you still have a scholarship with QAS, and you went one night to training and I remember you came home, well, I'm going to say in hysterics you were so upset you could hardly talk. You were just devastated with how you were treated. Do you want to explain what happened?

Yeah, So I initially coming back from the US, I'm pretty sure I got off the plane and went to practice that day, my first session. There was a new head coach in the program at the time, and he pulled me aside at the end of practice and basically said I wasn't good enough.

Anymore and that I wouldn't make the world team.

That I was trying so desperately to make through all the camps and stuff and taking time off school and away from my education to go to these week camps, two week camps, three week camps, like they were a huge time off we were having to take from university.

In all and at my cost, and all students had to do it.

So I came out, I was told I wasn't good enough, and then I just continued to put my head down and continued going to training.

I was determined to prove everyone wrong at that.

Point that can I just ask a question, though they thought you were good enough here at the States, Yes, yes, I thought you were a really good stund forward.

Yes. When I did eventually have to move universities.

Because of my program getting canceled, there were a lot of teams trying to snatch me up.

So coming home and sort of.

Getting that shock go, oh, you're good enough anymore was kind of a shock in that I was good enough over here? Why am I not good enough in Australia? Anyways? I kept going to training. Pushed me to go to training, even though I'm pretty sure every day it was like the last thing I wanted to do, and it would be at the point where I was in hysterics because I didn't want to go to training, but I continued

Why didn't you want to go? Was it because of the culture? Was it really toxic? Culture?

Wasn't the best, But there was just so much like anxiety around the fact that I was going to a place where the coaches didn't think I was good enough.

In situations like this, when you're trying.

To make a national team, it can also I'm not saying it did, but it can stem down into the athletes as well, because you know they want to be liked by the coaches and they want to because they want to be picked. And if you're not liked by a coach, I mean, that cuts your chance of making a team in half, you know what I mean.

So it's a little bit tricky and trying to find the right balance of whether do I want to go to practice and.

Continue this like to make this of squad or am I willing to take a step back? But then my chances are even less, even less, And if they really want me, maybe they'll pick me up down the track.

Do you think they'd taken any time to look at how you played, because you can't watch all the games.

That's what I did in the middle of the night. Definitely not.

But I used to send my game schedules to coaches and send links to where they could watch me play. So I don't really know whether they did watch me play or they didn't watch me play, but I wasn't good.

Enough in their eyes, Okay, So, and I just want to say, this isn't going to be a bitch fest or this is just discussing I suppose sport and management of athletes in Australia, and I'm sure it happens elsewhere, but also how Chloe managed what she's about to talk to us about.

So what happened that night?

So I had a one day at practice. I turned up and continue doing what I'm doing, and we were working on an exercise and was doing what I thought I was told to do. However, I apparently did it wrong and I had a coach on still school still scored the girl how to coach stand on pool deck and absolutely screeching lungs out at me. It was You're stupid, You're useless, Why are you here?

YadA yah yah, went on and on and on, and I do I mean, there's fifty people in the pool at this point, and I was an adults around. There were a handful, yes, were the other coaches listening.

There were other coaches, but a lot of them, from my knowledge, were coaching other athletes as well.

So who knows who saw it and who didn't.

But I do know that the athletes in the pool at the time I was playing with all witness step because people had made comments to me after it had happened. So as I'm being young and I'm just swimming back up the pool doing backstonone. Yes, coach, Yes, coach, you know, nodding my head, not really saying anything because it's not worth the argument at this point to try and improve my point.

When this particular coach.

Was he didn't like he didn't like me, and was deemed them a wrong so, you know, nodding my head, just acknowledging what he had said, but chose not to talk back to him, which well, at the time was the right thing to.

Do, but well I thought that would be the respectful thing to do, yes, but considering I didn't give him an invite back. He then proceeded to screen even louder and kicked me out of the pool, kicked me out of the training session, told me to leave the facility, don't come back.

He made a very personal level.

He was very personal, and I remember swimming to the side of the pool crying, and then a couple of the other girls were They were being lovely, they were being very company.

But it was also for me the point of I'm not going back.

Like I hated, I don't want to play water polo any but like it was, you wanted to play water pol water.

Polo, but I didn't want to go back into that environment and be around that particular coach and all the coaches that were involved in that organization, and you were sitting on pool Dick with another young lady that had also been abused by.

The second Yes, yes, and she was commiserating with you. So I wasn't the first.

That it had happened to, but I eventually was the first person to speak up about it. So a lot of people just put their head down and let him continue to do this. But I had asked to sit down and have a meeting with the head coach and a mediator, and she came as well, and I went in with.

My list of questions because I've written all down, and I asked questions and.

The answers back, I guess weren't really what I was

To go to these gym sessions.

So in my meeting, you know, I'd brought up stuff like that, like why does she get to go and I don't get to go even though we're on the same scholarship and we were both in the US, so we've both come back for break. So there was a lot of sort of back and forth and trying to figure out why me, why wasn't IV given the same opportunities as everyone else to try.

And meet this Australian team. You came home that night, you were so upset.

And then the next morning we spoke and I said to you, we can take this further, because this is inappropriate to have a grown man screaming at a young woman who was standing there in her togs. No one came to defend you on the side of a pool. It's just completely inappropriate. And so I said to Chloe, I will get involved because this is really wrong, but you need to understand that this will be the end of your any chance of getting on the Australian team.

And we were right. We spoke up, they had the meeting.

They didn't take me, see though I had, I had to threaten to get lawyers involved before they even responded to the email message.

And it's at this point my anxiety was.

So through the roof that like the thought of going to practice like I was in like serious shaken, Like I couldn't even drive to practice. I used to have to get friends to take me because I was shaking so badly. I couldn't get behind the wheel to drive myself to what I'd always driven myself to, you know, where I loved.

So it was a definite. It was tough. I had the meeting, and then maybe a week later.

I got cut from the program, which was kind of expected, but we knew it was We knew it was coming, and you know, I took that on the chin and I turned up to practice the next day and then the coach at the time actually turned around me and went, oh, I'm surprised he even showed up today.

Oh, very got cut.

And at that point, you know, now I'm bought to tears again. You know, I've just been cut from my dream. I have all the girls around me who have just made the team, Like it's you're trying to hide your emotion to not and be happy for your colleague, you with your friends, and you don't want it.

I didn't want the sympathy for being cut.

Like I knew I had water polo in the US stell, but it was pretty heartbreaking to get cut from something you had been training so long before.

It was an interesting thing when I said that letter and I was ignored and then threatened to take it to the Queensland government because it's a Queensland government run program.

Or OUs teams.

So for you and I to put in a form complaint, even though it wasn't taken seriously at first.

Was quite significant. And don't get me.

Wrong, I'm all for coaches being passionate and encouraging their team members and if we're doing something wrong, tell us we're doing something wrong. But its attacks on people to make them feel less than they are is where I have an issue with it. How was your anxiety around water Pillow when you came back?

It was a little rough at first.

I had to sort of figure out ways to manage my anxiety and stress. But I did have a really good group of team members and like a really great coach, although at the beginning we didn't quite get along. But I also think that was a little bit of from what I had just experienced with my past coach. So I took them a little bit of time, and we definitely had some blow ups on pull deck. And if you ask him now, I mean write or die, I mean a good great friends, great friends.

And we'd go for war with each other because we.

Went through so much as a coach player relationship, not getting along at first, so then sort of coming to the understanding of one another to then be able.

To win two championships. So how did you and coach work out your differences?

But well, we had some big blow ups on pullback, but for us, it just came down to sitting down and having a conversation.

To know.

Why we are the way we are. I guess sort of what led me to coming to Salem. And when I first went to say them, like, I wasn't particularly.

Happy about it.

My program and dream School had just been cut. I'd been dropped from OZ, you know, I was coming back toward Apollo from I guess, from like a community that I felt didn't want me to then having to start afresh, you know, going to make new friends and a new coach and your you know, I had to switch degrees. I wasn't able to continue what I was doing at heart weight. I had to change to something different at

Like, this is what was paying for my education.

So for me, I wanted to continue to play to earn a degree, and that was a big part of it for me.

You just wanted. You just loved it over in the state. I did a college system and the fun and the parties, and I loved it.

So how any conference and non conference like in season games, have you played anywhere between one hundred and twenty one and fifty games? So at that time you had when you dropped from the old squad, you would have had way more game experience than anyone on that team.

I mean that was early on in my career.

In the US, but I still probably would have had thirty to forty games under your.

Belt under my balllet.

Yeah, and you were playing teams like Brown Wagner, my owner Harvard, l.

Are you California teams? San Frante's San Francisco.

Teams out in Florida. I mean we played everyone. We sat pack into a twelve passenger seat then and off you go.

Off we go.

Resilience wise, what did you learn from that experience when you went back to Australia.

I think for me, like I could have left it all and walked away and.

Happily just done university in Australia, but I would have had a totally different life and career track than I do now. I think like I came back, and at first, you know, it took me a while to get back into my love for this sport that's given me a whole lot.

But once I had built back, I guess.

It was the strength to be happy in the pool and be happy to do things.

I fell in love with the sport again.

But it sort of just shows I think my experience easily demon streets if you can walk away from anything in life, but there's typically going to be some sort of other path. Potentially, it's still involving what you love. It just may not be exactly what you expected it to be. And I mean, so, what's your involvement with water followed?

Now you've finished all your study, you're living in Boston, you're working.

So now I commentate for Brown University for the men's and the women's water a pollo and I do all the commentating on ESPN for them, and I also help out at mit SO Massachusetts Institute's.

Technology and I do.

Like the game clocks and help run the games essentially, so I give back a little bit. I referee here and there on the side, but refereeing in the US is pretty intent with all the coaches and it can get sort of spiked my anxiety. So I figured out what I can do that still makes me give back to the sport. Let's we get back to the sport and enjoy it rather than being in an uncomfortable situation.

That so you find if a coach gets world up and starts screaming at you as a.

Riff, you find it quite triggering.

Yeah, it can be, and you know it can sort of trigger your anxiety a little bit with you're being absolutely screened out because you made a terrible call or something. So like I coach more high school than I do college, just based on the intensity of the games.

But it's a way I hand it back to the sport.

And do you put that anxiety around being screamed it on pool deck?

Back to that incident, a qas.

I think it definitely contributed or it contributes to my anxiety and being yelled at. Look, that's I think in my mind that is the main triggering events that happened.

There may have been others, but that one is always sort of in the forefront of your mind of your mind.

So have you moved on.

From it, Like do you think about it and going we wish I had a handle it differently or are you proud of the fact that you kept showing up?

Yes, you cropped it. You got dropped from everything, but we pretty much assumed that that would be the case.

And you know, you're opportunities with you know, maybe making an Australian team were shaftered. Like do you I know you knew quite a few of the girls in the pool for the Olympics, and you know, I sat up and watched them and felt such pride and was so excited for those girls that made it. I'm also now a lot of girls that didn't make that team and it was heartbreaking for them.

How did you feel watching them at the Olympics?

Did you feel like I did, just really super excited for them, crowd so excited and proud and big.

Ripples an amazing coach.

I know how hard those girls work because I went through it when I was younger. I understand the process of how much time and energy and effort goes into it. And like a lot of those girls did a year or two years in the US, so they've also got to experience that US college life from maybe you know, two years or six months or whatever it is.

But I have no regrets in going back.

I wish they I think the biggest thing I wish I could redo is.

Push harder to get an answer of why.

I mean, I sat down and I had meetings with them, but I sort of just accepted the response that I was given instead of pushing to actually uncomfort the truth and not this bullshit excuse of getting they would have. But I mean when I see them on pool deck these days, I still acknowledge and say, Hi, Hey, you going, And whether they choose to eva did me or walk away, that's.

Up to them. And that's what happened last name, and that's what happened last time.

And I mean a lot of the coaches I still have great connections with, and my partner he's a coach over at Brown University, so we've been able to help him build some connections with Australian coaches for recruiting purposes and getting students over to the US. I just think coming to the US, for anyone who wants to do it, it's such a great opportunity and if you do get the opportunities of blessing, because not many people can say that I know, you know they did college in the US.

An amazing job and gone amazing job from it.

So it's so if you had as phony parents or you know, young people that are listening to the podcast about you know, maybe wanting to get their kids to the States, or you know, or they themselves have maybe done a year of nursing but play.

An amazing sport and you know, want to come over and finish their nursing over in America, what would you recommend they do as a pathway?

Mine was a typical and that I we didn't want to pay for a recruiter. They were at the time crazy expensive for being the middle man, so we just skipped the middle man and I tried to do it myself, which I was very fortunate enough to get that opportunity.

Where the other Aussies that I played, or I know that they did.

Go through recruiters, So you always have the recruiter way and they'll help.

You find a university and find the right fit.

I did it, but all saw you, your utwee coach, saw you play over a campags.

So I had that route as well.

So I had been emailing and he'd actually just seen me play, and.

That's how that happened.

And then what I transferred it was through universe alumni connections. But I know that there are a lot of coaches who are now flying over to tournaments, whether it's.

For water polo or swim or.

Basketball, whatever it is. And the coaches are coming into tournaments these days, where back when I was a freshman, that wasn't.

Really a thing.

Of coaches from the US coming to international competitions. I think the easiest way is through a recruiter, but there are other means of getting over here.

Yeah, so you just span at their emails and sent them video footage and yeah, I mean every coach.

If you go to their website, like the university website, into the athletics page and onto the team, there's always the coaches listed and nine times out of ten years an email address attached to that. I used to email like the head coach, systant coaches, volunteers, like anyone, anyone, I didn't matter whose email I could find. I was sending them an individual email, trying to make it as personal as they could.

At the time, I don't think they even had footage.

I just had a like an athletic resume and a passionate design. I used to just once a week email the coaches until there would get a response from it. It was hey, we're not interested, or cretty close whatever, But a few hit and then I was able to sit down and have conversations with them over like Oka at the time it was skype, you know, sit down to chat, see if it's a good fit, and then onto negotiating scholarships.

And I would just say the coaches, I want a fool ride, I'm not coming, and they hit in London, but they love center forward. It's over here. The focused on a lot of my.

Position is really wanted in the pool, and I was exactly what teams were looking for. And so I think you need to find a team that is looking for what you can provide or what you would excel at me. It was my size and my strength was what I was really good at, and you know, playing that center board position. But other teams may not want a center board and they just want super fast, quick on.

The hand with the ball players.

So you just got to find your niche what coaches are looking for.

So I suppose the big takeaway from this is that sometimes there are consequences to standing up for what's right.

However, I don't regret it. I don't know, you don't.

Because if it had to be done, and maybe you know, through the right education and counseling whatever, you know that coach or coaches may coach people differently or be aware of the impact their words and actions have on other planes.

That's the only thing I can hope for is that when they go to yell at someone or.

I'm sort of sitting in the back of their mind of how is this actually going to impact impact that person?

And all I can hope is that when they you know, for all I know, it may have happened again, it may not have happened again.

But I just wanted to be that person to stop the cycle of bullying. Bullying, I guess in sport, in particularly in that environment that I was in, and I know once I stepped away, a lot of other girls who had experienced the same things started to speak out about it, and there was a bit of a change in leadership and protein stuff and how they ran things. So there was a little bit of change. But like a lot of the girls I played with no longer play.

So I like to think that maybe maybe you're standing up and getting people the courage to stand up for what was written to stop this mistreatment among young athletes.

Because it's really at that point you're doing what you love and you love to do it, so having someone make you.

Not love what you love anymore is with stuff.

Absolutely well, thanks Cloth for chatting with me. I hope you guys have got something out of this. It wasn't like I said, to have a bit of a breakfast. It was just really that sometimes there are some really tough situations in your life and you can choose to deal with it or not, and that's okay either way.

It's up to you.

But I think for that great greater fulfillment and to move forward in your life, at some stage, I guess it has to be dealt with.

So thanks. I asked the usual have love mahold I

Would you have aged jumping scars be escape