Dear coaches, athletes, prospective students, staff, and umpires,
The picture I am about to paint for you is nothing but brutally honest. It is the truth, from what I feel has transpired to me as a collegiate athlete during my three years as an Eastern Connecticut State University Softball Player. This article may be tough to read for some. It may cause a lot of hurt feelings. But at the end of the day, truth is the only safe ground you can stand upon.
This is a story on the aftermath of coaching abuse towards players. It is a discussion on the truth of a matter once a coach goes too far. Once they push the limits, once they cause a break, and what happens once that break takes place. To the players that I once called teammates. This is not against you, but if you feel it is, maybe it is time you look in the mirror. Maybe it is time you own up to your mistakes.
In the Fall of 2015, I walked on to the ECSU softball team.
It is now 2019.
It has been exactly a year and one month since the world uprooted itself, the ground fell from beneath my feet, and I felt my hands suffer the tight burning of loss being to steam through them. The day began like all others; I woke up. I brushed my teeth. I took a shower. I ate breakfast. I grabbed my book bag, my bat bag, my practice clothes, and headed out the door. I went through the day like every other. I smiled at my teammates, the only friends I had surrounded myself with for months, and told them I would see them later. I sent out the practice reminder text, making sure we all wore the same thing, showed up half an hour early, and knew who would be there on time. I always wanted to make sure we were all on the same page, no one wanted to have punishment running in the middle of the game season. The day continued and practice came quicker than usual, probably because I was rushing straight from class. I dropped my bat bag on the floor at exactly 3:20 pm that day, and got in line to run the bases. It was just another day on E-Soft. After practice, the gym flooded with basketball players ready to take the court. We all packed up our bags and began to make plans to visit the dining hall for team dinner. I heard my name called from the opposite side of the gym. It was you, coach, calling my name. I walked over with the two others you had called, and you said, "I need to see you all in my office, individually." We all looked at each other with panic in our eyes. Doesn't that say it all coach, that we already had panic in our eyes?
The senior headed in first, then the other junior. Upon exiting the senior told me it was nothing to worry about, just a couple questions on how I felt about an item from the leadership meeting… because I was in leadership, and at one point, you thought I was a leader. Finally, it was my turn. I sat down on the couch as you and the other coaches looked at me with disappointment in your eyes. "You're not going to like this conversation," you said. I had heard those words before. You see, I wasn't just any other player on the team. I was a team pity party. You had cut me before, three other times to be exact. Once freshman year, twice sophomore year. I had to try out to make the team this year, unlike all my friends. I hadn't played an inning in my three-year career… or should I say two and a half since I was a manager for the spring last year? The conversation began and proved to be a slippery slope from the first words. I cannot remember the exact words, and I'm sure your story is different from mine, but the end results were the same. "You have a bad attitude," "We can't keep doing this," "You're not going to play… ever," "You will be the team cheerleader forever" "You just aren't good enough." "We don't know if you'll ever get to where you need to be, we don't think so." "We've given you so many chances…" and boom. There it was. "Then I'll make it easy for you. I quit," my mouth shouted as I slammed your door. I ran down the hallway, into the brick wall, collapsed and grabbed my phone. It was over. I had ruined everything.
Fifteen minutes later I walked down the same hallway I had been through hundreds of times before. There are many memories in that hallway for me. Mike's surprise trip to Florida, our walks to the gym, the laughs I shared with my teammates, the conversations I shared with other coaches, but all of a sudden that hallway seemed twice the size, and darker than ever. You weren't in your office like I had hoped, I picked up the phone, called you, and arranged a time to talk again. I didn't mean what I said, and you knew it. But, it was your out, and you took it.
The week passed with meetings between you, I, other teammates of mine, and the three other coaches. Every one of them left me the same. The energy was being pulled out of me. The tears hit the floor as they had never before. I felt lost, useless, and most importantly, a disappointment to you. I did not know my place in the world from the second my placement on the team came into question. I was losing everything, the team, my family, and my "mom", who was you. You told me the decision was ultimately yours, but what the team said would weigh heavily on your mind. I wasn't allowed to talk to them, only you were. I believed this was to keep them focused, little did I know you would pass around a notebook at practice the next day, asking the team to write all of their thoughts in it about me. Little did they know, you would use that as your battle gear to remove me from your roster.
I will save everyone the time of reading what took place throughout the week. In the end, I was done with the team. I had lost everything I spent years working towards. It was over. I sat in a meeting in front of my team at 7 o'clock on the most memorable weeknight of my life. I sobbed, unable to breathe, gasping for help. They stared. They said they were sorry, and had no idea what that notebook would be used for. They never apologized for the conversation they had in the van with you, the one where you used forty-five minutes of your time to speak about me…individually… only. "I grasped my hands and let the water leak. I did this to myself, I ruined this." I was now the stranger in the room to a group of people I once called family. I left the meeting that night, months ago, not knowing many of the people in that room would never speak to me again. Since that time, the world has proved to become harder than ever. Every morning is the same. I wake up and the feelings come flooding back. Disappointment, sadness, insecurity, loneliness, rejection, heartbreak, frustration, anger. I avoid mirrors at all cost. No one from the team can look at me without turning away, so why would I look at myself? You haven't reached out and your words sting like a ray of electricity piercing through my bones and into my veins. "I'll always love you." "You're still apart of our family." "We won't treat you any different." "I'm still here for you." But are you? Am I? We're you there when I spent the night throwing up from the lack of air unable to get into my chest? How about when I decided class wasn't for me, because taking the risk of seeing someone from the team, and having them walk by, was worse than taking a zero for the day? You weren't there. And you said you would be.
The days have not gotten easier, Coach. Every day I am wrong, and every day there is more damage to be undone. So tell me, Coach, was I really that awful? Was I really that meaningless to you? How easy is it for you to go day to day without someone like me?
Every day I think of that notebook, the notebook you used to destroy me. The notebook I now use to destroy the image I have of myself. The pieces of paper on your desk resembled knives, life-shattering knives.
I wonder did you mean to ruin college for me? To take away all of my friends? To take away the one thing that brought me happiness?
Think about that. Pitch by pitch, out by out, inning by inning.
