Personal Narrative: The Challenges Of Cheerleading

Cheerleading Challenges People have always told me to follow my dreams. We hear that again and again, day after day, but most people never listen. Dreams may seem so far out of reach, but if they aren’t scary, they aren’t big enough. I constantly wrote down my dreams because they were frequently changing. One dream of mine was always recurring; It was to be a cheerleader. It bothered me that Paynesville schools made the decision to cancel its cheerleading program because I knew there were a lot of girls that would thoroughly enjoy it. Being the persistent person I am, I was determined to achieve this goal and get our cheerleaders back. I spent many nights researching and trying to figure out how I could do this. The first step I took was to
talk to the Paynesville Athletic Director, Max Meagher.
Walking into his cold office was one of the most intimidating things I have done. All I could think about was how scary he was. I tried to calm myself down so I would sound professional and get my point across. I sat down and started tell him about my idea to bring back the Paynesville cheer squad. I was immediately shot down; Instant heartbreak. Continuing the conversation, I brought up the fact that New London High School has a competitive cheer team. Max thought the idea was very interesting, so he said he would contact their Athletic Director and see if it was a possibility that we could co-op. To my dismay, they said no along with Eden Valley. I was so frustrated, but I knew giving up was not an option. I continued to research the surrounding schools and finally my prayers were answered. Atwater-Cosmos-Grove City School had a competitive cheer team. I contacted the right people, talked to Mr. Meagher, and that's how I got to where I am today, a cheerleader.
Going into this, I did not know anyone. The first day of practice was utter hell. I showed up at the ACGC High School to see a red van that looked like a sore thumb surrounded by three girls. I reluctantly got out of my car and slowly walked up to them. One had pink hair, another with buck teeth and braces, and the last one, the only normal looking one, was a 6 foot tall giant. As soon as I stepped onto the sidewalk, the pink hair girl jogged up to me wearing tight shorts and moccasins and squawked, “Hi! My name is Morgan!” I softly replied, “Hi, I’m Grace.” It was a very awkward couple of minutes. More people kept showing up. There was an African American boy, a Mexican girl, a blonde, curly haired girl, and two little seventh graders. They were all so different from me; It was overwhelming to take it all in. Trying to keep a good attitude, we all loaded into the van and headed to SCSU for team camp. The day was long and boring. My team did not have any sort of work ethic and were a bunch of babies. I truly did not know what I got myself into.
We did not have many practices after the camp until school started. Every Sunday I would force myself into my car and drive to ACGC. Practices were four hours too long. I had kept an okay attitude the whole summer in hopes that my team would maybe get a little more normal, but my hopes soon ran out.
It was the second week of school when everything went downhill, fast. It all started with a Sunday practice. I walked into the gym already having a bad attitude, which probably was the first issue. I stared at my feet as I walked, then glancing up, there was my team. Only about half of the original team stuck around. The pink haired girl and the black guy quit, along with the Mexican girl, Vivica. We had added a transgender, a cross country dog lover, and two “used to be” dancers. This was the most random group of people could ever put on a team.
We started practice with a dynamic warm up, which was very easy to me, but of course,no one else. Usually after warm-ups a normal team would go right into stunting, but not this team. We had to sit there and talk about things that had nothing to do with cheerleading . My frustration levels were through the roof at this point, and it was just the beginning of practice. With three and a half hours to go, we actually started to stunt and go through our cheer routine, only stopping every five minutes to add a point that had nothing to do with the problem. With about an hour and a half left of practice, we stopped for a supper break. I sat down, leaned against the pole in the gym, looked to my right and just about lost it. My eyes were swelling up with tears when I saw Jeff, my transgender teammate. His legs were covered with deep, red, swollen cuts. My heart ached, but I pretended I didn't see it. I looked away to my left and one of the dancers, Aleaha, was talking to another girl. I stared at her for a split second when I realized that her arms and legs were also covered in cuts. This was the first time I had witnessed self-harm up close. I was completely astonished.
Trying to get those terrible, sad, images out of my mind as I sat and tried to finish my supper.
Fifteen minutes finally passed, feeling like an hour. Practice then continued with the obvious stops and barely getting anything done. When my coach gave us our final dismissal, I was out of there. Sprinting to my car I broke down in tears. My sobbing was so heavy that I could not bear to drive. I sat there for several minutes trying to pull myself together, but failing, I decided to drive anyway. I found that the car is the best place to cry. I felt isolated from the whole world because no one could hear me or see me. My team had no idea what I saw or felt inside. I just could not understand why anyone would do that to themselves. What could be so bad that one would do that.
I tried to make sense of it all, but I could not. I pulled out of the parking lot and started to drive home. I called Molly, no answer. I called Emily, no answer. I called Lucas, no answer. This just made me even more mad. I just turned the radio off and cried. At this point, everything I was mad about or that was on my mind came up. I started to regret even joining cheer. I was having second thoughts about myself, my friends, and school. I wanted to quit so
bad.
I was almost home when Molly actually called me back. I could barely talk through my sobs. She kept repeating, “It will be fine, it will be okay.” when I could finally tell her the story, she was very surprised also. We said our goodbyes and I instantly felt terrible for telling Molly about my problems. I knew she had been going through a hard time and that my problems were not as bad as hers. That was just one of the things going through my mind. I tried to stop thinking like this as I drug myself inside. Right away my parents started drilling me with questions. I told them everything. They wanted me to talk to my coach about it, but I had no idea how I would bring that up to her without sounding like I was judging them. Their second option was for me to quit. I was really contemplating that. I decided to just go to sleep.
I woke up the next morning and things seemed much clearer already. I knew quitting was not the best option. I weighed the pros and cons and reminded myself why I wanted to be a cheerleader in the first place. I had to recreate that determination to follow my dreams. And I also had to put myself in my team mates shoes and just be there for them instead of judging them.