Cheerleading has been a part of me ever since I can remember . 

When my mom was 16-years old, she did a foreign exchange year during high school in Toledo, Ohio, where a family brought her in. This family and my mom remain in contact.

For my second birthday, my mom’s host family sent me a cheerleading uniform that I fell in love with and in turn made me curious about cheerleading. At the time I was still too young to start cheerleading so I wasn’t able to practice with a competitive cheer team until I was 5-years old.

From my first practice, I loved it. Growing up in cheer wasn’t always easy and led to a lot of frustration and injuries down the line. Regardless of these factors, it is still the place where I can be myself and a place I have always come back to, no matter how rough it may get.

When I was around 11-years old I came to the difficult decision to quit cheerleading. After winning countless competitions and having a number of impactful moments through cheerleading, I lost my passion for it while being at a toxic gym.

The gym I was at heavily manipulated me into thinking I wasn’t good enough and that I couldn’t switch gyms because they would make me out to be a traitor and hate me. This destroyed my confidence and made me quit the thing I once loved the most for the next two years. 

Over those two years I attempted to find a new me in different sports and even though I grew up doing a variety of other sports, none of them came close to cheerleading. Nothing could give me the confidence I had while cheering on a competitive team and there wasn’t a day I didn’t think about cheerleading and how much I missed it.

After two years, I finally switched gyms and started on an even higher level team, which proved to be more difficult than I expected because of the damage done by my old coaches. My past experiences were still following me, and had diminished my confidence. I was insecure about my body, my skill level and myself as a whole. 

When I finally touched the mat again, hitting all of my stunts, and qualifying for the German regional championship gave me back some of my confidence. That same season I was a part of the team that competed at the UCA All Star National Championship, an international competition, that took place in Orlando, Florida, fulfilling a dream many cheerleaders around the globe have. Being able to compete internationally and even placing second at a competition that big allowed me to gain a lot of my confidence back. 

What fully brought back my confidence was becoming a coach and being able to share my knowledge with young athletes that remind me of the way I used to be. I made it a point to do better than my old coaches and encourage my athletes to choose what’s best for them as athletes but also as humans.

Being able to coach and also be a team captain on the highest level my gym offered, made me gain confidence, more responsibility and showed me how to be a leader not only in the gym but also in the rest of my life.

In my 12 years of cheerleading I´ve learned to not give up because it gets hard or others want you to. Keep doing what you love, if you´re not in a place that  makes you feel happy, find your happiness somewhere else. Little me would be so proud of where I ended up.

Competitive Cheerleading truly shaped me into the person I am today.