- 2022 Highlights
Personal Statement
My whole life, I’ve been around golf. My brother, who is five years older than me, started playing when he was four. By the time I was born, my family was fully invested. My family being so immersed in the sport left me with mixed feelings. When I was about 4, I wanted to play. However, as I approached seven years old, I found quite a bit of frustration in the sport, so I decided not to play.
When I turned nine, I went back to golf and started to play a bit more competitively through JrPGA. I wasn’t nearly as naturally as good as I was when I was younger. At that point, most of the girls had already been playing competitively since they were six years old. Although I was beyond frustrated due to my competitive spirit, I kept going even though I knew I was already behind. However, I took a break again from playing the summer before Middle School and honestly thought that I was done with golf again; I was wrong.
I remember that I sat down in my room the night before the Middle School golf team try-outs and wrote down a list of activities that I could partake in that year. In fact, I still have that list hidden away in my room. I sat there, eliminating activities one by one for about an hour and a half, and the only thing that I was able to come back to was golf. I argued with myself for about another hour because I already knew the struggles of the game and that I was so behind. Regardless of how much tried to avoid it, I always came back to golf, so I told my dad the night before tryouts that I wanted to play again.
I came in in 6th grade and was decent, but I wouldn’t consider myself good. That is where my journey really began. I wasn’t content with being mediocre. From the time I could speak as a toddler until the end of second grade, I got picked on by kids for being silent day-in and day-out; for being a Selective Mute. I felt powerless for many years. I decided that I would never be powerless again, and that meant winning or at least putting my all into anything and everything I do. I put my everything into golf. I ran a mile every night after practice, even though I stayed at practice until dark most nights. I changed my diet to fit my increased need for calories due to the work I was putting in. I studied until midnight to keep my grades up. Everyone looked at me like I was crazy and questioned what I was doing.
I was never naturally great at anything that I did. I’m still not. To get where I am today, it has taken blood, sweat, and tears; and trust me, there has been plenty of all of those things! By the time I was in 7th and 8th grade, I was considered good. Because I believed I was good, I got lazy. During off season I didn’t do anything extra--I didn’t even want to practice. The following summer my parents enrolled me in a tournament; It was the summer between 8th grade and my freshman year. It was my first official large-scale tournament. I played the Ackerman course at Purdue. I remember it being 100 degrees and 100 percent humidity making it feel 105. I was absolutely miserable, and I performed horrendously. This put me back on track. Again, I worked with everything I had and took very few breaks.
After my Junior season where I had just hit my stride, shooting my personal record of 74 and won the Sectional, I got sick. The day after Winter Break, I was diagnosed with mono. I was sleeping for an average of 19 hours a day and lost 30 pounds. I missed 14 weeks of school, and as fun as it sounds, it was miserable. I was diagnosed with chronic fatigue that the doctor said may last the rest of my life, and there was a real chance that I was never going to be able to play golf again. Even now, I’m still battling a bit of it.
This past summer I almost gave up. It was the third day of Girls State. Girls State was my first tournament back, even though I knew I was nowhere near playing shape. I only had a week of practice after six months off of practice. I had already battled the first two days to make the cut which was 60 out of 120 girls. I showed up the third day with a fatigue I had never felt before. By the second nine, I felt like I was going to pass out. By 13, I was leaning on my cart to keep myself upright. By 15, my parents and the other parents were questioning if I should drop out. I won’t lie, I wanted to. I had never felt as bad as I did that day. I genuinely thought that I would need to be taken to the hospital if I finished, yet I refused to be pulled. There was no one on this Earth that was going to stop me from finishing, so I finished. I put up a horrible score, but I finished. After turning the score cards in, I was immediately rushed to the car where I was doused in ice water to try and cool off my body temperature. I don’t remember much of what happened afterwards, but I do know that I was crying. I was so happy that it was over, but I was so ashamed that I even had the thought of quitting. I slept for the next week only waking to use the restroom and eat.
From then on, I have refused to even let the thought of quitting enter my head, because nothing will ever be as bad as I felt that day. During this season, I have been battling to bounce back, where I have shot a new personal record of 71 winning the Conference. Throughout my time in golf I realized, I’m not good and I never will live up to my own standards. Some might think it is unhealthy to think this way because it causes burn out, but it only drove me more to reach for the unobtainable. I stay determined because it’s hard to beat someone who won't quit. I got into a great swing coach, started going to a sports psychologist, and pushed myself in everything--even outside of golf. I pushed myself to go against my selective mutism and break out of my shell with the help of my support system. It wasn’t easy, but I did it and have no plans to stop. Now I plan to go on and play collegiate golf and continue on in my aspirations of being a Biomedical Engineer.
Through all of this, I have had many people support me. My family, swing coach, sports psychologist, high school coach, teammates, golf friends, golf course pro and staff, etc. have supported me in every endeavor. The people in my life have taught me the mentality that if you shoot for the sky, you hit the ceiling, but if you shoot for the stars, you hit the moon. As Snoop Dog said, though, “Last but not least, I want to thank me." I want to thank me for believing in me. I want to thank me for doing all this hard work. I want to thank me for having no days off. I want to thank me for never quitting. I want to thank me for always being a giver and trying to give more than I receive. I want to thank me for trying to do more right than wrong. I want to thank me for just being me at all times.
