Gold, who won the first of her two US national figure skating titles at TD Garden in 2014 (and was born in Newton before moving as a youngster to Chicago), wrote a candid and moving 2024 memoir about her own mental health journey through disordered eating and thoughts of self-harm, which she also shared in the 2020 HBO documentary “The Weight of Gold.” Working now as a touring skater and coach, the Toronto-based Gold is an important voice in the work to remove stigmas about mental health and to coach young athletes in more healthful ways.
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“My trauma in the sport, I was able to use it, learn from, what not to do,” she said in a recent telephone conversation. “Becoming an Olympic athlete, how can you go through that journey without being traumatized? In a lot of sports really it’s glamorized, the same in the work space, where it’s, ‘If you’re not constantly climbing that corporate ladder, people see you without drive.’ It feels that way in sports, as well.
“My question is, ‘Is there a way to through the Olympic journey, to win a championship, get a Super Bowl ring without any type of trauma?’ I don’t know, but I think that we should find out. I think a lot of us, we put mental health aside, didn’t really appreciate it, people thought it made you weaker. Some days must happen to us, yes, but I fully believe that you don’t have to walk through hell to partake in a sport which is supposed to bring communities together. That’s one of the big reasons I work in the mental health space so intensely, to help find ways to get through without ‘big T’ traumas.”
To that end, Gold has openly supported efforts to have independent mental health professionals available to athletes, endorses the creation of the “calm zone,” an area where athletes can unwind on their own, on-site at every Games, and perhaps most importantly, speaks up regularly and with confidence about her own lived experience.
“A lot of times we grow up to become the person that would have saved us when we were younger or we grow up to be the people that raised us, one or the other, the parent that drives the kid every day, or the parent that says, ‘I had to walk 4 miles in the snow so you have to walk 4 miles in the snow.’ I think I’m growing up to be the person that would have saved me when I was younger. I’m a big fairness person, and there’s so much unfairness with how mental health is treated, the stigma around it.”
Once upon a time, Gold thought she was alone, “certain I was the only one in figure skating” struggling with her mental health. Kudos to her for making certain other athletes know they are not.
▪ Is LIV Golf on life support? Once the talks of a merger between the PGA Tour and Saudi-backed breakaway tour stalled, I said to let LIV starve. The cracks are starting to show, with Patrick Reed announcing Wednesday he is following Brooks Koepka out the door. Throw in LIV finally conceding to a 72-hole format in its ongoing futile quest to get world ranking points, and it’s clear the only thing left driving the league is money.
As Rory McIlroy said on a recent “Stick to Football” podcast episode, “It hasn’t really resonated with people … They were coming into the game saying, ‘We’re going to be different, we’re going to be this, we’re going to be that,’ and it’s not.”
Stay tuned, folks: If the PGA gets Jon Rahm or Bryson DeChambeau, it could be over.
▪ Of course Bill Belichick should have been a first-ballot Hall of Famer. He’s the living definition of “first-ballot Hall of Famer.” But too bad, too, for other coaches who get pushed further back in line while Belichick presumably gets his nod next year. Mike Shanahan, Mike Holmgren, and my personal favorite, two-time Patriots slayer Tom Coughlin, aren’t getting any younger.
▪ I still think Eli Manning should be a Hall of Famer, too. Two Super Bowl wins, two Super Bowl MVPs, playoff runs over Tom Brady and Aaron Rodgers and Brett Favre, his résumé is worthy.
▪ Good luck, Joe Brady. I’m still trying to figure out what the Bills’ plan was. Owner Terry Pegula does not inspire confidence. First, Pegula admitted his firing of Sean McDermott was rooted in the emotion of the aftermath of their playoff loss to the Broncos. It went downhill from there. From selling out wide receiver Keon Coleman to propping up general manager Brandon Beane, who somehow got a promotion to president of football operations despite so many roster deficiencies. Pegula eventually settled on promoting Brady — the offensive coordinator on the very coaching staff Pegula scapegoated in favor of Beane for the much-maligned Coleman draft decision — to replace McDermott.
With the Patriots on the rise again, the Josh Allen window just got smaller.
▪ As much as my journalistic/column writing heart wants as much access to players as possible, I have to agree with Coco Gauff. She should have been able to smash her racket in private. When her promising Australian Open run came to a crashing halt in a straight-set, 59-minute loss to Elina Svitolina, Gauff found what she thought was a private area to take out some frustrations on her equipment. Instead, cameras followed.
“I tried to go somewhere where they wouldn’t broadcast it, but obviously, they did,” she said. “So, yeah, maybe some conversations can be had because I feel like at this tournament the only private place we have is the locker room.”
Former world No. 1 Iga Swiatek agreed, saying, “Are we tennis players, or are we, like, animals in the zoo?”
▪ Shoutout to reader Pete Cahill, who made sure I didn’t miss the UMass Boston men’s hockey team winning the 60th annual Codfish Bowl, the second-oldest tournament in the country. The Beacons’ 5-1 win over Worcester State was led by tournament MVP Chris Repmann.
The Patriots are heading to the Super Bowl. Ben Volin and Dan Shaughnessy are in Denver to break down the AFC Championship game and preview Super Bowl LX.
Tara Sullivan is a Globe columnist. She can be reached at tara.sullivan@globe.com. Follow her @Globe_Tara.