Olympic figure skater Gracie Gold talks about pressure she felt to minimize mental health struggles
Olympic figure skater Gracie Gold opened up about her private struggles with mental health and figure skating in an interview with NBC's "TODAY" show Tuesday.
Olympic figure skater Gracie Gold opened up about her private struggles with mental health and figure skating in an interview with NBC's "TODAY" show Tuesday.
After she won her first U.S. figure skating championship in 2014 and earned a spot on the Sochi Winter Olympics team, Gold began to feel the pressures of elite figure skating. Her mental health started to deteriorate as the self-destructive voice in her head grew, a voice Gold titled her memoir — “Out of Shape Destructive Loser" — after.
Gold took a break from competing in 2017 to seek treatment for what were announced as an eating disorder and anxiety. In reality, she was dealing with suicidal thoughts.
"It wasn't 'palatable' is the word that they used for the world and specifically the skating community," Gold told Savannah Guthrie on Tuesday. "We don't talk about those things out loud, but for me, it wasn't gossip or hearsay. It was my story. I was in the middle of Arizona in rehab in the middle of a season, and I felt like an honest answer was appropriate."
Gracie Gold during the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, on Feb. 19, 2014. Matthew Stockman / Getty Images file In the memoir, Gold opens up for the first time about being raped by a fellow skater at 21 years old.
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