When you’re a gymnast, gymnastics is all you know. You spend most of your time in the gym and anytime you spend outside of it is still spent thinking about it, worrying about it, making choices and sacrifices with everything you do to improve your gymnastics. It always comes first and for me, it was a priority over everything else I did for 18 years. I literally used to think of myself as a gymnast before I thought of myself as a person, and I think many people in my life thought that about me as well.

Here’s me before my senior prom. I only had an hour to get ready, because I had just flown home from a meet.

Since gymnastics takes up such a huge space in your life, it’s ridiculously hard to let it go. When everything you’ve worked for your entire life is suddenly gone, it literally feels like there is nothing to live for, like you have no purpose. I had gotten so used to introducing myself as “Hi, I’m Miranda, and I’m a gymnast” that “Hi, I’m Miranda” sounded like nothing to me. When it came around to saying a fun fact about myself to the class as an icebreaker, I realized I had nothing to say. What had I done the past 18 years besides gymnastics? Oh, right - nothing.

I spent the weeks up until my last day of gymnastics dreading leaving the gym for the last time, dreading doing my last real tumbling pass ever, dreading putting my grips away. Telling myself that without being a gymnast, I don’t know who I really am, and feeling more and more lost as the date approached. I legitimately thought that I was nothing without the sport, and that no one would want to be friends with me in college since I had nothing interesting about me any longer.

Suddenly, it was my last day. It was bittersweet, of course, but the tears dried and I left the gym. Strangely enough, once I had left, the worst part was over. I had thought waking up each day would be meaningless, that once my body was done being put through the sport I wouldn’t be worth anything, but losing gymnastics honestly felt nothing like that.

As the label of “gymnast” was stripped away, I was forced to figure out who I was without the sport. What do I like to do with the five hours I’ve gained back every single day, hours I don’t have to spend in the gym anymore? Do I like to do any kind of exercising that doesn’t involve flipping through the air, risking my life every minute of every day?

Having dinner with some friends from my dorm freshman year - good news, I did make friends in college that like me, gymnast or not. I still live with most of these girls today!

Through the trials and errors of these past few years, I’ve learned a few things about myself that I never knew, back when I didn’t have the time for self exploration. I love working with kids, and fighting for equality. I love to write, and read, and I have time to do those things. I love being outdoors, and I shockingly DO love to exercise, even when it doesn’t involve gymnastics. Running, biking, swimming, yoga, or lifting weights I am always down for. There are so many things that make me who I am, and I never got to see those pieces of me when I was “just” a gymnast.

That isn’t to say I regret my time in the gym at all - those days were the most cherished days of my life, and they taught me countless life lessons. In fact, I think a lot of who I’ve recently discovered I am is because of gymnastics. I can’t thank the sport enough for shaping me into the person I am today, and giving me my best friends for life. But as glad as I am that I did gymnastics during that time of my life, I'm also glad I'm retired now. I know that I am exactly where I need to be.

My teammates and I, being goofy with our coach after practice one day. These are some of my most cherished memories.

Of course, there were days I didn’t want to figure out who I was without the sport, I just wanted to go back to who I was. Sometimes I didn’t want to work out because working out in any form compared to gymnastics is so boring - where’s the risk, where’s the thrill? Some days I didn’t want to talk to anyone, and I certainly didn’t ever want to talk about gymnastics. Stepping into the arena to watch my college’s first gymnastics meet as a spectator hurt, and it took all I had to sit and watch without tearing up. Those feelings of “who am I, and why am I here if it’s not to do gymnastics” stuck around for longer than I’d care to admit.

Here’s me visiting my gym for my first time since retiring from gymnastics. I remember being so afraid everyone would be disappointed in me, but my teammates and coaches welcomed me back with open arms and I still visit every few months, feeling just as at home as I always have.

Time heals all wounds as the cliche says, and the hardest breakup of my life is now a sweet memory. Nothing compares to the feeling of flying, and I’ll always miss it. Not a day goes by that I don’t miss flipping around in a leotard just a little bit, because there’s always something to remind me of my past life. Maybe I’ll get a text from a teammate that they got a new skill, or I’ll see a famous gymnast’s post on Instagram and watch in awe. Some nights I’ll have the most realistic dreams that I’m vaulting only to wake up in confusion, remembering once again that I’m done with the sport; it’s all in the past. But I’ve learned to love those constant reminders of the sport and who I once was, rather than dread them.

Here is a tattoo I got a few months ago to remind myself that no matter where I go in life, gymnastics is where I came from and it will always be a part of me.

A lake day spent with some of my many teammates, who are still my best friends.

I thought once I was no longer a gymnast I wouldn’t be connected with the sport, but that’s where I was wrong. Gymnastics will never leave my life, and I’ll never want it to. I may not be the girl covered in chalk, stepping into the gym every day to get stronger anymore. But I’m now a proud gymnastics coach to little girls that remind me of who I once was, full of dreams for the future; wearing tight little pigtails and displaying the happiest smiles anyone ever did see. I also practice with the gymnastics club at my university every once in awhile, just to get back out there and mess around.

Here are some two-year-olds I coach at the YMCA. These peanuts love everything about the sport already, and I can’t wait to help their love grow stronger as they get older.

So, to all those retired gymnasts out there; I see you. Keep on loving our sport with the same passion we once did and practice your back handsprings in the grass on sunny days.

To all those about to end their gymnastics career, know it isn’t as scary as you think. The anticipation for the shock is worse than the loss itself, and you’ll grow into yourself soon enough, carrying pieces of the gymnast you still are inside of you everywhere you go.

To all those who are young gymnasts, cherish the time you have left in the sport. Practice hard, and leave with no regrets. Enjoy your time on the mat, because it comes to an end quicker than you’ll want it to.

There is life after the sport, as hard as it can be to believe. All things considered, how it feels to lose the sport you love turns out to be something I’ll never know, since I’ll never lose it. Once a gymnast, always a gymnast.