Swimming From The Darkness: The Rise And Fall And Rise Of Michael Phelps
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Swimming From The Darkness: The Rise And Fall And Rise Of Michael Phelps

"You can't put a limit on things. The more you dream, the farther you'll go."

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Swimming From The Darkness: The Rise And Fall And Rise Of Michael Phelps
QZ

Picture beautiful Sydney, Australia at the turn of the century in the year 2000, summer winding down into its last leg as August rolled around. But it didn’t quite feel like summer was ending yet. It seemed as though summer got its second wind as the 27th Olympiad began. Not only were the Games beginning once more, bringing countries and nations together like the world hadn’t seen for four years. Not only were the greatest athletes in the world coming together to show off the blood, sweat, and tears they had put into their sport for years. As the 27th Olympiad began, so did the journey of a legend. 16 years ago, 832 weeks ago, 5,840 days ago, however you prefer to keep track, a fifteen-year-old boy stood in the aquatic center on the last day of the swimming events, a soulless expression on his face. At just fifteen, he had gotten to the world’s biggest stage that he had dreamed of for years, but came up short of his ultimate goal: a medal. No one could mistake the fire burning in his eyes under that blank face. 16 years ago, Michael Phelps started his journey to the top, overcoming some of the darkest times in his life, shocking the world and even himself.

In Sydney, Phelps got his first taste of what the competition in the Olympics was truly like (as well as already becoming a household name), and he never forgot that disappointing week. However, instead of letting it deter him, he only used it to motivate himself to get better and better each day, setting his next ultimate goal of getting a second chance in Athens, and proving the haters and doubters wrong.

When Phelps began swimming at age 7, no one could have imagined what an “outlet for his energy” would help him become. Over the years, the butterfly stroke would become Phelps’ signature race, and it started early with him breaking a national record for his age group at age 10. In Athens, where he swam a record eight events, that event would be culminated in an Olympic record and his second gold medal. His first gold was won in the 400-meter medley with a world record time. “After I got one, I just wanted to keep getting more.” Get more he did, as the 15-year-old in Sydney was now a 19-year-old in Athens, Greece who had won a total of eight medals, six of them gold. That soulless expression was long gone and replaced by ear-to-ear grins and tears of joys (from himself and his mother, Debbie). He was on top of the world, holding two world records and three Olympic records at the conclusion of the Games, and looked like he was at what would be the climax of his career, or so it seemed.

Even though Phelps had quieted the critics in 2004, four years later they were back with a vengeance, all saying repeatedly that the now 23-year-old swimmer would never top his performance back in Athens as 2008’s Games in Beijing drew closer and closer. Even though he qualified for eight events yet again, it seemed as though no one believed anymore, as if four years ago was just a dream never to be seen again. When Phelps was asked about the chances of winning eight gold medals and proving those same critics who had been there from the start wrong once again, he simply said he was going to prepare routinely. “I am going to prepare myself for that meet just like I do every other meet. There is only so much I can do in a month, and then I am going to prepare myself the best that I can.”

There was an interview back in 2008 with Phelps’ mother where she said she would get phone calls from his school saying that he couldn’t focus on anything. Her response? A typical Phelps family remark, “Well, yes, he can. He can focus on the pool…He was able to focus on what he loved.” It is remarkable to think of the kind of laser focus Michael Phelps had to have had to accomplish the most incredible feat. In all eight of his races, Phelps set an Olympic record, and in all but one he set a new world record. He became the leader for most gold medals won by an individual Olympian. The sweetest of all of these accomplishments? Phelps finally set the record he missed matching back in 2004 by swimming 8-for-8 in gold medals, a performance of a lifetime. “Records are always made to be broken no matter what they are. Anybody can do anything that they set their mind to.”

Coming into the 2012 Olympic Games in London, the world was seeing a different Michael Phelps. They were seeing someone moody and stressed and no longer the relaxed, happy persona they had grown used to. Phelps had served his three-month suspension for a photo with marijuana back in 2009, and that seemed to be the beginning of the fall of America’s clean-cut hero. The London Games were like fresh meat for the critics. In his first final of the games, he missed the medal stand by finishing in fourth place, the first time he had done so since the 2000 Games. He won two more silvers, one to the second of Chad Le Clos in the 200-meter butterfly, setting the stage for an epic redemption in 2016. He also grabbed three gold medals and broke the record for most Olympic medals won ever, and three golds are nothing to sneeze at, but it just was not typical of the Michael Phelps the world had grown to know.

Phelps had said he was retiring after the 2012 games, but in 2014, he began his comeback. Recently, he told NBC that one of the darkest times of his life was when he wasn’t swimming, and in turn sent him spiraling into a meltdown that no one could foresee him coming back from. He had no peace, no relief, and no replacement for the love of his life since childhood. Even his coach, Bob Bowman, was skeptical. Phelps had despised the gift he had been given going into London, and Bowman was not easily convinced that he wasn’t training for medals or history. But something happened in a conversation that changed Bowman’s mind. “This time Phelps wanted to swim for himself and enjoy the journey.” In 2014 at the U.S. Championships, Phelps did not win a single final, and later that year on a September night he “chose that road for a reason. That was probably the most dangerous of all ways I could’ve chosen to go home, and for some reason I did. If I didn’t, I might not be here now.” On that very road, Phelps got pulled over for speeding and was convicted for a DUI (his second), followed by a six-month suspension from swimming.

Instead of giving up completely on everything, the sport, his family, his friends, his coaches, his teammates, and most importantly, himself, Michael Phelps did something that takes a ton of courage to do. He didn’t let the dark, black hole continue to swallow him up and spit him out of existence. Instead, he got help. He admitted he needed help and he got it. He voluntarily checked himself into a rehab center in Arizona for six weeks, knowing while there he would have to confront the past that he had pushing away and letting burden him for years. Of course, Phelps would find the small pool in the center, and of course, he was drawn to it, knowing that swimming wasn’t the problem. Instead, he began searching. He searched for balance in his life once more and people that he cherished. He reconnected with his father for the first time since 2004. He got engaged to his on-again, off-again partner, Nicole Johnson. He made the biggest (and best) decision of his life to commit to swimming once more, with the help of his second-father since childhood, his coach.

Michael Phelps was falling in love with swimming again, the burden now inspiring him again and his fallen pieces beginning to fly back together as he rose once more, never to fall again. He trained harder than he ever had before, even before Beijing, and made the team. Without a moment’s hesitation from that first qualifying time, the critics came back full force, berating him for trying to go where no Olympian had ever gone before. People began to talk again, skeptical themselves, until the beautiful point where people, both in the United States and across the world, began to believe again. In his everlasting journey and goal to change the world of swimming, Michael Phelps was beginning to change the human spirit once more for the better as people united to believe in someone they had watched grow up before their very eyes.

Just in time for the Rio Games, in May 2016, he and Nicole welcomed their first son, Boomer, into the world. And the 31st Olympiad brought more success than Phelps and his support system could have imagined in five golds (one coming with some redemption) and one silver. But this was different.

In agreement with Bowman, Phelps masked every emotion and action that made him human for twelve years. When he swam his last race, the whole world cried with the man who no longer tried to hide his emotions. Yes, he is still as competitive as ever, evidenced in his reaction to taking back his title from Le Clos. And no, maybe Michael Phelps isn’t perfect, but who is? Everyone makes mistakes, but he is living proof that you can learn from them and let them fuel you to make you even stronger than before instead of letting them knock you down. Each and every time Phelps walked across the pool deck after a race this past week to see his family or run into the embrace of a teammate, his huge smile shows the unguarded emotion of someone who is absolutely, genuinely happy. A man who is finally at peace.

Michael Phelps wanted to change the world of swimming when he started his journey sixteen years ago. Today, he has accomplished that goal and more, and in the process, he has been reborn. Michael Phelps has found himself again.

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This article has not been reviewed by Odyssey HQ and solely reflects the ideas and opinions of the creator.
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