Letter from one athlete to another athlete

*** translated from Spanish, link below

By Adriana Barraza Castañeda, Mexican triathlete.

Hello, I am writing this letter to you ... To you who feel that you can not do any more, to you who are about to abandon this path, to you who think that you can not be a high performance athlete and study a university career at the same weather.

I write to you already on the other side of the rainbow, and everything I went through was worth it, and it will be worth your way too.

YES ... IT TAKES ME 6 YEARS TO GET OUT A DEGREE OF 3 YEARS, but the school behind me is much bigger than a paper. Maybe I do not graduate with honors or with the generation I started with, but I was in 15 countries:

Canada, New Zealand, Brazil, Ecuador, Barbados, United States, Morocco, China, South Korea, United Arab Emirates, Uruguay, Germany, Hungary, Spain, Japan.

I was in 29 cities around the world and I met the 5 continents. 
I was able to make 12 world cups, 4 world championships, 4 world series, win 2 national championships, I went to Central American and Caribbean Games, I speak 3 languages ​​and most importantly: I WAS IN AN OLYMPIC CYCLE.

So if ... I graduated with another kind of honors.

It was worth it to have slept two hours many times, because it came from training at 10, to work until 3 and at 5 it was already at dawn in the pool or gym, it was worth going to another country and not having gone to Knowing because I had homework, it was worth not having gone to the club to welcome, because I had a World Cup the following week. Thank you mom, thanks dad because they did not sleep to prepare a coffee or take me chocolate when they gave me physical tutoring a day before the exam at 4 in the morning because only at that time could, it was worth having gained 4 kilos in the end week , or having lost 5 and feeling weak training, it was worth having lost training sessions, but also losing many classes, it was worth seeing generation after generation graduating and I still stuck in college,

I missed family gatherings, I missed funerals of people he loved because while my family was saying goodbye to a loved one I still had exams and running series, I missed trips to the beach, sleepovers, group tasks, dinners student society, congresses and festivals ... I almost lost myself ... but I did not.

I met people of all kinds who trained me as a person, and do I tell you something? You will also know them.

Those colleagues who demanded to reproach you because you were not going at the same pace, but you will also have those who will be willing to take part in you. You will meet someone who will hear you cry at dawn when you can not do more and the next day at school will tell you that everything will be fine, you will be friends with the guard of the university, and the cafeteria, you will have preference when looking for a role because ABSOLUTELY everyone knows you (how can you not do it if you almost put the first stone of the school in 1987, right?) and why not? Even at this stage you will know the love of your life.

At the end, when they gave me my paper and I put on the toga, I realized that this role is not me, it does NOT DEFINE ME, what it does was all those nights, unconscious, sleepless, coffee, laughter, tears, tears, doubts, fears, travels, tasks, all those looks in the public, the embrace of the big 3 ... YOUR CONVICTION, YOUR PERSEVERANCE.

So I'm writing this to tell you not to give up, YOU CAN, DO NOT LOWER YOUR LOOK, the road itself is long, it's not easy ... but, HOW WORTH IT IS!

link https://www.atletasla.com/2017/11/12/carta-de-un-deportista-a-otro-deportista/