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Collected Item: “There is No Good Decision”

Give your story a title.

There is No Good Decision

What sort of object is this: text story, photograph, video, audio interview, screenshot, drawing, meme, etc.?

Photograph, video

Tell us a story; share your experience. Describe what the object or story you've uploaded says about the pandemic, and/or why what you've submitted is important to you.

My daughter is very athletic. I don’t make that statement lightly. I do not lie and I will look you in the eye and tell you my son is not an athlete. But my daughter was born with a natural ability for sports. Anything she tries, even recreationally, she excels at. When she was 3, she began gymnastics and in first grade, she joined the competitive team. It’s not just that she’s athletic, she works extremely hard. So making her sit out an entire season due to COVID was not an easy decision. I do not regret it, but it doesn’t mean it wasn’t hard. When this season began in May, we cautiously allowed her to return, fully masked. The cases were down and the coaches wore masks. We decided the risk was worth it for her mental health. Then the COVID restrictions were lifted June 15. My daughter became the only one in the full gym with a mask. We hoped for the best and have been lucky so far. But the cases are exploding. They are higher now than this time last year. What do we do? All her friends are from the gym. Truly. She doesn’t have any close friends at school because most of her time is spent at the gym. Can we take that away from her again? She worked out every single day of quarantine to stay in shape and she did. Can we look at her and basically say her work was for nothing? There is no good choice. What is more important? Protecting her physically or giving her the part of her life that secures her mental health? At the end of last week, I was seriously considering pulling her as the daily cases rose to 1,000+. However, in a move that shocked me knowing the clientele and position of the gym on this entire pandemic, even her gym has reinstated masks for all coaches. This made me feel maybe 5% better. Her one on one session is also from 8 - 9pm, which I was bummed at at first - so late for a kid! But I quickly realized we’re the only ones in the gym that late, which lowers my anxiety a bit. So we’re going to take the risk for now and allow her to continue going. I just hope it’s not a decision we regret.

Use one-word hashtags (separated by commas) to describe your story. For example: Where did it originate? How does this object make you feel? How does this object relate to the pandemic?

gymnastics, athlete, children, #lostseason, competitive, mask, California, Orange County, Delta, mental health, friend

Who originally created this object? (If you created this object, such as photo, then put "self" here.)

Kathryn Jue

Give this story a date.

2021-08-11
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