This year, only two female divers from Australia qualified for the Olympic 3m diving event. I was third. When the results came in, my dream came crashing down. Fifteen years of hard work, seemingly for nothing. And my dream—to represent Australia at the Olympic Games for the first time—was gone in a second.
Having failed, I joined the club that no athlete wants to join: the club of “almost Olympians.” We all share the same journey: We’ve trained so hard and made sacrifices, but came so close to securing our ticket to the Games. The feeling nestles deep in your chest and stays with you all the time.
Georgia SheehanMatt Roberts/Getty Images
The diving board
I started diving at the age of nine, after watching Mathew Mitcham and Melissa Wu win medals for Australia at the 2008 Beijing Games. I was determined to become the next big star on the springboard. I quickly tried out, plunging headfirst into a new life as part of an elite national team for junior athletes. I worked 30 hours a week. In the mornings, I got up at 4:30 a.m. No more parties or dates. My adolescence, organized around exhausting training sessions, smelled of chlorine.
While my determination drove me forward, I quickly realized that I was not alone in this adventure. The immense sacrifices that come with top-level sports are only possible thanks to a powerful support network. Over the past 15 years, my family has sacrificed a lot. Our finances, but also our emotional reserves, have been put to the test, all of which have disrupted the normal course of our family life. All for my Olympic dream. A dream that—let’s face it—remains intact today.
The Olympic dream
That’s how dreams work: they shape your life, even if they are eventually shattered. Those years of dedication and sacrifice didn’t just evaporate when I learned I’d failed; they wove the fabric of my identity, making me stronger, more resilient, and ready to face what came next.