The death of Katie Meyer hurt. Despite only meeting Katie once, her passing touched my soul. Being a former Stanford soccer player, I can all too well imagine what she was going through. Katie’s story is at the far end on a spectrum of unhappiness, gradients of which I’ve felt and my teammates have felt.
Something I heard Oprah say has stuck with me over the years. She was sharing what she had learned over the course of 25 years of interviewing people. No matter who she was talking to, Oprah found that every person wanted to know the same thing:
“Did you hear me? Did you see me? Did I say anything that mattered?”
What Oprah came to realize is that everyone wants to be acknowledged, validated, and valued. We, as student-athletes, want to be told we matter despite what we do on the field or in the classroom. There are a host of factors that led to Katie’s decision, but I’d be willing to bet that this yearning for validation was one of them.
Why? Because it was for me.
Stanford students are high-achievers. In the case of the student-athlete, from a young age, we grow accustomed to excelling on the field and in the classroom. We get used to not only the external recognition and praise but the internal gratification that comes with it. (For example, one of the most satisfying moments in soccer, for me, is right after I have a killer performance. When I’m shaking the other team’s hands and the opposing coach comes up to me and says in a low voice, “You played really well,” I can see in his eyes that despite all their scouting and all their preparation I still destroyed their defense.) You can call it an ego, you can call it whatever you want. But for a significant number of student-athletes who have lived for these instances, when we get to college, for the first time in our lives they cease.
College is odd because you can go four years without having relationships with adults.
My freshman fall I got my first C, dropped a class after scoring less than 40% on the midterm, and made one start. Some years I started more games, other years I started less. As a forward, you can do a lot of things well on the field, but if you’re not producing goals and assists, more often than not, your playing time is in jeopardy. That’s just part of the game.
But there’s a difference between your role and your worth. At Stanford, I felt like my value was measured in goals and assists, in what I could produce. During the times when I wasn’t “producing” (and, mind you, there were a lot. After all, I red-shirted the fall season of my junior year due to a knee injury and then tore my ACL my senior year), I felt like I wasn’t valued.
You hear people characterize the environment at Stanford as a place where there’s this incredible pressure to be perfect. I’ll tell you this, I am nowhere close to being a perfectionist; I felt pressure to survive.
My sophomore fall I was drowning. I had the time commitment of practice, meetings, treatment, and away trips, as well as the mental strain of being benched– all on top of vector calculus. I went to office hours twice a week, student-athlete tutoring one night, dorm tutoring a different night, attended extra study sessions offered for students of color on another, and I still failed the midterm. I got to a point where I didn’t have any more time to devote to the class. I can remember thinking, it’s impossible for me to work any harder to improve my grade. I felt helpless.
The only reason I made it through Stanford was because I intentionally sought out spaces away from the demands of soccer and school. The best decision I made was joining the Stanford Gospel Choir. At choir practice, I could just be. Instead of pressure, there was appreciation. I was appreciated for being me– for my existence, for my heart, for my laugh, for my willingness to show up on Thursday nights and be a part of their community.
The second-best decision I made was befriending the Browns. Cheryl and Bryan Brown were Resident Fellows (RFs). RFs are faculty members who live in or adjacent to the dorms in order to foster a sense of community. College is odd because you can go four years without having relationships with adults. Sure, you may interact with professors but that usually doesn’t constitute a relationship.
In my case, the adults I spent the most time with– the members of my coaching staff– for the most part, I didn’t have relationships with. Affirmation from peers is wonderful. Affirmation from people in positions of authority, from adults, from your Oprah, feels different; it’s special in its own way. Hanging out in the evenings with the Browns and their kids gave me a sense of belonging and worthiness that I didn’t feel throughout the day. It was there on the couch eating Cheryl’s signature chocolate-chip cookies that I felt like I mattered.
In the wake of Katie’s passing Stanford announced that they’re going to offer more mental health resources. Resources are great. Resources, however, can only do so much if the underlying issues aren’t addressed. Having another resource at my disposal wouldn’t have changed my calculus grade. I’ll never know what made Katie decide to take her own life, but I do know my experience, and I think it sheds light on some of the underlying issues that need to be addressed in order to prevent more tragedies like this.
