Off Balance: A Memoir Page 19

  The Cayman Islands looked beautiful, at least from what I could see from the condo windows. It was anything but a vacation. I was miserable and anxious during our stay, too paranoid to leave the condo for fear that I’d be seen by the media. The last thing I needed was to have more tabloid headlines about me vacationing in the Cayman Islands with this older married man. Even amidst the chaos of my life, my moral compass was still intact, and I wasn’t going to ruin Brian’s marriage by letting some misleading headlines get out. Besides, I never viewed Brian in a romantic way at all. I admired his confidence and his charismatic way with people, but he was like an older brother to me and someone I felt I could trust as a friend. Despite Brian’s efforts to make it tolerable in the Cayman Islands, I just didn’t feel comfortable being there, so we packed up after a few days and left.

  The police advised us to stay away from Houston for another week, so we decided to go and see Luminita in Las Vegas to explain in person the situation with Tata. We hadn’t talked to her since we left for the Cayman Islands, and aside from telling her to stay away from Houston and lay low for her own safety, we hadn’t given her the specific details about Tata.

  It was good to see Luminita, even under the stressful conditions. My life had spiraled out of control so quickly that seeing her and hearing her voice again made me miss our time together training in the gym and working toward a goal. Gymnastics seemed so far away at this point, like another lifetime, even though it had been only months since I last competed.

  Luminita completely flipped out when we gave her the full story. Refusing to hide any longer, she immediately reached for the phone to call Tata to confront him about the “hit.” By making that call, in one fell swoop she exposed our whereabouts and ruined the officers’ case against Tata. Tata and Luminita got into a yelling match. I couldn’t keep track of everything she was saying in Romanian, but she was hysterical and letting Tata have it, again. Inside, I was relieved that this was happening—it meant that whatever his intentions, Tata’s “plan” would not be taking place and there would be no case against him. Contrary to what the police were assuming at the time, I honestly don’t think Tata would have ever gone through with it. I prefer to believe that Tata was just making threats out of anger. Much to my relief, that chaotic episode of my life was over and I wasn’t even contacted by the police after we returned to Houston.

  Just before I had become emancipated, Tata and I had signed with a new agent, Janey Miller of Gold Medal Management. Having just joined with us, Janey was taken aback by how suddenly I’d left home and broken away from Tata. I’m sure she was wondering what kind of mess she’d gotten herself into by taking me and all my baggage on as a client, but to her credit, she stood by my side before and after the process, when most of my friends, colleagues, and sponsors had become afraid to touch me with a ten-foot pole. There continued to be some sponsorship and other opportunities on occasion, but not many. I was disappointed with USA Gymnastics for not offering me certain appearances and promotional events I thought I had rightfully earned. I watched helplessly as those opportunities were passed directly to other gymnasts. Janey saw that I desperately needed all opportunities to support myself, and she worked hard and never gave up on me. Thankfully, I still had my stipend money for making the US National team in 1998 and that $1,000 per month helped me survive that first year on my own.

  It was Janey who eventually landed me and Luminita a gymnastics home at the US Olympic Training Center (USOTC) in Colorado Springs in early 1999. I was thankful that the USOTC took a chance on me, allowing me to become the first female gymnast to train there. For almost a year, it was ideal as Luminita and I housed together at the USOTC campus. It gave both of us a safe place to live rent-free, with three meals a day, and a local gym to train in until I figured out a long-term plan. I still wasn’t sure of the direction of my life, but I knew I wanted to continue gymnastics. I just needed to get back on track. I’d put on some weight and was struggling to get back in shape. Finally having freedom, I’d let myself eat everything I wanted, from Big Macs to Dairy Queen whenever I felt the urge during the trial. The mistake of adding alcohol to the mix meant I was taking in more calories than ever before. It was just a matter of time before I blew up. I was depressed from everything that had happened with my family, and I turned to food for comfort. I also went through puberty that same year and parts of my body were beginning to change and expand. Before I even knew it, I’d put on fifteen pounds in a couple of months.

  To shed the weight, I increased my workouts, and Luminita had me running outdoors again in addition to training. She brought out the plastic sweatsuits, the kind wrestlers use to make their weight class by sweating off those last few pounds. In an attempt to get back to a high level of training faster than I probably should have, the sudden and strenuous workouts took a toll on my back. At first, I tried to push through it the best I could, but it turned out that I was suffering from a stress fracture in my lumbar spine (L4 and L5). The doctors advised me to stop gymnastics altogether for several months to let my back heal. I ended up spending the majority of the day in physical therapy during recovery.

  It was around this time that Luminita and I came to realize that we were far better as coach and athlete than as roommates. Being together day and night, we started getting into terrible arguments. I could see that she was still hurt and angry with Tata for everything he’d put her through, and I felt she was taking it out on me. I was already feeling down that I was injured and frustrated that I wasn’t able to train, so I didn’t handle it well when Luminita started “mothering” me and angrily asking where I was going at night. I had been staying out of our dorm room more and more often to avoid arguing with Luminita and, understandably, she was concerned when I wouldn’t return until very late or, sometimes, not at all. I was making new friends and exploring opportunities to party, and Luminita did not approve. Her intentions were good—and certainly justified, since I shouldn’t have been where I was most of those nights—but I resented her for asking at all. Later, of course, I realized she was just being a caring friend and doing the right thing by checking up on me, but at the time I didn’t want to report to her or anyone else. I had been controlled my entire life and was desperate to be free from everyone—and to exercise that newfound freedom.

  Clearly, Luminita couldn’t just sit around hoping my back would heal and that one day I’d regain my competitive edge. We both knew it was best for her to move on. I regretted the way things ended, and I’d wished we were both more patient and mature to make sure our good-bye was filled with the respect it deserved. I felt an enormous loss when she moved out of our dorm and stepped out of my life. She was one of the few people I had ever fully trusted. Following her departure, I slipped into a dark and often dangerous time of my life. For a long time I wasn’t even sure where Luminita had moved on to and, sadly, we rarely spoke. Eventually, I’d heard that she got a full-time gymnastics coaching position at Colorado Aerials and married one of the wrestlers from the USOTC. I was happy that she’d figured things out and made a good life for herself.

  All of the emotional baggage I’d carried into training that year in Colorado was just too heavy to ignore, and it affected my attitude. I’d lost my drive and fire to train to be the best, and nothing seemed to help. I had hoped it would be the right transition for me to be surrounded by other athletes who were goal oriented, and I was hoping it would inspire me to train again. It did for a while, but, like any elite-level athlete, that desire has to come from within, and I was still struggling in that department.

  I turned to partying to numb my pain and to forget all that I’d gone through the past year. It certainly wasn’t the right thing to do, but I experimented with drugs and alcohol as an escape from the depression I was feeling. I gravitated to new friends who knew how to party, so drugs were readily available. Within a short time, I was exposed to a wide array of drugs. I exerted no self-control and was willing to try anything simply because I had the freedom to. I l
ived on my own, so I had no curfew and no boundaries. I had gone from one extreme to the other.

  In terms of drugs, if it grew from the ground, I tried it. Marijuana and alcohol were my staples, but I tried other recreational drugs. Thankfully, I never used needles or anything that required them. I felt that the drugs I did abuse were powerful enough to put me in a state of euphoria, allowing me to forget all of my problems. There was no need to reach further.

  The rave party scene was popular at that time, so I dabbled in that, too. Raves were a haven for recreational drug use, especially ecstasy. My first rave party was at a huge warehouse in the middle of nowhere in some Colorado field. I remember feeling like I was finally part of “the glamorous life” as I waited in the dark in a long line of strangers to get in. A few months prior, I would have been at home tucked into bed by that hour, yet there I was partying with kids from all walks of life. I could hear the echoing throb of techno music as I walked inside with my friends. We went from one section to the next checking out the scene: in one area, kids were liquid dancing (a dance craze); in another area, they were jumping up and down into a frenzied sweat while waving glow sticks; and in a third section, people were sitting Indian-style massaging each other’s backs in a single row. I thought it was all very bizarre, but for someone so sheltered for so long, it was a world of intrigue.

  My friends were moving from person to person at the party looking for a “hookup” to score more drugs. I was pretty clueless and had no idea what we were looking for, so I just followed along. I remembered one of the older girls in our group showing me a tiny white pill with a clover on it. I had no idea what it was, but she said it was “fine” as she swallowed it, so I figured she knew what she was talking about. I not only took one, I swallowed a second for good measure, having no clue how powerful they were.

  My senses were heightened, and I could feel my jaw clench as my first roll of ecstasy kicked in. Ecstasy, the “love drug,” made me feel warm inside and unnaturally drawn toward everyone around me. In the moment, this chemical effect made it easy to make new friends and feel instantly connected to strangers, which I particularly wanted then. I was constantly hugging my friends and telling them I loved them. I could feel the music pulsing through me. I wanted to stay in this euphoria forever. Once my second roll kicked in, I started to feel a bit nauseous and realized that I’d probably taken too much, but it didn’t stop me. I ignored my body’s signals and continued to party as we left the rave and moved on to a house party, invited by someone we had met at the rave. By the time I got home in the wee hours of the morning, I was pretty out of it. I remember my friends’ faces were morphing into scary images, like a lion and the old woman from a beer commercial that I’d seen on television. I was lucky to have ended up home, safe in my own bed.

  After Luminita left, I’d started hanging out mostly with athletes I’d met on campus. I was still seventeen years old and a lot younger than most of them, so there was always the dilemma of trying to get into bars with fake IDs in order to be with the group. I’d accept their invites to parties or to just hang out and drink beer because I was lonely and I didn’t want to be in the dorm room by myself. Any distraction from my real life was welcome.

  I was inexperienced when it came to romance. Tata would barely let me go out with my girlfriends, so boys were completely out of the question. Now, with my newfound freedom, I could socialize with whom I pleased. This was all new territory for me. I wasn’t sure how to handle my feelings of attraction toward some of the guys I had befriended, especially when I found myself craving affection from one in particular. My parents had never talked to me about the birds and the bees. Sex and dating were pretty much forbidden topics in our home. I cannot imagine my grandparents broaching these topics with Mama or Tata when they were growing up, so it’s no surprise my parents avoided these awkward talks with me as well.

  I remember questioning Aunt Janice to some extent, sometimes with such honesty that I’d make her blush, but I was still rather clueless about sex, romance, and relationships. Aside from a “first kiss” in high school, I was completely inexperienced. I naïvely thought that any affection from a boy meant that he had genuine feelings for me and that, perhaps, he was interested in a real relationship. I remember being quickly jarred into reality when I saw my crush flirting and then passionately kissing another girl outside my dorm after he’d acted like he was interested in me. It was a very confusing time. I was living on my own, acting like an adult, but I was still a little girl in many ways.

  Physically injured, without a coach, and testing dangerous waters with alcohol, drugs, and boys, I was in a million pieces and had no idea how to put myself back together again.

  It was Easter 1999 that I finally stepped foot in my parents’ home again after running out six months earlier. It was a reunion I was dreading. I was afraid to see Tata, especially in his own house. I could hear him in my head already, yelling at me about leaving home and ruining everything the family had built. I didn’t want to go, but Mama and Aunt Janice kept insisting I come home to visit the family. Mama had become my main family liaison since Tata and I had not spoken during those six months, except for our “moment” in the parking lot.

  “Easter is a time to forgive, and you both should try,” Mama said. I was dying to see her and Christina, but I didn’t think I could handle another confrontation with Tata. I agreed to come on the condition that Tata wouldn’t bring up the gym.

  As I entered the house through the back staircase, I felt a small surge of adrenaline upon seeing a clear view of Tata through the glass patio doors. He was planted on the couch watching television—basketball or the evening news, I figured. Christina, Mama, and I hugged tightly as I walked through the door. It struck me just how deeply I’d missed them. We had a few private minutes to talk in Christina’s room before Mama went downstairs to get Tata. I was nervous. Mama begged him for a peaceful day and to go easy on me, but I knew Tata was still hurting from all that had happened between us. I had no idea how he was going to react to me. I told myself to be strong and not give in even if he was looking for a fight.

  Christina was in the middle of showing me some of the collages she’d made at school when Mama walked back in, followed by Tata. My throat choked up as I looked at him—he looked so old. It was clear that the emotional hell we’d just gone through had aged him so much in a short period of time. His eyes were tired and worn, his head mostly bald with tufts of gray hair on the sides. He didn’t have that Tata fire. I couldn’t speak, so we just stared at each other without saying a word for what must have been five minutes at least.

  “Okay, are you two going to talk?” Mama asked in Romanian.

  Mama pushed the two of us together to hug, and Tata squeezed me hard for a really long time. He was trying to hide that he was so emotional, but I could feel his body move up and down as he sobbed. It was one of the longest hugs we’d ever shared and the tears were streaming down my face uncontrollably. I knew that tight squeeze was Tata’s way of showing me what he was unable to say in words.

  It took a while for the lump in my throat to go away. I tried to get control of my emotions because I wanted Tata to start viewing me as a strong independent woman, not as a little kid bawling her eyes out.

  “Why did you have to go?” Tata asked me point-blank as soon as he caught his voice again. “We almost had everything set up and in place for you.”

  I looked at Mama. So much for Tata’s promises not to discuss the gym. Perhaps he wanted to hear me say it again in my own words, but I didn’t want to rehash everything and ruin our Easter together.

  “Tata, stop. I don’t want to talk about it,” I said quietly.

  Mama chimed in, too, begging him to stop in Romanian.

  “Tata, I don’t want to go there. I needed my freedom. Are we going to start again?” I asked.

  Tata bristled, some fire and anger returning.

  Tata and I went back and forth a little, then he stormed out of the room. I stayed
for a little while longer talking to Mama and Christina in the bedroom, then I left the house. We clearly needed more distance and perspective to understand each other.

  Mama worried about me alone and without any family in Colorado for some time, so in August 1999, she and Christina came to live in Colorado Springs for a stretch. I was shocked at first that Tata allowed them to rent a small apartment on their own, outside of Houston. They loved the fresh mountain air and beautiful scenery, and it felt like a new beginning for us in a way. Tata was busy back in Houston trying to set up his own car dealership, but he’d come to Colorado Springs to visit on occasion.

  During one of Tata’s visits, he and Mama got into an explosive argument late one night. I didn’t even know what started the fight, but it escalated super fast. I stepped in to try to calm Tata down, which only opened the door for him to yell at me for everything wrong I’d ever done. It got ugly. Tata said he was moving Mama and Christina back to Houston. Mama, who was usually the calm, quiet one in the room, started to lose it and argued back at Tata in Romanian. Tata grabbed Mama’s car keys and headed outside to Mama’s car, saying something about driving to Texas. Tata was screaming in front of our apartment building at the top of his lungs, and I was convinced the neighbors would call the police any minute. Somehow we ended up sitting in the car—Tata and Mama in the front seats and Christina and I in the back.

  I thought things might settle down once Tata realized the craziness of the situation—a family of four screaming loudly at one another in a parked SUV in the middle of the night—but Tata was undaunted and proceeded to complain about Texas and how we needed to be there. He was just getting started, it seemed. With one quick lunge, I dove over the front seat and grabbed the keys from the ignition. I opened the car door and dashed for the apartment, looking back to see Christina and Mama scrambling along behind me. We got into the apartment, and I locked the door before Tata could enter. Mama looked taken aback that I had the courage to lock out an enraged Tata.