Some of the biggest news from the Tokyo Olympics is about gymnast Simone Biles pulling out of competition due to mental health issues. It’s been reported that due to the incredible stress that Biles has been under, she’s developed something dubbed “the twisties” in the gymnastic world. What this means is that during her difficult flipping and twisting moves, Biles is unable to determine exactly where she is in relation to the ground—a critical skill needed for any gymnast.
The twisties is a problem with something called proprioception, your ability to know where your body is in space. It’s a component of balance along with your vision and the vestibular system in your inner ear. With her proprioception thrown out of whack, attempting any of her intricate and head-spinning routines could be incredibly dangerous.
This may lead many people following Olympic gymnastics to wonder, “Can stress really do that?” And sadly, from experience, my answer is absolutely yes. It happened to me in the aftermath of caring for my son with terminal cancer several years ago. The stress of his illness coupled with the grief of losing him triggered a host of neurological symptoms. In the aftermath of his death I experienced migraine headaches, smelled things that weren’t there and suffered debilitating vertigo—a condition associated with my vestibular system.
There’s a great deal of research about the effects of stress on your brain. Consider this:
- Stressful events and situations change the way your neurons (nerve cells) communicate with each other.
- Stress elevates the hormone cortisol, which can erode your brain’s ability to function. Cortisol can kill brain cells and actually decrease the size of your brain—specifically the prefrontal cortex, responsible for memory and learning, and the amygdala, making you more vulnerable to further stressors.
- Chronic stress can make you more susceptible to mood and anxiety disorders later in life.
- Stress can contribute to problems with your inner ear, which is responsible for the function of your vestibular system that regulates your balance.
- The effects of stress on your brain can impair your concentration, decrease memory, make it difficult to slow down your thinking or organize your thoughts, and it can cause insomnia.
The truth is that Biles is suffering from stress that has been years in the making. She is the last athlete who is still competing that had been victimized by sex offender Dr. Larry Nasser. And Biles has admitted that delaying the Olympics for a year was hard for her. She said that the effects of training at such a high level for an additional year would be tough on her body. Clearly the emotional toll has been just as tough.
Another truth is that your body will get what it needs, whether you listen to it or not. After I lost my son, I tried to pull myself together and continue on with my life. I went back to work, started to run again, and went to the gym a couple of days a week. However, what my body needed was to slow down, rest and heal. The neurological issues that I developed brought me up short and made me take recovery seriously—something I couldn’t figure out for myself.
And this may be what’s happening to Simone Biles. The additional year of intensive training, the stress of competition, the pressure of expectations and constantly being in the spotlight seems to have taken its toll. Thankfully, she has the wisdom to listen to what her body is telling her. To do otherwise would be a threat to her safety. It takes an incredible amount of courage to pull out of competition at the height of the Olympic Games. Simone Biles, along with Naomi Osaka and Michael Phelps are athletes with the audacity to speak about mental health, even if it’s at the expense of competing. They are at the top of my list of heroes.
