Beyond the Field: The Moments You Cannot See

This story is a part of a Syracuse University Athletics mental health initiative as part of Mental Health Awareness month to give student-athletes a platform to tell their stories of their challenges and successes. The goal in sharing our stories is to normalize conversations surrounding mental health. Everyone struggles. You are never alone.

By Meghan Root

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Scrolling through social media, reading those headlines, it felt pretty darn good to be Meghan Root.

I scored three goals that weekend — two of which led my team to a 2-1 overtime victory against Wake Forest, giving us our first ACC win in two years. It was the first ACC win of my entire Syracuse career. After that weekend, I led the team in goals and points. I scored more goals than I did throughout my entire freshman season. I helped my team get that first, long-awaited win. And I'll be the first to tell you — it felt so great.

I mean, those are the moments you dream of as a little girl. An overtime goal to end the game and give your team a huge win? I've been chasing moments like that for as long as I can remember. After the ball found the back of the net, my teammates mobbed me. It was pure joy. We'd been through a lot in the past couple of years — doubts, losses, changes — so that win meant everything to us. The media swarmed me — how does it feel? What does this win mean to the program? What prepared you for this moment?

As I got back to the locker room, I took a look at my phone. Unread Messages: 65. @Cusewsoc tagged you in a post. @Cusepics tagged you in a post. @soccergirl123 requested to follow you. "Congratulations, Meg! I'm so proud of you."

It was the best night of my life. I went to bed (at 2:30 am, I should add … I couldn't sleep because of the adrenaline) with the biggest smile on my face. You simply couldn't wipe it off. I remember thinking that maybe I'd never stop smiling.

And while I wish I could say that had always been my reality — it certainly wasn't.

Flashback to five days prior.

A Saturday night following a 3-0 loss to Notre Dame I sat in the same spot in my bed — up until 2:30 again. But this time my insomnia wasn't due to adrenaline or elation. It was due to the sinking feeling in my chest that we weren't doing enough … I wasn't doing enough. And instead of wearing that giant smile from the Wake Forest game, I scribbled down my frustrations in a notebook, replaying every minute of the game over in my head. Mistake after mistake after mistake. I wondered if we'd ever win in the ACC.

Flashback to two weeks prior.

We were playing our first ACC match at home against Louisville. It was a huge opportunity for us — an opportunity to start ACC play off with a win. A few minutes into the game, I had a mistouch in our defensive half that sent one of the Louisville players into our box, where she'd score their first goal of the match. It sent me, on the other hand, into a full-blown panic attack on the field, and perhaps the worst 45 minutes of soccer I'd ever played in my life. I left the field just before half with tears streaming down my face. I couldn't control my breathing. I tried to calm down, but I couldn't stop thinking about that touch. Louisville went on to beat us 3-0. I doubted I was good enough.

Flashback to a month prior.

About five games into the season, I sat in the middle of Manley Field House at a table across from my coach's husband. We were talking about my performances. He asked me why I stopped "being Meg" the moment I stepped on the field for a game … why I never allowed myself to perform to my ability during games. What was I so afraid of? I looked down, avoiding eye-contact, trying to hold back tears. Lips quivering, I muttered, "I don't know."

Flashback to 3 months prior.

As I prepared for the upcoming season, I wrote in my journal.

"Maybe I'll never do the things I dreamt about. Maybe I'm not that person. And maybe that's okay."

I closed the journal, set it on my nightstand, and turned off the light. I secretly wished I was wrong.

The journey to becoming the Meghan Root of the Wake Forest weekend certainly wasn't an easy one. It's a journey that still isn't over. It never will be, really. That's the thing about being an athlete … you're always chasing those moments. And even after they happen, you're back to chasing them again. And between those moments when you feel like you're on top of the world, there are the realities of what we do. There are missteps and mistouches and mis-just-about-anything-you-can-think-of. There are late nights of analyzing a game gone wrong. There are brutally honest conversations with people who know you can be better. There are major, major doubts. There are failures … so many failures.

But those aren't the things that people see. People see the headlines, the smiling interviews, the goal celebration pictures posted on social media. Don't get me wrong — all of that is so important and deserves every bit of attention it gets. But it's also important, I think, that people see the other side of that: the struggle behind the success. Sometimes I think people look at athletes and think they're machines — programmed to succeed. In reality, though, above all else, we are human. And that means we're prone to the same struggles as everyone else in the world. And that is okay.

I think it's important for young athletes to know that you can play the worst game of your life and experience a panic attack on the field one week and then play the best game of your life two weeks later. In fact, that's probably part of the reason why I played so well two weeks later. If I hadn't had that conversation with my coach's husband earlier that season, if losing to Notre Dame didn't send me into an insomniac episode of analyzing our game, if I didn't play so bad against Louisville — I wouldn't have found the person I can be. The whole first half of that season was failure after failure after failure, and it made me question a lot of things. But through those failures and through that questioning I was able to paint a picture of the player/person that I really want to be. And once I had an idea of who she was, I tried every day to be more like her. I'm still trying.

After that first win, we went on to lose every game for the rest of the season. Sports are like that. They tear you down just as fast as they raise you up. So we're back to the drawing board, back to the failures, back to the re-discovery. And that's okay. In fact, it'll probably bring us back to that next moment of greatness.

If I could give one piece of advice to any young, aspiring athletes out there — it is that it's okay to fail and it's okay to struggle. It means you're trying. And as backward as it may seem, embracing those failures and that struggle might just be the thing that makes you better. Sit with your struggle, use those around you for help, and know that you are never alone.

Syracuse University Mental Health Resources are available here.

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