My first love was toxic and abusive and began at ground zero of a pedophile scandal: Child gymnast
I endured Larry Nassar, John Geddert and the terrifying culture of youth gymnastics. Some days I am strong. But every day I am surviving.
Trinea Gonczar
Opinion contributor
"Once a gymnast, always a gymnast,” they say. I hold that close to my heart. From the time I was 8 to when I turned 17, I trained on “the team," an extremely competitive, handpicked group of elite gymnasts who represented the Great Lakes Gymnastics Club in Lansing, Michigan.
Parents would drive from hours away and spend nights in hotels, or with other families, in order to have their gymnasts practice there with John Geddert, the legendary coach who would lead the USA Women’s Gymnastic Team to a gold medal at the 2012 Olympics. In the early 1990s, after he had a falling out with the owners of Great Lakes Gymnastics Club, most of those parents would follow John to his newly formed Twistars Gymnastics Club, where their daughters were treated by a medical student named Larry Nassar.