Third year Day 48 - Thursday January 30, 2014

I was talking yesterday, saying that Bridgett's usually game to try things.  That's one thing about her personality that always been there, and really still is.  Bridgett has always been a person that has decided what to do and has not been afraid to try new things.  For instance, when she was young she played sports but never played soccer.  Then, when she was in sixth grade, at a time when soccer was really starting to get competitive, she decided she wanted to play.  I tried to explain that the team maybe wouldn't be too happy with someone inexperienced joining up, but that didn't faze her at all.  She had me sign her up, and started playing with gusto.  She only played that one year here, but she had a great time and made lots of friends.  True, some players were so competitive that they were upset with her inexperience, but that didn't bother Bridgett in the least.  Then, when she went to Utah for the second half of her senior year, she wanted to play on the high school team.  She tried out, and got on the team and played her heart out!  Actually, just before one of the games, she went out and got new cleats.  She played in them before they were broken in--big ouch!  She got terrible blisters, but kept playing anyway, for the team!  Brother DeGraff was the coach, and when he saw her blisters later on he couldn't believe it.  They needed her, and she wouldn't quit, even in pain.  (good thing I wasn't there, although if I had been I wouldn't have let her play in new cleats!)  Then, in college, even though she'd never even seen a rugby game, someone asked her to try out for the team and she went to practice and tried out and was selected to be on the team.  She loved rugby and had an awesome year playing.  She played hard and got hurt and kept on playing anyway.  True rugby spirit, huh!  She made lots of friends, including the fact that she dated a rugby player on the men's team.  Actually, she often practiced with the men's team, and even got to play with the All Blacks when they came to work out and teach the men's team.  She was in her glory that day!  She had wanted to try to work hard on rugby, and get on the women's Olympic team.  They will have rugby in the Olympics in 2016.  She planned and hoped to be there!  Her episode with losing an ovary due to a torsion scared both of us.  The doctors said that sometimes women get hit and lose an ovary, and after losing one ovary already, she couldn't risk losing another.  Back in those rugby days, I worried about her getting a head injury or another bad injury, since they don't wear helmets or pads.  We talked about finding a different sport to throw her energy into.  At length she decided to switch to Triathlon, and began her training for competing in that.  Who knew that her decision to switch to Triathlon would be the thing that endangered her and led to her accident and TBI while training on her road bike!