After 3 acls, back fractures, 3 broken arms and countless injuries in my 12 year cheer career i am done, today is my 20th birthday. Although I have practiced since then, (and then got hurt again, repeat), my last time on the mat was my sophomore year. I would give anything in the world to have the moment most seniors get to have, the one that they know its their last time. They take the floor and can take it all in, but i never will. I have gained a decent amount of weight, sometimes I get optimistic and say "ill run and ill tumble, im going to cheer" It takes running only a few miles and my knee looks like a watermelon. I also found out that I have hypothyroidism which makes dieting pretty much useless. (I wont take the medicine, it says you could loose your hair, id rather be fat with hair then skinny and bald). I pretty much have given up. I have came out of retirement 3 times, and every time i try to tumble, i retear an acl. I am still an excellent base, Ive always had great motions, and if I stretched a little more my jumps are just as good as they used to be - but noone cares about any of that any more, its all about tumbling so i have basically decided its time to stop trying.