Megan Cooke Carcagno, head coach of Duke University Women’s Rowing, penned a personal and impactful account of her journey from being cut from the Olympic team to rediscovering her identity as a coach on the Coaching the Whole Athlete website. The transition from athlete to post-retirement life can be fraught for rowers of every background, particularly so for those at an elite level. And then, Cooke Carcagno, like so many other women in her position, underwent another seismic shift in her identity when she became a mother.
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She goes on to clearly and passionately describe her love of a challenge and her aspirations of living with the multifaceted identity of athlete, coach, and mother. Cooke Carcagno summarizes, “I want my kids to see me as an athlete and a coach. To love this person who works hard and gives herself to others. I want my athletes to see me as a mother and a coach, to know that this impossible statistic is possible, achievable, and so deliciously satisfying. I want my life to be about chasing victories, attempting the impossible, and never giving up. I want to destroy the patriarchal terms of “stay at home mom” or a “working mom,” as if identity could be established by a simple location. I want to be myself and to have my decisions respected.”
