"Run Along"
Hannah Lichtenstein, a 2018 Swarthmore College graduate and four year player on the pitch for the Garnet, has been a contributor to D3soccer.com since the 2018 season. She publishes the website Run Along, where "people share their stories of the major life change that comes with saying goodbye to a lifelong sport and finding success in the next phase."
On the Run Along About page Hannah shares:
Inspiration
This podcast was inspired by my own battle with depression in the twilight and aftermath of my career as a college athlete. At times, sports psychology, mainstream media and some motivational speech discourse have addressed the concept of the "retired athlete". However, this tends to be the "former Super Bowl champion declares bankruptcy !" type of narrative. Not very nuanced. And when it comes to high school and lower-than-pro athletes, issues related to "retiring" -- which even seems a peculiar word choice at times when referring to someone who isn't professional -- are not given a lot of meaningful attention.
Goals
Run Along was created with the hope of opening up the depth and breadth of this conversation. We're going from the surface-level topics -- e.g. what to do with all your random participation trophies and how to not be the aggressive slide tackler in the over 30 league -- to the bottom of the ocean convos -- think loss of identity and a skewed sense of self-worth. The hope is to also gather as many kinds of stories as possible. Olympians, high school ballers, super-fan parents, and athletes who dealt with injury, congenital defects and everything in between.
The most recent episode (July 2, 2020), "Pride and Joy" features Isa Berardo, D3soccer.com's 2019 Goalkeeper of the Year, who helped lead the Pomona-Pitzer Sagehens to the most successful season in program history culminating in a visit to Greensboro, NC and the NCAA D-III Women's Final Four.
Episode Description
Growing up, Isa Berardo didn’t feel like the labels of “male” or “female” quite fit. Processing their gender identity as an athlete become complicated, however, in sport, an activity which really loves a binary. So, how did this All-American goalkeeper come to find acceptance in the very space that once isolated them? Listen now on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
