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Jessie Diggins opens up about her mental health
After her eating disorder relapse, Olympic champion cross-country skier Jessie Diggins said her priority is on having a happy and healthy season.
MINNEAPOLIS, Minnesota — Minnesota’s Jessie Diggins made history earlier this year when she became the first American cross-country skier to win an individual world title. But as she prepares to enter a new World Cup season later this week, her goals have changed.
During a conference call from Finland, Diggins said she has no expectations other than having a happy and healthy season.
“We’re all human and we’re doing the best we can every single day. So this season, I’m focusing on just doing my best and taking it one day at a time and one race at a time,” Diggins said.
Diggins has been open about how after 12 years of recovery, she had a relapse with her eating disorder this summer.
The 32-year-old hopes by sharing her story, it will help others feel less alone.
“Mental health is physical health. So eating disorders are not a behavioral choice. It’s mental health,” Diggins said. “I think it can be really challenging, and really scary, and a little bit of a taboo subject. It makes me feel really vulnerable putting myself out there because everyone knows something really big about me. But at the same time, I’m trying to change the culture of sport for the better so that we can change the way that we talk about and address mental health.”
It’s a big change from when Diggins was 18 and thought her eating disorder was her fault.
“I thought it was a behavioral problem or a choice that I was continuing to make wrongly over and over again. When I went to The Emily Program, I learned so much about myself,” Diggins said.
Diggins is now an ambassador for the Twin Cities-based, full-service eating disorder treatment program.
“We know that athletes who are at an elite level of performance, like Jessie is, are at a higher risk for an eating disorder. So their care teams, their coaches, their whole support teams really need to be aware of the risk factors and really get people connected to support quickly because eating disorders aren’t just going to wait,” said Jillian Lampert, chief strategy officer for The Emily Program.
Lampert said recovery is not linear. After Diggins shared she had relapsed on social media, Lampert said the response was immediate.
“We had people who messaged us and said, ‘Hey, I saw what Jessie said and I think maybe I need to come back to care, too,’ or, ‘Maybe I can get care for the first time,'” Lampert recalled.
Lampert said one of the hardest parts of treatment is making that first phone call. She encourages anyone in need of help, to make that first call to a family member, friend or a place like The Emily Program.
“People think of eating disorders and they see Jessie and maybe think of women’s sports. Eating disorders impact people of all genders, of all ages… and most eating disorders are not visible. So people can’t see that somebody is struggling,” Lampert said. “I think that’s really important — particularly as we move into this holiday season where there’s so much emphasis on food and appearance and everything else — that really checking with people. How are they? How are they really?”
Diggins is making her mental health a priority during a busy season of life that includes the COOP FIS Cross-Country World Cup in Minneapolis in February 2024. Diggins played a pivotal role in getting the event to Minnesota. The Loppet Foundation was initially ready to host the World Cup in mid-March 2020 but had to cancel due to the pandemic. This will be the first time the event will be held on U.S. soil in over 20 years.
Diggins said a home World Cup comes with added pressure and expectations.
“I’ve also struggled with that. I don’t want to disappoint people or let them down,” Diggins said.
But Diggins also said any race she’s in, will be because she and her team have agreed on it and because she wants to compete.
“This is something that a lot of athletes struggle with… is this question of, ‘Will you love me even if I don’t win?’ Because all the time, you’re told, ‘I cheer for you! I hope you win and you’re so great because you win races,'” Diggins said. “It’s easy to start internalizing that and thinking maybe that’s where my worth lies and that’s not true. It’s important to see the bigger picture.”
If you or someone you know is facing a mental health crisis, there is help available from the following resources:
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Jerry McAfee, founder of 21 Days of Peace, said many of these kids are committing crimes for recreation and don’t understand the consequences of their actions.
MINNEAPOLIS — Community leaders say they were disheartened to see the latest string of youth crime, but they’re not shocked.
“The youth that age and younger have been participating in criminal activity long before you guys just found out,” said KG Wilson, a retired peace activist.
Wilson said the perception of kids committing crimes is hard for people to imagine.
“Nobody wanted to believe that these children this young would be doing this type of criminal activity in the community,” he said. “Instead of them listening to the few of us that we’re trying to tell them about this before it gets worse, it got worse. And then you got the taps on the hands because a lot of these kids have been doing this for years.”
Jerry McAfee has seen the same things. He’s the founder of 21 Days of Peace and works with dozens of kids to keep them on the right path.
“This behavior is not new. What is new is we are yet to be alarmed to the point that the necessary synergy is created to get ahead of that stuff and to try and stop it,” McAfee said.
He believes it’s time for a new approach.
“What we were doing three or four years ago and have been doing the last few years isn’t working. It’s getting worse. So, if it’s getting worse just stop, admit it’s not working, and let’s put something together,” he said.
McAfee said many of these kids are committing crimes for recreation and don’t understand the consequences of their actions.
“That’s the message they got to get. This is not games. This is real-life,” he said. “I don’t think there is many repercussions, and what kids deem now as fun is dangerous.”
Wilson agrees the problem is getting worse each year, and kids and teenagers need to be held accountable.
“There’s going to have to be some consequences to their actions and they’re going to have know, these children are going have to know if you do this, this is what’s going to happen to you,” Wilson said. “If that doesn’t happen, they’re going to say and think in their mind, we can do anything we want and we’re just going to get a pat on the hand.”
He said it’s not all on the parents. He said some of them have tried to get their child help, but nothing seems to work.
“A lot of times these kids have gotten so out of control that some of the parents fear them. The parents fear them,” he said.
Wilson believes people need to become neighbors again and look out for kids on their block.
“We got to start getting back to community meetings,” he said. “It’s about tough love. It’s going to have to be about tough love. You’re going to have to get tough. It’s either you’re going to let them go, let the streets have them, or you’re going to take them back yourself.”
McAfee said it might be time to air public service announcements explaining the consequences of committing crimes.
The boy had been last seen on the 2500 block of 14th Ave S.
MINNEAPOLIS — Police in Minneapolis say a 4-year-old who was reported missing has been found safe.
According to the Minneapolis Police Department, Jacob Gonzalez Orbe had been last seen around 3:40 p.m. Wednesday on the 2500 block of 14th Ave S.
In an update Monday evening, police said he was found and is safe.
This story has been updated from a previous version.
Record warming in the Gulf of Mexico led to rapid intensification that even alarmed experts.
MINNEAPOLIS — The size and scope of Hurricane Milton is now so obvious that it can be seen from space, but the speed that it grew is what has been truly breathtaking.
John Morales, a veteran hurricane specialist for NBC 6 South Florida, verbally gasped and grew emotional while watching the storm rapidly intensify.
“It has dropped 50 millibars in 10 hours,” Morales said on the station’s live stream. “I apologize. This is just horrific.”
That video has now gone viral not just because of Morales’ emotional reaction, but also because of his frank explanation for it.
“The seas are just so incredibly, incredibly hot, record hot, as you might imagine,” Morales said. “You know what’s driving that. I don’t need to tell you. Global warming. Climate change.”
John Abraham, a professor of thermal sciences at the University of St Thomas, has been saying the same for years now.
“The warming that we’re seeing is entirely human driven,” said Abraham, who has worked with oceanographers to study and track the explosive warming of the ocean. “Think about the energy of a Hiroshima atomic bomb that ended World War II -six times that – every second for the entire year. That’s how much heat is going into the ocean.”
He says record heat in the Gulf of Mexico is exactly what’s fueling Milton.
“When we think about global warming, it’s really an energy balance problem,” Abraham said. “Ninety percent of the global warming heat ends up in the oceans, and as the ocean waters heat up, that’s what gives fuel to these storms. It increases their size, their wind speed, the rainfall and the storm surge. Parts of Florida are expected to get 18 inches of rain as Milton comes ashore.”
He sais there’s no sign of that trend slowing down. Amid all the warming in the gulf over the past 10 years, this year hit another new high. He said the implications are clear.
“We’re not going to get more storms, but the big storms are going to be bigger,” Abraham said. “We are seeing more of those big, really destructive storms because of climate change. That, along with that rapid intensification, is what scientists are really focused on.”
John Morales shared that exact concern in the wake of Hurricane Helene, he just didn’t expect his warning to be realized so soon.
“Climate change is here,” Abraham said. “We are well past the point of being able to stop climate change. But there is good news actually. We’re not past the point of being able to do something good about it. If we think about climate change, it’s going up like a rocket like this. We want to bring the curve down. We have the power to pick a more sustainable path, we just need the political will to do so.”
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