2018-19 U.S. Ladies' figure skating

[mrrice]

Why in the heck did Vincent feel the need to point out that she is 35 pounds lighter???

Dude, NOOO! Weight is just a meaningless number. Seeing what she can do is enough.

I can only hope that Gracie wanted people to know about her weight loss. Otherwise, I think he could have mentioned that she is getting into better shape and left it right there. I am thrilled that she has her flip back and is continuing to work hard.

 

[DenissVFan]

Posting exact numbers was unnecessary, especially when it comes to somebody with an eating disorder. The same message could have been phrased differently with more sensitivity.

 

[MarinHondas]

Posting about her weight as her coach is really not OK. I am still really skeptical of this coaching team and this only adds to that. She is an adult and can make her own choices, but from the outside, just eh.

Agreed. You can get in better shape without monitoring your weight. Working out consistently and eating healthily will obviously aid in losing weight, but as a skater who has struggled with disordered eating you do NOT need to be counting the pounds you are losing while doing these things. You can see the results in your skating. You can increase workout difficulty based on on ice endurance/performance. You don't have to be monitoring pound for pound. Knowing Gracie's struggles, it makes extremely concerned that Vincent seems to be monitoring her weight like this. Hope it's not what it seems.

 

[satine]

Just posted about this in Gracie's fan fast. So glad others agree about the number comment. I hope he is just, for lack of a better word, ignorant about how number-focused eating disorders can be. Perhaps Gracie did want people to know about it, maybe she didn't. We can't know what goes on behind the scenes. Hopefully, we are just looking too much into the weight loss comment and it isn't a sign of number-focused thinking.... I hope so.. hwell:

 

[MarinHondas]

But will add- Beautiful, rotated 3flip. It's nice to see that!

 

[oly2018]

Agreed. You can get in better shape without monitoring your weight. Working out consistently and eating healthily will obviously aid in losing weight, but as a skater who has struggled with disordered eating you do NOT need to be counting the pounds you are losing while doing these things. You can see the results in your skating. You can increase workout difficulty based on on ice endurance/performance. You don't have to be monitoring pound for pound. Knowing Gracie's struggles, it makes extremely concerned that Vincent seems to be monitoring her weight like this. Hope it's not what it seems.

What really concerns me is the number 35. That is a large amount of weight to lose for someone of Gracie's stature and would only be healthy if done slowly. I don't know what the timeline is, but the implication is not good. I agree with everything you have already said. When you are in recovery, you normally are not fed real time numbers.

 

[macy]

What really concerns me is the number 35. That is a large amount of weight to lose for someone of Gracie's stature and would only be healthy if done slowly. I don't know what the timeline is, but the implication is not good. I agree with everything you have already said. When you are in recovery, you normally are not fed real time numbers.

well, she has been back training since what, march? i would assume she probably has been working on it since then, which is a healthy time frame to lose that amount. either way, i don't think vincent would have posted it without gracie agreeing or telling him it's okay, but who knows. we as fans can only hope and pray for the best for her and her health. i'm sure she knows what she's comfortable sharing.

 

[andromache]

I kind of assume that Gracie is OKing everything that he posts?

I hope Gracie is monitoring her weight loss and overall diet/fitness with a nutritionist who specializes in eating disorders. Monitoring one's weight while in recovery can be good in order to ensure that weight is being lost at an appropriate pace.

I imagine that combining elite sport (which kind of requires SOME sort of weight monitoring, a specific diet and training regime, etc.) with eating disorder recovery is really, really complicated. I hope that Gracie has the resources at her disposal that she needs to juggle both and stay healthy.

Regardless, I don't think a coach should ever disclose a skater's weight/weight loss/gain to the public, especially with specific numbers, ESPECIALLY when the skater has struggled with disordered eating.

 

[Spinning]

Why in the heck did Vincent feel the need to point out that she is 35 pounds lighter???

Dude, NOOO! Weight is just a meaningless number. Seeing what she can do is enough.

No it isn't meaningless number. It is big part of being professional(athletes, dancers, models). But said so in this manner and Gracie's circumstances was very poor judgement.

I have unease feelings regarding his update on Gracie for a while now. He should wait until she is more advance in her comeback stage. She is right now not just ready to be exposed in the social medias. People are far too brutal in their judgements towards top athletes. I as a fan can wait and don't mind she working her way back in private.

 

[Seren]

I think if he had just said she is getting fitter then that would have been fine. Numbers + eating disorder history makes me uncomfortable.

But the confident triple flip is great.

 

[theharleyquinn]

I understand that many have wanted to give Vincent the benefit of the doubt, but I honestly have big grievances with how he's handling posting about Gracie. But even those feel relatively marginal compared to him posting her weight now. I can't even begin to express how regressive that is and the flippancy one must have to her previous struggles to share that. Even if Gracie wanted it to be shared, there is a lot of scholarship in the field that should have guided a coach telling her that it didn't need to be publicized to show fans how she's doing.

 

[Metis]

Number one rule of eating disorders: NEVER USE NUMBERS. Seriously, treatment centers and groups enforce this rule with the fire of a thousand suns for a reason.

 

[andromache]

I am okay with Vincent's updates in general...I can understand why Gracie would want to keep people updated on her progress! It might provide additional motivation for her, and I think after Rostelecom and withdrawing from Nationals she might have realized that keeping everything shrouded in mystery may have done more harm than good, as it gives people unrealistic or improbable expectations. Now that she's on an upward trajectory in terms of fitness and jumps, I can see why she would want to share it!

But sharing the numbers :hopelessness:

Even if Gracie herself is not triggered by the numbers on a scale (we don't know the details of her issues, and she herself described it as "disordered eating" rather than a straight-up eating disorder), using numbers sends a wrong message.

 

[DanseMacabre]

I understand that many have wanted to give Vincent the benefit of the doubt, but I honestly have big grievances with how he's handling posting about Gracie. But even those feel relatively marginal compared to him posting her weight now. I can't even begin to express how regressive that is and the flippancy one must have to her previous struggles to share that. Even if Gracie wanted it to be shared, there is a lot of scholarship in the field that should have guided a coach telling her that it didn't need to be publicized to show fans how she's doing.

Seconded. As someone who's been dealing with an ED for the better part of 20 years, I've been side-eyeing a lot of Restencourt's social media behaviour around Gracie. Advertising her weight loss or concentrating on the numbers isn't a smart move. That's like Eating Disorder Recovery 101.

Being in competitive shape is obviously a necessity if one wants to participate in a sport at an elite level but putting stuff like that on social media is ill-advised at best and harmful to both Gracie and others dealing with EDs at worst. To be honest, his social media strategy reeks of exploitative opportunism. I remain unimpressed by him.

 

[Gullygirl84]

Can anyone shed light on how eating disorders are treated (from a cultural standpoint) in France? I'm curious...glad for Gracie that she is doing better, but agree that this was worrying/seems like it could be triggering for someone with an eating disorder (or for someone/a fan with an eating disorder who views that kind of post). It will be interesting to see how this coaching relationship plays out...I selfishly like seeing Gracie's progress of course in terms with jumps, but I also hope that this isn't something her and her team feels obligated to share after her GP, to show that she is a work in progress...

 

[DenissVFan]

Their motto should be: let the jumps speak for themselves.

 

[DanseMacabre]

Their motto should be: let the jumps speak for themselves.

Yes, exactly. Sometimes less really is more.

 

[theharleyquinn]

Seconded. As someone who's been dealing with an ED for the better part of 20 years, I've been side-eyeing a lot of Restencourt's social media behaviour around Gracie. Advertising her weight loss or concentrating on the numbers isn't a smart move. That's like Eating Disorder Recovery 101.

Being in competitive shape is obviously a necessity if one wants to participate in a sport at an elite level but putting stuff like that on social media is ill-advised at best and harmful to both Gracie and others dealing with EDs at worst. To be honest, his social media strategy reeks of exploitative opportunism. I remain unimpressed by him.

Thank you. I have a similar history and it really is 101. There's no reason for a coach in this sport to not know this, and even if not, once you get a skater that is in recovery, getting smart should be your first priority. I have also sensed a lot of exploitation in his posts. He seems much more concerned with projecting what he's doing for Gracie as a coach to an audience rather than showing her journey as a returning skater.

I've been thinking a lot with respect to Gabby Daleman and Gracie about how you balance what may be a skater's agency against known standard practices in mental health counseling and physical recovery. It's easy to say that a skater and their coach know what's best and will make the right decisions, but that isn't always the case, especially when they are making trade-offs by accelerating recovery. There is a clear right and wrong here with what Vincent has done.

 

[Metis]

Seconded. As someone who's been dealing with an ED for the better part of 20 years, I've been side-eyeing a lot of Restencourt's social media behaviour around Gracie. Advertising her weight loss or concentrating on the numbers isn't a smart move. That's like Eating Disorder Recovery 101.

Being in competitive shape is obviously a necessity if one wants to participate in a sport at an elite level but putting stuff like that on social media is ill-advised at best and harmful to both Gracie and others dealing with EDs at worst. To be honest, his social media strategy reeks of exploitative opportunism. I remain unimpressed by him.

I had no idea you and I battled the same demon. I’m so sorry. <3

But, yeah, I agree with all of this. For some reason, I flashed back to Britney Spears’ comeback with “Womanizer” and how the video director told her they were going to have to deal with the body size noise no matter what, so they might as well take it head on. Which... feels somewhat applicable, in that Gracie’s performance at Rostelecom wasn’t especially encouraging. But why is she only doing her first off-ice now? If she hadn’t been doing any off-ice training, why the heck was she entered for Rostelecom?

And why does he know her weight? And why would he post the number instead of talking about her stamina being noticeably improved (or something else more benign, though of course skating fans would immediately read into the weight aspect) and let the chips fall as they may?

Can anyone shed light on how eating disorders are treated (from a cultural standpoint) in France? I'm curious...glad for Gracie that she is doing better, but agree that this was worrying/seems like it could be triggering for someone with an eating disorder (or for someone/a fan with an eating disorder who views that kind of post). It will be interesting to see how this coaching relationship plays out...

Can’t speak to France specifically, but as a general rule, countries with socialized medicine produce some of the worst case studies but seem to do better in terms of actual recovery. The US has hundreds of inpatient facilities but your discharge date may well be determined when you arrive, if you can even get insurance to authorize you beyond 2-3 days of care before cutting you off. Beds are still scarce, but it’s largely due to high patient turnover, not a 2-3 month stay by the majority. By the time patients from Canada get approval to be treated in the US, they’re ... extremely sick. Similar story in Europe, and it can be quite a long time before someone is able to enter inpatient treatment. On the other hand, those countries tend to be much more enlightened regarding length of stay and have more robust social services and post-inpatient planning — everyone I knew who was in Europe had significant inpatient time (6 months fully inpatient, 6 months on weekend visits home, for example) and extensive post-care planning: weekly bloodwork, counseling of all kinds (to help return to the job market, general recovery work, etc.). Whereas in the US, you can find plenty of people with EDs who’ve had treatment approved numerous times but whose total length of time in inpatient across multiple facilities is two weeks.

I’ve heard of staff at ED treatment in the US mentioning that their sickest patients come from Canada, which is broadly backed up by anecdata. In my experience: my friends in socialized medicine systems became sicker than your modal US patient, but they had better long-term outcomes, permanent damage to the body being held equal.

 

[Lunalovesskating]

Mariah and Bradie had amazing practices according to Rockerskating on Twitter. No fall, no step out. Ting had some problems though :/