Olympic Medalist Laurie Hernandez Admits She Tried Convincing Her Mother to Let Her Quit

Laurie Hernandez became a household name when she walked away with a gold and silver medal from the Summer Olympics in 2016. But little did the New Jersey native realize at the time that her experience in Rio de Janeiro would change her life forever.

In an exclusive with PopCulture.com, the 19-year-old admits she underwent some incredible development due in part to her time at the Olympic games in Brazil three years ago.

“It has changed my life completely,” Hernandez told PopCulture.com. “As a little kid I always imitated anyone that I saw on screen [and] I was always a crowd pleaser.”

Hernandez admits she “wanted to make people laugh” and credits the artistic gymnastics sport for enabling that specific development.

“Through gymnastics, I’ve been able to do that,” she said. “And then I was able to do Dancing With the Stars and go on tour and come out with books and have all these different events that were happening.”

She went on to say that all of the hard work she’s put into gymnastics and to see the way her life has played out today is “mind-blowing.”

To think that at one point, Hernandez also wanted to quit the sport entirely is what’s truly mind-blowing to so many. Not just one time did she think it, but more than a few.

“There were multiple times in gymnastics where I tried to convince my mom that I wanted to quit,” she admitted to PopCulture.com. “She recently told me that there was a checklist that she would go through … if any of the checks on the checklist were checked off, then I probably wasn’t able to quit. It was: being tired, hungry, being injured, I was in a meet season or I think it was learning a new skill. Sometimes, it was all the above, sometimes it was just that I was tired, and every single time I wanted to quit when I was at a low point, and thankfully for my family convincing me and saying, ‘Hey, let’s wait until things get a little better.’”

Hernandez adds that that’s what really helped keep her in the sport and “fall in love with it over and over again.” She also said that she posts sticky notes all around her house — even in the freezer — as little reminders to not give up and to keep pushing through.

“I have a post-it note that’s on my front door that says, ‘There’s so many opportunities that wait for you, all you have to do is turn the handle,’” she said of the creative affirmations. “It’s pretty much just encouraging myself on the days where I don’t want to go and I don’t want to go to practice, saying that there’s so many neat things that are waiting for you, all you have to do is literally, physically, go and look for them. So, that’s my encouragement.”

The gymnast recently entered her second year partnership with Alcon — the global leader in eye care — to launch the “Eye Can, Eye Will” campaign, which is her way of encouraging fans to develop their own mantras.

“It’s something that’s very near and dear to my heart,” she said after admitting that she’s needed contacts since she was 12 years old. “In 2016, I had mantras that I would say to myself like, ‘I got this’ and ‘I can do this,’ and now, going to Eyecaneyewill.com you can create your own mantra, and that makes me so happy because now we get to spread that positivity to others and I’d love them to have those mantras as I did.”

The teenager says her goal right now is to make the 2020 Olympic team, but until then, she’s going to stay focused on perfecting her routines while enjoying the process at the same time.