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Figure skating: "My greatest victory is to have succeeded in loving myself", confides Guillaume Cizeron

2021-05-02T03:17:44.611Z


Guillaume Cizeron released this Thursday a book on his tormented journey almost a year after revealing his homosexuality, a rare occurrence for a c


There was first a photo with his companion posted on Instagram on May 17, 2020, World Day Against Homophobia.

Then a long letter to the Team to reveal themselves a little more.

Almost a year later, Guillaume Cizeron, 26, released “My Most Beautiful Victory”, an unvarnished testimony to years of questioning, loneliness, shame and then acceptance.

Before joining his ice rink in Montreal (Canada) to prepare for the Beijing Olympics in 2022, the Olympic vice-champion and quadruple world champion in ice dance confides.

Is the title of the book strong enough to sum up the hardness of your journey?

GUILLAUME CIZERON.

My victories on the ice are also personal victories.

Basically, my best victory is to have succeeded in loving myself.

I gained my confidence thanks to medals which may be futile but which proved to me that I was capable of accomplishing things.

Not to be a shit like I was told at school.

How did you write it?

It was very therapeutic.

I thought I would write it myself but realized that I needed an outside point of view.

I worked with Lionel Duroy

(Editor's note: autobiographer of Depardieu, Vartan or Mouskouri)

.

Talking to a stranger gave my parents more freedom to share intimate things than they ever told me.

It was very important to me that they felt comfortable that it was published.

Was this exposure hard for them?

It is really a gift that they gave me and that they are giving each other.

It helped them a lot to change their guilt.

My father is someone who does not forget and he will always blame himself for not having been very present at the very beginning of my life and, later, for having been able to say hurtful things… What touches me that is that he always tried by all possible means not to make any further mistakes.

This is what makes him proud.

An example for other parents ...

There are many who will be able to identify with themselves and take some of the guilt away.

After my "coming out", friends of my parents who had gay children and could not manage came to talk to them about it.

I threw a small rock and the echoes help other people.

To burst the abscess of shame?

Shame is a very important part.

It's very difficult to get out of it because it's very destructive.

I am seen as a successful person, but I would never have had this career, this life, if I had not learned to accept myself.

Sport showed me what version of myself I can be when school was devastating.

Skating saved me.

How to overcome the insults or the trifles?

We build ourselves a lot in the eyes of others.

When you are told that you are a fag, a shit, you end up thinking that you are a shit.

When you are humiliated, you end up feeling really ashamed and that feeling takes hold.

It's hard to deconstruct the beliefs we have about ourselves.

It's a lifelong inner work ... One of the messages of the book is that we don't have to believe the stories that others tell about us.

What has changed over the past year?

I realized I had a voice.

I take this as a responsibility.

I want to inspire others.

I am ready to share this.

I built with Gabriella

(Editor's note: Papadakis, her childhood partner)

a great career but the rest is a really banal story, which thousands of people live.

Somewhere, I give them the floor.

Do you see yourself going further in taking a stand?

The book is not meant to be an activist or a claimant.

I am not angry, I am not pointing fingers at anyone.

I want to raise awareness, appeal for compassion, do good to those who are suffering.

Everyone is a bit homophobic by default.

Kind of like racism.

The number of times I've heard: "Ah, you're gay but I like you because you're not flamboyant or extrovert, not too crazy what!"

Or all the people who "tolerate" gays but don't want to see them kiss, marry, or have children.

What did you learn ?

I realized that I didn't need to hide for the rest of my life.

For my generation, when you found out you were gay, it was like a condemnation.

We said to ourselves: I'm not going to be able to get married, not have a child, not be able to say it, not be able to hold hands or kiss the one I love in public.

In the darkest times I have experienced as a teenager, it was really: my God, my life is going to be long until I die.

I saw myself growing old on my own, in secret…

(Smiles)

Today, I can talk about it publicly without running any risk, except if I go to Turkey…

"

My greatest victory", Living your homosexuality is always a struggle

.

XO Editions.

Recommended price: 16.90 euros

Source: leparis

All sports articles on 2021-05-02

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