A Year of Yearning
A car wreck, the loss of her father and months of physical therapy could not keep sophomore gymnast Mika Love Houston from competing. But anemia finally has.
Houston’s season has been plagued by setbacks.
When her dad was driving her to Utah State in August from their home in Las Vegas, they were in an automobile accident outside Beaver, Utah, which killed her father and severely injured her wrist.
“[Losing my dad] was hard,” she said. “I think it made it worse that I was actually there when it happened. If somebody’s sick, you have time to prepare. But it was so sudden. It’s kind of hard to deal with, but I just have to move on. Life goes on, and I just remember. We were close.”
Houston’s father, John, drove from Las Vegas to nearly every one of her meets last year.
“They were very close,” said USU Head Coach Ray Corn. “John/Toby Houston never missed one of her collegiate events if it did not interfere with work. I think that first year, he missed one meet only. That was it.”
Despite her injured wrist and missing the first two and one-half weeks of class, Houston never considered quitting school or gymnastics.
“I never thought I wouldn’t [stay],” she said. “It was something I never even thought about. I didn’t even know that Ray was going to redshirt me this year.”
Senior gymnast Jessenia Abrego, Houston’s teammate and roommate, said, “I think her dad would want her to keep competing.”
Corn said keeping Houston in school was the right thing to do.
“Every college student starts out the semester with A’s,” he said. “By the time Mika reported to school, she started with F’s. We could withdraw her and bring her back at a later time, but I didn’t think that was the wise thing to do. So we kept her enrolled and kept her focused by saying ‘You’ve got to bring your grades up.'”
She passed every class.
Houston couldn’t train through the fall because she had to wait for the cut on her wrist to heal and then had to undergo physical therapy.
“It took forever,” she said. “My wrist had a deep cut, almost to the bone. It took a long time to be able to work out and not have it get swollen.”
Corn said he considered redshirting Houston but left the decision up to her.
“We talked about redshirting, then it got to the point that she made the decision, ‘No, I’m not redshirting,'” he said. “She made that call. Then when she started competing, we said, ‘Yep, you’re right. We don’t need to redshirt.’
“We did not think that she was even going to be competing this year. Her arm was pretty mangled, but she heals very, very quickly and she’s a very determined young lady,” he said.
Houston led the team in the all-around competition for the first half of the season without her father in the stands. She competed in all events at every meet until the BYU competition Feb. 22, which she missed because she was sick.
“Once [my wrist] was better, a lot of stuff came back easy,” she said. “It didn’t take long to get my tricks back, it was just a matter of getting my wrist healed.
“My mom tries to come to more meets this year just because [my dad] can’t. But it’s hard,” she said.
Corn said he was impressed with how well Houston competed despite everything that had happened to her.
“In that first meet, she performed in the all-around and was very successful,” he said.
March 2 in Missouri, everyone knew something was wrong when Houston fell in her first three events.
“When that meet took place in Missouri, I knew there was something wrong,” he said. “That was not the same Mika. So the minute we got back, I said, ‘We’ve got to get her to the doctor and see what’s causing all this’. Sure enough, they found anemia.”
Houston said when she first learned about the anemia she didn’t think it would keep her from gymnastics.
“I didn’t think it was going to keep me from doing anything,” she said. “I thought I’d take some supplements and be OK. I didn’t know that I’d be on hold. I went back to work out.
“I’m upset, but I think if it was my senior year I’d be more upset. I guess things happen and there’s nothing you can do about it. I have more time for homework,” she said.
Corn said Houston is a team leader because of her example.
“Mika has a personality that she seems to be very quiet, very emotionless, but has a way of leading by example,” he said.
Abrego said it is Houston’s attitude that has pulled her through the hard times.
“Mika is really determined,” Abrego said. “If she puts her mind to something, she does it.”
Houston said it is hard to go to meets and not be able to compete.
“It makes me more nervous because I watch every single person, every single warm-up, every single thing they do,” she said. “When I’m competing, I don’t see everything, every mess-up. It’s hard just to watch.”
Houston has two years of eligibility left, and Corn said she should have her anemia under control by this weekend.
“I think I could have done better than I did,” Houston said. “But I’m proud that I came back and was able to do all-around. There’s always room to improve.”