Olympic Diver Wins Gold Then Is Finally Told Her Grandparents Died & Mother Has Cancer

Olympic diver for China, Wu Minxia, won her third consecutive gold medal and in doing so became the first woman in history to win three consecutive Olympic golds. She’s worked hard for it too. She devoted herself completely to training and was cut off from the outside world. So much so, that she had no idea her grand parents had died over a year ago and that her mother was battling breast cancer for eight years.

“Wu called us after her grandmother died, I gritted my teeth and told her: ‘everything’s fine, there aren’t any problems’,” Wu’s father Wu Jueming told the paper. Wu’s parents found such lies were “essential” to ensure their daughter could keep focused on her training, the Shanghai Daily said. “We never talk about family matters with our daughter,” the father said.

Wu’s parents also haven’t seen their daughter and have been using the Chinese equivalent of Twitter to keep up with her. Thankfully, her mother’s breast cancer is now in remission.

This is kind of sad. No one should be kept in the dark about family issues for the sake of training. She can’t even enjoy her gold medals now.