Chin up, girl! Lolo Jones' dreams of cha cha cha-ing her way to a Mirrorball trophy were cut short on Tuesday, Sept. 16, when she became the first celeb to be eliminated from season 19 of Dancing With the Stars. The Olympian and her partner, newcomer Keo Motsepe, struggled in their big debut on Monday, after a technical hiccup threw Jones off the beat.
The athlete, 32, was visibly upset over her performance in the premiere, but she seemed to handle her elimination well. In a post on Facebook after the results show, however, she shared her true feelings about the experience, admitting she felt "broken" and "unlovable."
"When I was dancing last night and messed up I had flashbacks of the three Olympics that people constantly tease me about," she wrote. (Jones competed, but did not medal, in track events at the 2008 and 2012 Summer Olympics, and as a bobsledder in the 2014 Winter Games.) "I thought, 'Oh no, here it comes again. People are going to ridicule me,'" she added. "I'm so tired of feeling embarrassed."
After her less-than-perfect cha cha, she "joined the other competitors upstairs" but "couldn't force a smile." She was so upset, she wrote, that she "felt like vomiting." In between dances, she escaped backstage to fight tears. "I felt so broken," she confessed in her Facebook post. "So unlovable. Embarrassed."
Perhaps the worst part of it is that Jones will never get to show what she's truly capable of. "My brief time on DWTS was a lasting lesson. I really wanted to stay on the show and have the layers of hurt wash away by showing the public how hard I work," she shared. "I wanted to come away a victor for once. I wanted to do so good performing in public that the haters would stop teasing me."
Instead, she's turning to her faith for comfort. "I need to trust God that he would heal my heart," she wrote, adding a note of thanks to everyone who offered her support. "You were helping me not fall into darkness," she told her fans. "Love ya guys."
