Dwayne Wade recently sat down for an interview with ESPN Magazine, where he appears on the cover of their Body Issue. Here's what he had to say, in a self-penned essay:
"To me, doing the Body Issue is bigger than looking at an athlete's body. It's more about the story we are telling of overcoming my fear of doing this. I had a fear of being naked in front of others and a fear of being judged. So to me, overcoming that is the biggest thing. Someone may look at me and think, "Why would you have insecurity?" Well, this is real life and I'm human, and these are the things that I deal with that many others might deal with.
When I was young, my belly button was an outie, and I never even wanted to take my shirt off when we were at the swimming pool or outside during water fights. The only people who went into the pool with their shirts on were the kids who were overweight -- and me. I knew that I was different. I knew from all the kids I had seen that nobody else had what I had. No one else had an outie. Even when I got to high school, I didn't want to do swimming class because I didn't want people to see my feet -- as an athlete, my feet were a little rougher -- and my belly button. I had my doctor write me a note to say that I couldn't do swimming, and the first day I sat down and watched everybody else and it just looked so fun. I eventually was like, "I've got to do it, I got to do it."
...I work hard on my body, man. I'm 34 now; it doesn't come as easy as it did when I was 21, 22. I have to work at it now, where it used to be something that just came natural. Now I have to put in so many hours, but it makes me feel good to see the finished product. Like I said, being 34 but still being talked about -- to me, that's great, and it shows a lot about my hard work.
...I've always had an old-man game -- it's always been a part of me. But obviously when I was 21, 22, 23, I was just more athletic and faster. Now I have to use it more because it's an older game. It's just an understanding that, you know what, I'm not going to try to use my burst all the time because I'm playing against younger, quicker, athletic guys. I'll be playing into their hands if I do that.
I never envisioned that I would be playing this long. I think I always told myself that my body would tell me, "Hey, I gave you enough, it's time." So whenever my body tells me that, I'll listen to it and then I'll make that decision. But nah, I'm not there yet. I've got some good years left."
Read the full essay at ESPN.
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