and I kind of had my idea in my mind of what it would be like

but it's so much more amazing than I could have thought

I didn't even think I was gonna try out for the Olympics

for the third time and thought i was going to be done in 2014

and then you know to win a medal in my first race in the Olympics was awesome

and then to feed off of my teammates' swims

and then to go out with a gold in my final race, it just

no, I never ever thought that this would happen

I know at the turn she was ahead of me

and then I knew she even got further ahead of me off the underwater

but that was the last time I ever had to use my legs in a race and darnnit

if I didn't, you know, give it everything I had and then when you look up and you see

six 100s you know that it's, it's all those little tiny precise things that come to

add up to to a gold medal by six 100s

You dream about it. I had let it go through my head just a little bit

earlier that day like what would it be like if I won and then to look up and

see that it's reality and that I'm living it at that moment

I just didn't know what to do and I was so thrilled to be up there

to the people that say I could stick around and maybe win more medals

and do it again in four years

they might be right, I maybe could, but it's a beautiful thing to achieve everything

you wanted and more, and I'm really excited to to try new things

and to go for new goals

This has been the most incredible experience of my life

and I'm so grateful that I got to have it

and now it's time for for new chapters