What Made Maddy Run: The Secret Struggles and Tragic Death of an All-American Teen

If you scrolled through the Instagram feed of nineteen-year-old Maddy Holleran, you would see a perfect life: a freshman at an Ivy League school, recruited for the track team, who was also beautiful, popular, and fiercely intelligent. Maddy was someone who succeeded at everything she tried. But when she began her long-awaited college career, her parents noticed that something was different. Previously indefatigable, Maddy became withdrawn, and her thoughts centered on how she could change her life. In spite of thousands of hours of practice and studying, she contemplated transferring from the school that had been her dream. When Maddy's dad, Jim, dropped her off for the first day of spring semester, she held him a second longer than usual. That would be the last time Jim would see his daughter.

This is the story of Maddy Holleran's life and her struggle with depression, which also reveals the mounting pressures young people - and college athletes in particular - face to be perfect in an age of relentless connectivity and social-media saturation.

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