From Alia Bhatt to Deepika, celebs applaud Simone Biles as she pulls out of Olympics to focus on mental health

supper star Deepika Padukonehandjob Alia Bhatt, Varun Dhawan, and others in the Bollywood fraternity have heaped praise on one of the most decorated American gymnast Simone Biles after she withdrew from Thursday’s all-out competition to focus on her mental wellbeing.

Deepika Padukone, who herself has been quite vocal about her battle with depression, took to her Instagram handle to give a shout-out to Simone. Sharing a news screenshot of the athlete by a news outlet, she added the hashtags, “I hear you…”: “#mentalhealth”, ‘#mentalhealthmatters’.

Alia Bhatt also took to her Instagram story to enhance Simone’s voice. Sharing the news, she wrote, “A reminder that your mental health is just as important as your physical health. It helps to change the narrative about mental health all over the world, more power to you.”

Taking to his Instagram handle, Varun Dhawan also wrote, “What an inspiration! An important reminder to take care of your physical as well as your mental health! A message for such tough times.”

For the uninformed, American gymnast Simone Biles cited mental health concerns as the reason for her exit from the women’s team final at the ongoing Tokyo Olympics. The Rio 2016 gold medalist doesn’t want to put her “health and wellness” at risk.

“Whenever you’re in a high-stress situation, you panic. I want to focus on my mental health and not put my health and well-being at risk,” CNN quoted Biles as saying.

“It just sucks when you’re fighting with your head,” Biles broke down in tears as she explained her decision at a press conference. The American gymnast said her team wanted her to go ahead and compete but didn’t want to risk the medal. “I was like: I guess the girls need to do the rest of the competition without me. They’re like ‘I promise you’ll be fine, we saw you warm-up.’ But I said ‘No, I know that’ I’m going to be fine, but I can’t afford a medal for the team and I need to call it quits,” Biles said.

According to USA Gymnastics, Biles withdrew from the artistic gymnastics women’s team finals, citing medical grounds. The American took a big step on his landing, exiting the vault with only one and a half turns after making only one and a half turns. Then he left the gym with a drug and after a few minutes he took his name off the rest of the program.

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According to Olympics.com, although Biles withdrew from the team finals, she still qualified for the upcoming individual all-around and equipment finals. The individual all-around is set for Thursday, while the equipment finals will take place from August 1-3, with Biles qualifying for all fours: balance beam, vault, floor exercise and uneven bar. Last week, Biles became the first Olympic athlete to have her own customized hashtag emoji on Twitter.

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– with ani input