Olympic gold gymnast Shawn Johnson reveals why she refused to speak to her best friend for 8 years

Former Olympic gold medal-winning gymnast Shawn Johnson East has spoken about the breakup of a best friend.

The Dancing With The Stars winner revealed she hadn’t spoken to her friend Nastia Liukin, 35, an Olympic teammate, for eight years.

“Nastia and I were best friends, trained and at the Olympics we were roommates,” Johnson East, 32, told Access to Hollywood.

“We were 16 and 18 years old, we were kids,” the blonde added.

It turned out that it was not easy to compete.

“I felt like we were so in the spotlight and so scrutinized to be each other’s biggest competitors,” Johnson said.

“And we had discovered on the competition floor how to be best friends and competitors.

“But when the world started to wonder how we should deal with it, they said we should also be each other’s worst enemies.”

Eight years passed before loved ones intervened.

“Our boyfriends at the time were so tired of hearing us talk about each other that they said, ‘Enough of this, go back to talking to each other,’ and we did,” she recalled.

“And since then it’s like we haven’t missed a beat.”

“It was amazing,” she said. ‘It was also very confusing for both of us because we were very nervous. We didn’t know how to rekindle that… and within two minutes we were best friends again.”

Now they are super close.

“We both said the same thing: ‘I don’t know what happened, but I miss you and I miss us,'” Johnson recalled of their reconciliation. “And it’s been that way ever since.”

In December 2023, Shawn welcomed her third child with former NFL player husband Andrew East.

“It really never gets old,” Johnson East said as part of the announcement, via People.

“You spend the entire pregnancy wondering how you could ever love another baby as much as you loved your first two, and then in an instant your heart expands and triples in size. It’s incredible.”

“Being a mother is truly my favorite thing,” Johnson East continued.

Johnson East and her husband, who tied the knot in 2016, already have two children, a four-year-old daughter, Drew, and a two-year-old son, Jett.

Johnson East competed for the United States in the 2008 Summer Olympics, winning one gold medal and three silver medals. She has stopped gymnastics since 2012 due to knee problems.

Andrew East was a long snapper in the NFL for five years, but didn’t make the practice squad for the then-Washington Redskins until 2018 and 2019.

Andrew East officially retired from football last year.

Johnson East competed at the World Gymnastics Championships only once, in 2007, winning all three events she competed in.

The Easts will welcome a third child in the same month they celebrate the one-year anniversary of Andrew’s father’s death, which occurred on December 27, 2022.

“Life is so good and we feel truly blessed to have a third healthy baby join our family. My father was born on December 9 and passed away unexpectedly on December 27 last year, so December is a very impactful month for us,” says East.

It feels very special to see our baby born so close to my father’s birthday and I’m sure he would smile at us and be so proud of us.

“It was amazing to see Shawn go through another C-section with a smile on her face and loving this baby with everything she has. She’s incredible. These are the moments that life is all about!’

Johnson East had announced her pregnancy on Instagram in June and showed off her bump for the first time.

She captioned her post: “Swipe for a surprise” with a photo of the star sitting in an old stadium in Greece, with the Olympic rings visible behind her.

In the second photo, Johnson turned to the side and cradled her growing bump in a black dress.

The star also showed off her bump in further photos captioned: ‘Big baby back on board and ‘I feel free not to have to hide this anymore.’