That's what they've tried to do to me a lot of times, by not believing me, constantly questioning my commitment and 'am I really bought in and am I working hard enough?'

It got real bad in 2018 and 2019, when I reported to them that I had a lot of pain in my right ankle. I had a CT scan, and an MRI scan which both came back saying that there was nothing wrong with me.

So the coaches told me to get on with it or give up. I remember the doctor at British Gymnastics saying to me like, maybe it's just time that you think about moving to the next thing in your life or doing something else cuz it's not working for you.

That was really difficult and for eight months, I trained with a fracture in my right ankle that people told me wasn't there.

We were there Monday to Friday, if you're always surrounded by people telling you you're a bad person or there's nothing wrong with you constantly, you start to believe it.

And sadly I ended up walking away from the sport injured because nobody fixed my ankle. I walked away with a lot of issues mentally.

I was in a very bad place and got to the point where I didn't want to be here anymore and contemplated all of that. It was just a very dark time.

I eventually picked myself up and paid for private medical care for myself to eventually get to the point where I am now where my ankle is the best that it's been in a long time and feels better but I had to fund it all myself because British gymnastics basically don't really care about you unless you're adding value. As soon as I couldn't qualify for an Olympic place, they got rid of me straight away.

During Covid actually, I remember getting emails from UK Sports, the ones who pay us, explaining that because it was Covid-19 and no one knew what was happening, no one was going to be taken off funding. Then, a few weeks after that, I was told that they were taking me off funding and it was just too bad that I didn't have a job or income, it was just what was happening.

Why do you think they did that?

I think it was for a few reasons. I think part of was my bad temper and the fact that it wasn't healthy to keep doing that to myself all the time, which I get.

What!?

If you challenged anything that they did or said, they'll just attack you or they'll get rid of you, or they'll make it much more difficult for you to achieve. I could never prove this but my coach also thinks the same thing... I think there is an undertone of homophobia to it in British gymnastics. I always got in trouble for posting pictures with my t-shirt off and would get made to delete posts from Instagram.

All the judges would ever comment on is that my tattoos make me look scruffy.

What's the motivation to keep going?

I honestly don't know , I'm just really stubborn. Everything in me just says stop, give up now, stop trying.

Then there's a small voice saying, oh just one more try... you just never know. When people think that you can't is when I really just want to do it. I've always been like that.

I think it's for me as well. I've been through so much crap with the sport. It's been a very toxic end to it. That makes me sad as well because it was something that I love so much that I don't want them to have the power of getting rid of me.

I want to stop the sport on my terms.

Do you still love it?

In a weird way, yes, but I also hate it at the same time.

It's caused me the most awful times in my life that yeah, but I keep coming back because it's something that I love and I cherish and has given me a lot of good things.

I think that's a big reason why I want to come back as well. I don't want to end the score this way.

I'd love nothing more than to have been kicked out of the sport and shunned and then to come back, do it all myself, and prove everybody wrong, that I can do it. They all think that they got rid of me and I just want to come back and say 'fuck you all'.

Why sport? Aside from that motivation and the revenge, why sport? What is it that you love so much about it?

I just love the challenge of it. It's so difficult in terms of the skills that you have to do and then you have to make everything look nice, and you have to jump high and you've got to be in the middle of the mat..

There's always something that can be better. It never gets boring, which is difficult because you're constantly chasing so you're never satisfied. I need that in life too, I'm always climbing up the walls or wanting to travel and move, I think that's why trampoline is good for me, there is always something else to accomplish. You can travel the world doing what you love, why wouldn't you want to do that?

Trampoline is very unique in the sense that it's not just the fastest to the post like swimming for example. It's very different as I'm not always in control of my own destiny. I have to hope that the judges like me on that day or they like the look of me. A lot of it revolves around human opinion. Part of me is very jealous of those sports because I would love it if trampoline was a sport you couldn't argue with in scoring, if you pass the line first - that's it - you've won.

That's what I love about sprinting, it was completely objective. There's no argument to who is the best but that was very suffocating at the same time. You're chasing the clock.

Yeah I can imagine, especially when you get to your peak where it's the smallest margins and you're beating your time by 0.001, it must be so frustrating. But that's actually what caused me the most stress in trampoline. I'd go to a competition, feel like I had a good performance, then the score comes up and it's shit.

I remember going to the World Championships and one of the judges told my coach she deducted 0.2 from my score because she didn't like my hair and I didn't smile enough I missed the final by 0.1 that day. That was the difference between being paid 8,000 more pounds a year.

I was like... oh, thanks.

That's an expensive haircut.

My coach wanted to punch her in the face right there . It's also difficult because at competitions, there are judges from Russia, from Georgia, and from some countries who are openly homophobic. I get on the trampoline as an openly gay athlete and they're already not going to like me, why would they?

That's the difference with athletics, doesn't really matter if the person next to you is homophobic if you run faster than them.

Are all the new tattoos a way of self-sabotage in a way?

Maybe. It's annoying, because how can a tattoo make what you're doing on the trampoline look any different?

Like a tattoo doesn't make my knees bend, it doesn't make my arms fly out. If you don't like my tattoos fine but It's not in the code of points to deduct that.

Wow Luke, thank you. I have a tradition where I ask athletes to write a little poem, a letter to sport. I call them letters from a broken athlete. It normally starts with 'Dear Sport'. What's yours?

Dear sport,

My joy.

My passion.

At times my only friend.

So maybe that's why this hurts so bad? How can I give you everything and still feel like I have nothing?

This journey has taught me more than I could have imagined and taken me places only once dreamed. With you, I've faced my hardest lessons and battled back from hell too many times. I really think I hate you but strangely love you even more.

Thanks for taking the time Luke.

Yeah, thank you very much.

Enjoy the rest of your holiday.

Thank you. See you later.

And we'll speak, Ciao.

Bye bye.