After 13 hours I had an epidural, and at 18 hours I had to have a C-section because her heart rate was going up and down.
At the start of this journey I needed a goal. That is who I am, how I live. So the goal was to be competitive on the LPGA Tour, and that's still the goal.
Can't you get that airbrush going, give me more up here, Dolly Parton style?
Did golf lead to the demise of my marriage? It might have. I got so selfish. Serious tunnel vision.
Even if I'm a bust, I have to finish the journey.
I am a babe for a living.
I didn't get into this to pick up a new hobby. I don't want to just be a golfer. I want to be the best.
I didn't want to be five foot three or less forceful.
I don't have a life, I really don't. I'm as close to a nun as you can be without the little hat. I'm a golf nun.
I don't want to be famous famous. I'm happy on the second tier, where I have autonomy on a professional level but I can still go out to the movies without being recognized.
I gotta keep my mom out of this. She left me for five years. We have a tumultuous relationship, as you can imagine.
I guess I crave stability.
I had no idea what I was doing. I played for half a season with the Women's Professional Volleyball Association Tour and got my butt kicked.
I have to believe in the process. It has become like a religion. It is part of my everyday life.
I knew about magazine covers right away. You're here, then you're gone in four weeks. I could never let my existence rely on that.
I knew beforehand that my delivery might be hard: The baby wasn't dropping, and even though I'm a big girl, I am narrow inside.
I love owning a house, especially when my friends come and stay. It's like, Hotel Gab. Even if I'm not here, I like knowing someone is.
I never once felt golf was more important than Laird or my marriage. I just didn't do a great job of balancing so many different things - strong personalities, busy schedules, hectic careers, living in two places.
I thought I would graduate from high school and work in a gift shop.
I used to think that I should just cash in on the modeling, do it as long as I could, get some financial security. But volleyball is my passion. It's what makes me go.
I want to keep from falling into the big athlete's rut.
I want to play until the end.
I was a kid for whom nothing and no one was more important than my survival.
I'm a natural. That's why I make the big bucks.
I'm not just a model who plays volleyball, or a volleyball player who supports herself modeling. I'm a female athlete personality.
I'm not really modeling much anymore. I did a recent cover of Elle because it's in my contract as their fitness editor. They have to put me on once a year.
I'm very open-minded.
I've never quit at anything in my life.
In Brazil, the women schedule appointments for their nails, hair and even their babies.
In some weird way, having a C-section was a blessing for me. It was actually nice to have a reason to chill and just be with her. I had a night nurse and a live-in, but I let everyone go after the first night.
It takes so much effort to maintain the intensity, but isn't it like that with anything that is worthwhile?
It was good for me to think about other things besides my career. I also tried not to rush through it, as I may never be in that place again.
It's not like I was all-wise, but I understood from the start that my looks were very specific. Everyone said, My God! You're so tall!
My body is a vehicle for the mechanics of my sport.
My greatest strength in all of this, besides my discipline, is my curiosity.
My husband likes to eat steak for breakfast, and the smell of red meat was nauseating.
Once I got past my anger toward my mother, I began to excel in volleyball and modeling.
Stay calm and aggressive.
The thing I don't like about this fear of being big is that it feeds into this general female thing of wanting to less powerful, less assertive, less demanding, less opinionated, less present, less big.
The timing of golf only added to an already difficult juggling act.
They call you, and you get to come down and take some steamy photograph. My question is, what happened to the 50 most beautiful people the year before? Do they only get to be beautiful for a year, or what?
This other stuff, it's fun, but it's nothing.
Volleyball anchored me at a time in my life when I needed it. It gave me a reason for being this big, big girl.
Why not go to the highest point of excellence?
You know the stripe that goes around the toe? My idea. Makes your foot look smaller, and believe me, girls like me need all the help we can get.
You slam the bottom and either walk away or suck it up and get through it.
She graduated from Florida State University.
As an Elite agency fashion model she could command a $10,000 a day rate.
Gabrielle's nickname is "Gabby".
In 2002, she became the first woman to compete at the American Century Pro Celebrity Golf Tournament.
Gabrielle and Laird have one daughter, Viola Hamilton, who was born in October 2003.
She has the same birthday as James Farrior, Nicole DeHuff, Howie Long, and Malcolm Young.
In 1993, she became Nike's first ever female cross-training spokesperson.
She was on the covers of Harper's Bazaar, LIFE and Women's Sports & Fitness.
In 1989, she began modeling for the Ford Agency of New York.
She earned an athletics scholarship to Florida State University in 1987, and majored in Communications.
Her measurements are 36-24-35.
Gabrielle is 6 feet, 3 inches tall.
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