Life can be difficult when you are an 8-year-old girl. You often have to deal with pressures that adults around you don’t understand, and sometimes those pressures may be more than what people three times your age would be able to handle.

One 8-year-old girl who understands this all too well is Peyton Thorby. She is a cheerleader and in fact, she was part of a team that was going to be in a championship competition.

That team, the K-Tech Krakens were heading for Tampa Florida to compete in the Showcase for Champions Cheerleading Competition. The little girl had been waiting for the day for a long time but there was bad news waiting when she arrived with her mother.

Although the coaches were at the competition waiting, she was the only member of the crew to show up to compete. This meant that she had to make the choice. She could either quit or move forward by herself.

Peyton had a difficult time after receiving the bad news and her mother admitted that she had a bit of a meltdown. After pulling herself together, she decided to go solo.

She admitted that she was shaking a lot and had butterflies, even though she never has them. Even though she was nervous, she managed to give a wonderful solo routine and won first place in the process.

“We’re all proud of her, telling her how well she did,” mom says. “Because we were proud of the fact that she decided to do it solo, but the fact that they gave her the first place trophy, where she had earned it, that was all a surprise. We had no idea.”

The little girl has even managed to get a spot on the Jennifer Hudson show! Well done.