“You need surgery.” Just a few weeks before a national basketball tournament, these words would change my life forever. Basketball is my true passion that is a part of who I am. Unfortunately, I experienced failure at meeting my athletic aspirations, due to an injury. Although my particular injury was out of my control, I constantly felt ashamed that I could not completely fulfill my athletic goals as I had hoped. I felt I had let everyone down who had been there for me and supported me. This injury has also shaped me and changed my perspective on how I see and appreciate certain things. Throughout my years of high school, I have battled a chronic knee injury which was devastating for me. I have had surgery not once, not twice, but three times in efforts to correct the problem I was having. Throughout these past few years I often found myself asking, “Why me?” or “Why did this have to happen to me?”. Overtime, I started to ask myself a better question which was, “Why not me?”. I feel everything happens for a reason and I was dealt this difficult obstacle because God knew I could handle it. This injury has made me mentally tougher than I could have ever imagined. Along with my mental toughness, I have had to face some tough decisions at a …show more content…
young age, with respect to my knee. The decisions to have particular surgeries would determine if I could ever play the sport I love again. I can vividly remember times I had to listen to my doctor tell me bad news. At one point, I thought all I was ever going to receive was bad news. I started to lose hope for myself. This is because the bad news I constantly received reminded me of how I was failing to achieve my goals. To add onto all of this, my doctor told me my injury was rare and that there was not much research in this particular area. That was very hard to digest at just fourteen years old, but I had to take all of it in. Dealing with adversity was becoming second nature to me; somehow I managed to stay positive through it all. I know there are others out there who have challenges greater than mine.
I think that is why I was humbled because my situation could be worse. I became more and more appreciative and learned that my world wasn’t ending; my world was just changing. I learned that I had to adjust to change in order to position myself for future success. I had to see different perspectives and open myself up to new ideas. Also, I had to fully accept the fact that things were changing for me. I now realize that change is good sometimes because it introduces you to new opportunities and experiences. Instead of playing basketball 24/7, my injury gave me exposure to different interests that I would have never experienced before and will never
forget. I was able to overcome this failure by developing a strong, positive mindset. I learned to not fixate on failure, but instead to focus on the positives alternatives I did not notice before. I finally understood that basketball was not the only path to achieve my future. I realized my work ethic and academics were what would be the determining factors for my success. I learned a vital lesson that I have more to offer than just basketball. To be honest, I would have not come to this realization if it were not for the change in my life that caused me to adjust. The way I have responded to adversity has helped me grow mentally, spiritually, and physically, which has introduced me to different opportunities I never appreciated or acknowledged before.
Unfortunately like all the other sports I am apart of, basketball has its own fair share of injuries while participating during the sport. Unlike soccer, I have not experienced as many sport related injuries, but none the less, I have my fair share. Throughout all four years of high school, I still have to fight and take caution of my weak right ankle. It is because of my ankle that my basketball career has taken multiple catastrophes. For every time I land on my ankle in any that I see as a danger to my ankle, I immediately have to call myself off the court and miss valuable practice and game time. Plus, every time I step foot on any basketball court, i must have my ankle tapped and I must wear a brace. Not only must I worry about if my ankle will finally give out, I also have to worry about pulled muscles, strained back, bruised body parts, sore limbs, and even headaches from getting bashed in the head from an elbow every now and then. Finally the worst injury of all, being dropped dead tired and still having over an hour left in your practice. But after read The Glass Castle, I always think of a saying that Jeannette Walls’s father always told her, “ Things usually work out in the end. If they don’t, then you haven’t come to the end yet.” This saying has taught me that no matter how hard something seems to be, it all will eventually work out in the end and the good times
In November of 2010, I was playing basketball in the fifth game of my senior season. It was just like any other game. However, I would soon find out otherwise. It was late in the game; I drove into the lane and got fouled hard. I was knocked so off-balance that I speared the floor with my knee. As soon as my knee hit the floor I heard a “snap” that I will never forget for the rest of my life. Little did I know at the time, that would be the last shot of my high school basketball career. Not long after my injury, I consulted a doctor. After getting an x-ray and an MRI, the doctor informed me that I had completely torn my ACL and would need to have surgery. An ACL tear can be a very devastating injury. The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is one of the four major ligaments within the knee. The ACL is one of the most commonly injured ligaments, injured by an estimated 200,000 patients each year. Of the 200,000 annual ACL injuries, surgery is performed in approximately 100,000 cases. There are many types of reconstructive surgery on the ACL. However, there is an alternative to surgery in the form of physical therapy.
“Ok thanks”James sounding sad.Him and his mom leave the hospital and on the way home the car was silent.
As soon as I started high school, my goal was to play college baseball. I played baseball for a very competitive select club that traveled out of town every week from Thursday through Sun as well as practicing every Tuesday and Wednesday. All through high school, I sacrificed my free time in the summer to prepare myself for college baseball. After receiving offers from four year universities as well as junior colleges, I decided that a junior college would provide me the best opportunity to continue to develop as a player. Even though I decided I wanted to play at a junior college, I wanted the experience of going away to college and living in a dorm so I decided to attend a junior college in Iowa where they had dorms for student athletes. Being ecstatic to be able to go off to college and play baseball was short lived. During the first month of baseball practice, I injured my arm, spent two months in physical therapy with no improvement, and then finally receiving the bad news that I would need surgery to improve. Surgery was performed over Thanksgiving break, but I was now faced with months of physical therapy, which meant
When i Was at the mosque outside on the court while i was playing a 3 on 3 basketball game. And the teams was me, bosh and Salah vs Abu, Sunny and Musa. We started to play, and my team was down by 8 points. So i was kind of mad at my team that we was down by so much. So i told them let me take over and try to get us back in the game. So they let me take over and we went on a 7-0 run and out of nowhere we was only down by one point. Then we made a turn over, then they got the ball and they passed it to abdi. And abdi got through his defender and bosh stepped up and tried to block his shot but he head faked bosh and i step and try to block his shot and i jumped up tried to block his shot and my knee cap moved out of
Beginning as a freshman I started every game never, but to sit on the bench unless there was a major problem. This repetitious cycle mirrored itself over and over again until there was a problem, physically, with my body. I had felt a pain in my back that ran down my leg for some time, but no one other than me knew of this pain. I am a very strong willed and determined person, not letting pain stand in my way. The pain started to vaguely effect my everyday activities, such as walking across Wal-mart which put me in agonizing pain. The only way I played basketball with this pain was by focusing on the goal I was out to achieve.
The timing was horrible, because I was immobile and was not able to do everyday necessities without having help. With the physical change I felt inadequate because I was a burden to my family, friends, and teachers. My psychological journey lasted over four years during which in time, my identity was being transformed from an athlete to a “nerd”. With my identity being questioned, I fell into what Harris describes as the “abyss”. Looking back now, I can see this was the turning point and that the pain was temporary. I had to discard my athletic demeanor and put more emphasis on my scholastic abilities for my future. I agree with Harris’s thoughts of, “reframing [from] negative, painful events in our lives, reinterpreting wounds so that they become starting points for growth” (Gestalt’s 3), and feel that I have used his ideas to become who I am today. At that time in my life I did not know Harris 's thoughts but I did know I had to think positive about my injuries or I would have ended up losing
Have you ever been injured? By sports? If so, what injury did you have? Did you do active rehabilitation? Do you try to prevent injury when exercising? These are some questions that you might need to ask yourself when exercising or participating in sports. You also must know that there are many sports injuries as well as many ways to prevent them.
Depression happened, the second time I needed ACL surgery because I had no reason to recover fast and I needed to rethink my life choices. But the second process was also worse than the first because waking up with the grogginess and having a different pain set in, made me feel defeated once again, even though I already knew the procedures. Yet again I would be bed ridden for more than three weeks. Being bedridden and in a lot of pain affected my sleep, appetite and energy. The depression had many stages, it went from not this process again to making me question my identity while I had the whole time in the world with nothing to do other than think and sleep. And even after recovery the second time around I only had to go back to school. I couldn’t go back to soccer, I didn’t have any additional happiness other than being able to walk again and do every day routines over and over again. Although I went through the painful weeks being bedridden, the year of physical therapy and the identity change, I wouldn’t have found out who I am today without also going through the physical journey.
I was told about a new innovative surgery that would cut the recovery time in half and give me the chance to play football, so I went for it. The recovery time depended almost solely on therapy in this case. Therapy was tough, but I had a goal in mind so I took the challenges to the next level. I was determined to push myself to the limit in order to get better, whether it was with the physical trainer or by myself at home. I did anything and everything it took. I grew stronger in the process, not just physically, but
I figured that I had grown about five inches since my freshman year and had gotten stronger it might be time to play basketball competitively once more. When November rolled around I was on the varsity team, but unfortunately my basketball skills was not up to par. It was tough at first, because I was a new face on the team, and the guys on the team had a great chemistry that they had built up throughout the years. After a few weeks had rolled by, I realized that I would not be in the rotation.I told myself that the team’s success is more important than my personal desired statistics.I decided to make the most of my role on the team. It was a tradition for the guys who were not in the rotation to contribute to the game in some way, guys did this by preforming stunts after significant plays and momentum shifts in the game in our favor. This was great because the crowd loved and it and more importantly my teammates fed off of the
Instead of wallowing in my misery, I took initiative and made the most of my situation. One should never worry about what they can’t control. Aside from the social life issues due to my injury, I had to attend therapy for my rehabilitation. When I first started putting pressure on my ankle and flexing, I was as white as a ghost, deathly afraid that I might hurt it again. But eventually, as time went on and my physical therapist provided words of encouragement, I was able to trust my body again and have faith that my ankle would allow me to do what I was able to do before the injury. Since I had never dealt with having an action or movement temporarily taken from me, it was hard to take that first step again. Imagine standing at the edge of a cliff and staring down at an abyss. What’s down there is unknown to you and so you are unsure if you should jump or not. This was the predicament I found myself in when I had to walk to my physical therapist who stood a couple of feet away. I had to reach down inside myself and find the courage and bravery that I knew was in
When my coach told me those nail biting words I had been waiting to hear for months, I was crushed and confused. My coach told me, "you're not big enough to play at this level". I was as talented as anyone else on the team, but because of my size I was characterized as incapable of playing. I took a step back and looked at the big picture. I knew there was a reason those words were said to me and from that exact moment I decided to change my life around. I was a standout player both my freshman and sophomore year and I was finally called up to play at the varsity level my junior year. I was one of the strongest players on the team and led the team to a district appearance for the first time in years. For the past couple of years, those words my coach told me have stayed in my head. It has determined me to work harder than anyone else not only on the field but off the field as
My injury was an accident, but I viewed it as a failure. Not only have I believed I failed my team and parents, I thought I failed myself. I had a goal for myself and that was to bring a championship to the program. But for it to end so suddenly caused negativity to fly around in my head, constantly bringing me down. I let my “failure” affect me mentally and a result of that, I was
It was the start of summer 2002, and the Mid America Youth Basketball (MAYB) national tournament was taking place in Andover, Kansas. Along with the rest of the team, I was excited to play some basketball for the first time since the middle school basketball season was over. Our team, Carlon Oil, had been together and played every summer for the last four years. We were a really good team, with an overall record of 65-4 over those four years and were hoping to continue our legacy. Lonnie Lollar, our coach for the summer, was also the coach of our high school basketball team. I had a history of groin injuries, and every summer it seemed that I would have to sit out at least a game on the bench icing my groin. But this summer was different, and I along with everyone in the gym wouldn't have expected my summer to end with a injury such as a broken leg.