As student athletes, we are constantly faced with daily challenges, presented to ourselves both on and off the field. From balancing our academic workloads and rigorous training schedules, to dealing with the pressures of competition, our journeys are shaped through the peaks and troughs of adversity. As any athlete knows, perhaps one of the most daunting hurdles to face is overcoming sports injuries. The grueling physical pain, hardships of the mental strains, and the unknowing fears of not being capable of returning to your sport can become quickly overwhelming.

These feelings are most familiar to Jake Figurski, a North Central College junior football student athlete, and Ciré Smith, a North Central College sophomore track & field student athlete. As both high school and collegiate student athletes, Jake and Ciré are no strangers to the enduring hardships brought forth by their athletic injustices. Back in high school, Jake experienced a major concussion that took him out of his whole football season, limiting his cognitive skills and confusing his emotions when responding to an unseen injury. Ciré on the other hand is currently recovering from a stress fracture in her foot as she ran through the pain following her most recent Spring track season, enduring constant uncertainties in treatment methods. Despite experiencing different physical afflictions, these injury-prone phases of doubt and crisis can mold the uplifting of renewed resilience and inspirational character development in injured athletes.

Adjusting to Curveballs

Sports injuries, no matter the sport or individual’s athletic status, are practically inevitable, especially when competing at higher levels like in collegiate athletics. According to the Journal of Amateur Sport, reportable injuries are typically defined as injuries that:

1. Occur as result of participation in organized athletic practice or competition

2. Require attention of an athletic trainer, physician, or physical therapist

3. Result in restriction of an athlete’s participation in their sport

For younger athletes like college students, dealing with a sports injury and having to quit playing the sport they love can be extremely disheartening. Many student athletes often experience injury-related consequences that are affiliated with no longer participating in their sport, including loss in sense of identity, deprivation of self-esteem, and deficiencies in proper stress management.

When experiencing the initial response to a sports injury, many athletes can often get overwhelmed with not just physical pain, but spiraling mental thoughts and differing emotional states. During this time, many injured athletes can have the tendency in focusing too much on the “uncontrollables” during initial injury response: the “could haves”, “shouldn’t haves”, and “if onlys” of getting hurt and injured in play or competition. The hyper fixation of these possible outcomes only takes the athlete away from their current situation by spending too much of their time and energy fixating on a different outcome. By accepting the reality of the specific sports injury, you can start to properly embrace the early emotions of your athletic injustices.

Emotions are also an essential part of the healing process so allow yourself to have time towards mourning or feeling loss in the moment during the initial impact phases. Studies from the International Journal of Science and Education show that hiding or burying early feelings can ultimately interfere with the mental coping during the later stages of your recovery process. Through proper situational analysis in the initial impact phase, athletes can be successful in moving forward on the start of their recovery process.

The Road to Recovery

The key first step in successfully overcoming a sports injury is developing a recovery process. Each recovery process is individualized to best tailor the needs of the individual athlete, specific sport, or type of injury. Dr. Brittany James, North Central College’s Assistant Director of Athletics for Health Care & Director of Sports Medicine, has worked with countless student athletes at North Central to aid in their healing process and help them return to play/competition in their sports. In our interview, Brittany exemplifies her outlook on working with student athletes, saying, “Knowing a patient before they become a patient is often most inviting. Creating positive spaces to interact and advocate with athletes, injured or not, works to help them understand value in their sports and long-term health.” By working alongside coaches, other trainers, and the athletes themselves, Brittany helps to generate a fitted recovery process around the athlete’s needs, familiarity, team sport training perspectives, and athletic goals. Having a thorough and developed recovery process helps injured athletes stay motivated and on-track to successfully navigate their path to recovery.

Stages of Physical Recovery

While each sports-related injury has differing levels of physical pain, strain, and length of recovery, physiotherapists have complied 5 different stages associated with providing proper intervention towards the actions of physical recovery:

Stage 1: Pain Management

The primary focus of Stage 1 is addressing pain symptoms and protecting the athlete from further physical trauma through offloading movement and resting the afflicted area(s). Common uses of intervention by physiotherapists include RICE tactics (Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation), manual pain reduction therapy, and stretching exercises.

Stage 2: Mobility Restoration

After assessing the athlete’s condition, physiotherapists often begin restoring the athlete’s range of motion to help regain necessary flexibility and joint mobility. There are many simple activities used across many different sports that utilize muscle strengthening, flexibility, and therapeutic exercises during the return to movement in Stage 2.

Stage 3: Increasing Strength & Stamina

Stage 3 often involves most of the physical injury pain becoming obsolete and allowing the athlete to begin increasing their muscle strength and endurance for their return back to sport. Physiotherapists often involve both form and posture control into common bodyweight exercises to accurately maintain effective comebacks of both strength and endurance. 

Stage 4: Reconnecting Coordination/Technique

The rehabilitation process of sports injuries will now require specialized sport proprioception, which is defined as the body’s ability to put together movement, action, and ability in intuitive and automatic ways to increase reconnection to body self-awareness. Stage 4 intervention utilizes various movements like single-leg stances for neuromuscular control, but can often depend on the necessary conditioning needed in the specific sport.

Stage 5: Return to Play/Competition

The final stage of the recovery process involves the athlete’s full/near full physical recovery completed for successful return to play or competition in their sport. Assessing new athlete conditions may involve precise return conditions set by physiotherapists or athletic trainers, including competition timeline factors or full practice requirements. 

Throughout the entire recovery process, injured athletes should be mindfully active to embracing the “little things” toward successful recovery and post-injury prevention. Factors influencing mindful recovery include optimizing a proper sleep schedule, having a balanced nutritional diet, proper hydration, and strength & conditioning training. Brittany James emphasizes the importance of these factors as being the most beneficial for all athletes across all different sports. Brittany believes, “When you are injured, your body is still working hard to get back to homeostasis. These practices will not only help aid your injury recovery, but will help prevent future injuries as well.” Applying these habits into your normal lifestyle as a student athlete will keep yourself mindfully active to recovery; hopefully avoiding another future injury in your athletic career.