Many athletes take advantage of the fact that they are in good health and are able to play their sport. At times athletes tend to get bored of their sport or they become restless of going to practice everyday. Now don’t get me wrong, I have more than once experienced the feeling of getting bored of going to practice everyday and not being able to go home right after school and relax, but what happens when the option of being able to play your sport is suddenly taken away? Is there relief? Is there frustration? Is there regret?
To start off I will begin with a little bit of background. This is my second year of playing basketball. I’m not completely sure why I thought it would be a good idea to try out for a sport I have never played before, but I ended up trying out and made the team. Of course I had absolutely no idea what I was doing because I’ve never played the sport before, but I just tried to fake the confidence as best as I could. Having to go out and play a game that you have never played before nor understand, is very nerve wracking. Since it is my second year I understand the game a lot more and I have an idea of what I’m supposed to do. Everything was going pretty well.
I know for a fact that I’m not the only athlete that chooses not to wear their ankle braces on certain days just because they aren’t feeling it. But the day that I decided to not wear them was probably one of my worst mistakes.
Last week on Thursday I was in the gym during seventh period. We always just do ball handling drills so I never put on my ankle braces or anything else. I finished going through the drill so I went to take a step back. I stepped back with my right foot and it ended up rolling flat to the floor. I heard it and felt it pop. I reached down for my ankle, and I started to feel more burning. But then the pain started becoming excruciating so I fell down and started screaming. I was on the ground screaming and the pain was increasing so I ended up hitting the gym floor with my fist repeatedly. I couldn’t breathe but I also couldn’t stop screaming, I felt like I was going to pass out because I couldn’t get any air in. My eyes were coated with tears and I remember looking around and just seeing everyone stare at me.
After a couple of minutes my coaches helped me into a wheelchair and brought me out to my dad. I was lifted into my dad’s car and the drive was extremely painful and what felt like the longest ride of my life, finally came to an end. When my step mom came home she took me to the ER. When I got there they looked at my ankle and tried to move it around. Then one of the nurses took me back to get x-rays. The table was very cold and it was extremely hard to stay still. Taking x-rays was not fun at all because of the fact that I had to move my ankle in certain places. I was given a boot to protect my ankle from jerking around and crutches.
