Managing your Mental Health During an Injury for Athletes
When training is tied to your identity
When you have been training for a tremendous number of hours every week for years, a big part of your identity will unavoidably be linked to sports and training.
To quickly clarify, I am not referring here to professional athletes. If you are one, then this article probably won’t be for you.
However, you don’t need to be a professional for a physical injury to take a toll on your mental health. When you are used to regularly spending hours training, and you suddenly have to stop, what happens then? Even if it’s temporary, the pill is hard to swallow.
That situation may seem silly if you are not that much into sports. Indeed, it probably sounds silly to the people around you that are not sports freaks themselves. After all, it’s just for a few months or even a few weeks. What’s the deal?
And yet, you feel devastated.
Why am I telling you that
I am a gym freak, I have been training seriously for over 10 years now, and strength training is a huge part of my life.
My practice has evolved a lot over time, and so did my goals.
However, it has always been a part of my life, and it definitely is a cornerstone in my life. I have changed jobs, professional fields, apartments, cities — even countries — and hung out with many different groups of friends.
Among all of that movement, training has remained my constant.
I put my heart and soul into each training, in each set, and in each rep. I design and redesign my program with passion.
I have been lucky not to have suffered from many injuries over the years. But the last few months got me with two in a row.
It started with elbow inflammation. Nothing bad, but I had to seriously take a step down in my training and work with my physiotherapist.
As it got better and I was finally able to train normally again, I hurt my lower back. There is no shortcut for this one. I had to rest completely; just being seated was painful.
It is better now, but not over yet. I still don’t know when it will be completely okay, and I must admit this drove me crazy.
My mental health suffered a lot from it.
I didn’t know how to cope with it mentally. I am still finding my way around it somehow.
So I am writing the article I wish I read weeks ago.
Why it affects you so much
You first need to understand why that injury affects you so much, and why your mental health suffers from having to pause your training for some time.
Here is why:
You care about it.
Training is important to you; you invest a lot of time and energy in it.
As with any other thing for which you care, if it is taken away from you, it hurts.
It is sudden.
Injury takes you from top to bottom in an instant.
The fall is quick. You didn’t have the chance to gradually decrease your training load and adapt to that diminishing presence of sports in your life.
You don’t control it.
As humans, we love to have control over things.
You can do a lot for injury prevention, but the risk is always there, and injury is not a choice. You just have to deal with it.
You feel empty.
You used to spend so much time training, so now what do you do instead? You might not have another ready-to-do hobby to fill your agenda with.
But training wasn’t only keeping you busy; it was filling a purpose for you, this one may be different from person to person, but now nothing is filling that void anymore.
You are afraid of the consequences.
Depending on the sports you are practicing and your personal goals, the consequences you fear might differ. Maybe you are afraid of losing strength or muscle mass, missing a game — or worse, a season — , gaining weight, losing a skill, or having to start all over again.
How to cope with it
Now that you know why it affects you, it’s time to dive into some coping strategies.
Here is what you can do to help:
Put things into perspectives
Easier said than done, I know.
Remind yourself this is something temporary, and everything will be back to normal soon enough. Training isn’t a linear process.
No matter what you are afraid of, it is okay. If you lose some strength or muscle mass, or regress in some skills, it will all come back. You will never be back to zero; your body has a great memory.
If you miss some games or an entire season, it is okay. I know it’s crap, but you have a whole life full of games in front of you.
You are here for the long run. Don’t rush things or stress over an imposed period of rest; put it back into the perspective of a lifelong practice and see how okay it is.
Injuries are part of the deal.
Connect to your sport in different ways
Not being able to train as you would like doesn’t mean you have to disconnect completely from your activity.
Stay connected. Read, learn, meet with your training buddies, go to games, support your teammates, coach people, design a new program…
Being entirely disconnected can increase your feeling of emptiness, but it doesn’t have to be. Every sport has its whole universe. And this goes beyond training.
Deconstruct your identity
You feel bad because such a huge part of your identity is linked to your physical activity practice, which you can’t do anymore.
Sometimes it takes an injury to realize it.
The truth is, even if you have built your whole universe, interests, and identity around sports, it only remains a little part of you. Humans are so complex and unique.
There will always be way more to say about you.
It can be hard to identify the other things that really just make you who you are when you have spent so much effort and time identifying yourself around sports and training.
Take some time to reflect on it. Deconstruct, explore, and question. Make a list of everything that makes you the person that you are, and go as deep as you feel like.
This will help you understand how rich your identity truly is.
Invest in other activities
Spend the additional free time you now have to explore new hobbies or develop skills in something else.
This will occupy your time and your head and help you get some perspectives. Who knows, you might find your new passion in the meantime.
Avoid spending this time scrolling social media, binge-watching, or ruminating. This will only make you feel worse and feel like you are now wasting your time.
Using your time wisely, doing things you enjoy, and learning will help a lot for your mental health during this period.
Just imagine. You get back to training after a few months or weeks off because of your injury, which happens to every athlete. Still, in the meantime, you’ve learned to play the piano, started drawing and painting again, taken Spanish classes online, spent more time bonding with your kids, or improved your writing skills… Wouldn’t it be great?
Summary
I will leave you with a little summary of the points we talked about in this article.
Why not being able to train after an injury affects your mental health so much:
- You care about your sport
- It is sudden
- You don’t control it
- You feel empty
- You are afraid of the consequences
What you can do to help:
- Put things into perspective
- Connect to your sport in different ways
- Deconstruct your identity
- Invest in other activities
Hope this will help you as it did for me.
Take care, rest well and heal well.
Never lose faith in your body.
