Hobbling on the long road back from injury
Injury. Quite possible one of the worst words for a Warwick athlete to hear. And with around 70 sports clubs at Warwick, it is inevitable that a certain percentage of our student athletes are going to get injured in some way. It can not only affect you physically, but mentally and emotionally, as I recently learned after breaking my foot.
After reaching out on social media, I was amazed how many people contacted me with such a variety of different injuries. I spoke to Laura Whitehead, women’s captain of Warwick Athletics, who has suffered from recurring hip pain.
“At points I found it very difficult to watch others train, compete and improve while my training was put on hold,” she said. “However, being part of the exec retained that important involvement in the club.”
She still regularly attends circuit sessions, adjusting reps to her injuries, and kept up her fitness by swimming (a great low-resistance cardio workout). As part of her exec role she is responsible for running sessions 5-6 times a week, but fortunately had a lot of support from other exec members.
As a member myself, the Athletics team has always had numerous members suffering from injuries, especially sprains and shin splints. Steph Collings, former secretary for Athletics, had to have surgery to correct an acute ligament weakness in her right ankle, and was unable to run for a whole year.
“Feelings of frustration are not uncommon, and there is always the temptation to get back into sport as soon as pos- sible- but you mustn’t rush”
Feelings of frustration are not uncommon, and there is always the temptation to get back into sport as soon as possible – but risking going back into sport too soon can lead to even worse problems. Keeping the right attitude, keeping occupied and being sensible about recovery time were three key aspects of the recovery process I gleaned from chatting to former Warwick student Glenn Humphries. He plays hockey and cricket, and had surgery to reconstruct his anterior cruciate ligament.
“I was stuck in my flat, not able to go anywhere, and ended up slipping into a routine of not getting out of bed until the mid afternoon. Thank God for the PS3 to keep me sane! It was frustrating watching my hockey team play every week, and not being able to help them. I got in trouble a few times for shouting abuse at the umpires. I think that was down to my frustration.
“God knows how I’m going to get through the cricket season without playing. I played over 60 games last summer, now I won’t play any. The biggest temptation is to start playing early, but if I damage this repair, there’s nothing they can do, and I will never play again, which would kill me.”
Alice Trew is a member of Thai boxing and yoga. Cracking her rib had her feeling left behind: “I’m only a little involved with the Thai boxing club now. It was really hard to train, I couldn’t participate fully in sessions, and – most frustrating of all – it prevented me from competing in the inter-club competition.”
And the effects of injury can be felt even long after recovery. “I definitely feel the loss of that training time. It distanced me from both the sport and the club.”
Even in the day-to-day routine as a student, injury can seriously affect your life. Swimmer Melissa Morgan recently ended up on crutches and was told off for ‘being loud’ at night whilst walking on them, being ‘too slow’ during fire alarms and walking slowly through University buildings, as well as being tutted at by fellow students. Melissa told me: “I felt really embarrassed using crutches anyway, so to be complained about made me extremely upset.
“Furthermore, levels 3-5 of the library were awful, because my crutches were loud and everyone would glare at me and tut under their breath. I couldn’t do anything to stop my crutches being loud and I couldn’t work in the library as I felt so uncomfortable, so I worked elsewhere.”
However, Melissa did find a positive in her experience in having to focus on upper body strength work. “I realised I had been neglecting a whole part of my body in terms of exercise when I was in the gym… I started doing upper body weights and realised I found something I loved!”
And what about recovery? When the cast comes off and the doctor tells you it’s time to ease in, it’s important to take this period seriously.
With serious leg injuries that inhibit your ability to walk, even the thought of exercise can sound like a joke. But upper body, core (and if it is an injury below the knee, even upper leg) workouts can be areas that many athletes forget to target. Being restricted to all things sitting down, I have found some fantastic seated workout exercises on YouTube for my arms and core – some even include exercises for your upper legs, which is an area I would have thought impossible to exercise in a cast.
And what about recovery? When the cast comes off and the doctor tells you it’s time to ease in, it’s important to take this period seriously. As well as swimming for low-res cardio, spinning, yoga and aqua jogging are all options. Alternating walking, running and strides with jog recoveries on soft ground is a great way to build up to running.
But are clubs and Warwick Sport doing enough to support their injured members? Warwick Sport offers one free physiotherapy consultation to its members. However, one free session for women’s basketball captain Giuly Zecchini is not enough.
She has now broken her ankle nine times playing basketball, a common injury. “At least every month we have someone injuring their ankle. In the months of January and February I had five girls injured and they were all ankle injuries except one,” she said.
Giuly has had to have extensive physio. However, she doesn’t believe that physio support at Warwick is good enough. “[It’s] way too expensive,” she said, “[it] would just be nice for Warwick Sport to take better care of us”.
I spoke to a spokesperson from Warwick Sport about this, who informed me that the cost is discounted for staff and students. Sessions cost £36 for 45-minute initial consultations and half-hour appointments thereafter, in comparison with the non-discounted prices of £50 consultations and £43 appointments.
It’s valuable to remember that there are other actions you can take that will minimize the time you’re laid off with an injury, however. Principally, keep positive, and busy. It’s also an idea to adapt club sessions to your injury to avoid becoming distanced from your club, if possible.
It is essential that you don’t try to dive back too soon though because this risks worse injury with longer recovery time, or even irreparable damage. There are always other exercises you can do, whether you are in a cast and have to exercise sitting down, or have to stick to low-resistance exercises. Learning to adapt is therefore crucial.
And finally: rest! Your body heals while it sleeps, so make sure you give it that time to heal. The road back from an injury is not a simple one, as the people I spoke to testified, but sometimes following some simple advice can help to make the process less arduous.
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