Most athletes have different experiences with injuries throughout high school. But how do they handle these injuries?
While some decide to seek medical attention from doctors or their school trainers, others do their best to push through their injuries so they can continue playing the sport they love, whether that be by hiding it or lying about it.
Some coaches agree that their players are honest about their injuries and have no issue with making them or athletic trainers aware of what’s going on.
“If one of our players (is) dinged up, they don’t have a problem letting you know about it,” head football coach Alex Bettag said.
Some athletes believe it is best to seek help when it comes to their injuries.
They know what consequences they might ultimately face if they aren’t honest about their injuries. If some injuries remain unattended, they may cause long term damage down the road.
Knowing this, many athletes prefer to allow themselves to heal before getting back to their sports.
“Most of us tell our coaches because we know it’ll end up affecting us deeper if we don’t,” junior Andreas Poulakis said.
On the other hand, some athletes aren’t as honest when it comes to their injuries.
Of course no athlete wants their season to be cut short due to injury. So what do they do to avoid this?
To varying degrees, some will choose to simply hide it.
In some cases, school trainers or doctors may restrict players from playing if their injuries are serious enough.
But because of this, some athletes hide their injuries as a way around this obstacle. Maybe it’s the athlete’s senior year, or a big game is coming up that they really don’t want to miss.
Obviously, doctors or school trainers are unable to help the situation if they are unaware of it, so it may be hard to recognize an injury if the athlete isn’t upfront about it.
“There’s nothing we can really do about it except (to) make sure they have a safe place to express their concerns,” athletic trainer Felicia Cooper said.
With all of the fun and excitement that comes with sports and being an athlete, there are also injuries.
Injuries are almost unavoidable when it comes to being an athlete. However, being responsible when it comes to recovery is extremely important to get back to playing.
“When it comes to an injury, every single player obviously has different experiences with it,” junior Janel Matos said. “Everybody just wants to play.”
