By Katherine Bird ’18 | Staff writer
“She seems to have a complete tear to her Anterior Cruciate Ligament and a slight tear to the Medial Meniscus.”
The doctor’s words also known as what I believed to be my death sentence. Tears to the ACL are a temporary sob story to an athlete’s soccer career.
I turned my cheek away from the doctor and immediately began to silently ball my eyes out. Took me awhile to realize no matter how much I cried, my knee wasn’t just going to heal over night.
It wasn’t like I went out with a bang and tore my ACL after a really good shot or an attempt to stop an attacking player. My team was losing 6-0 and there was two minutes left in the game. I went out with bust.
After surgery, when all you can do is lay down or try to use the crutches, you feel isolated. At least I did. I was stuck sitting in a dark black basement all day with my leg elevated being reminded everyday that you can’t play the game that you love. On the plus side I was able to finish Gossip Girl for the third time.
It was a shake to my world because I go from playing soccer everyday to now only being able to walk if I have a 10 pound brace on. I’ve played soccer since I was three. 13 years of my life have been dedicated to practicing and performing at the highest level I can. Now the next six months will be dedicated to me trying to bend my knee 90 degrees.
Physical therapy is slow. They don’t push you or at least you don’t think they are. The “hardest exercise” they have me doing is calf raises. If you know what those are, then you know where I’m coming from.
Everyone kind of dealt with what had happened in their own way. I just sat in a dark basement and watched Netflix and thought of how this couldn’t get any worse. My mom dealt with it by telling everyone that had an ear about what happened. My dad tried to tell me all these positive things but truthfully, I never listened because at that point I believed I had the worst luck in the world.
The hardest part of the whole situation is sitting on the sidelines. I watch as my teammates from both my travel and high school team get to participate in fun practices and nail-biting games that come down to the last minute. It’s hard because a one second difference would mean that I’d be out there with them. It’s hard because that used to be me. It’s hard because now I have to focus on my knee and not soccer.
This whole situation has taught me an important lesson. You never think it’s going to be you. Life will throw you curve balls but they’re being thrown for a reason. You can either step right in front of them and hit them or strike out. Either way the curve ball was still thrown and you had to deal with it.
