Concussion as a Student Athlete
Navigating being a student athlete in college is a practice in self-advocacy, dedication, and patience as students find balance between studies and achieving peak performance consistently. As young adults, too, this intersection of identities for student athletes pose challenges to moving through spaces insofar as they must be diligent in time management but also well and able to physically get to morning lifts, back-to-back classes, team meetings, philanthropic events, among the numerous other physical spaces they are obligated to be.
A student athlete myself, I face these challenges and my mobility is a key component of my athletic identity. The facets of my personality that I’ve adopted through sportsmanship allow me to move and progress as a student, friend, partner, daughter, and individual. When I sustained a concussion the first week of April, the fourth one I’ve had and first of my college athletic career, my mobility changed drastically. Suddenly the physical movement I was reliant on for a sense of purpose was a detriment to my health. The regimen of studying, attending class, and building a schedule outside of practice was reduced to simply laying in bed without a phone, laptop, book, light, game, or any form of entertainment to occupy my time. Notifying professors and making doctors appointments were tasks I was reliant on others to do for me. Having a concussion was ultimately an event that revealed additional challenges to moving in both a literal and figurative sense, but also forced me to reconsider what mobility can look like and that moving optimally does not have to mean moving at peak performance; it can look like moving in the ways that best serve my needs and allow me to do the most in my current situation.
Caroline Stone