“Does this hurt?” I winced in pain as the chiropractor lightly twisted my left leg.
“Eh. Kind of.” I wasn’t about to give in that easily, even if the pain was making tears well up in the corners of my eyes. The night before, I was at practice. It was an off night, and I blamed it on eating a hamburger immediately before. We began to practice falls, and did them in the normal drill fashion- one knee falls, then two knee falls, 4-point falls, and 180s. My left knee wasn’t too happy about the whole situation, but I told it to stop complaining because we were almost done.
I guess I was too focused on the cut I had on my shin from falling on my skate during the last drill to notice the rock sitting in front of me as I got up from a two knee fall. Before I could recover from it, I was already back down on the floor and feeling a surge of pain from my left knee up to the top of my head. The panic of something being horribly wrong took over, and instead of doing the logical thing and telling my coach I needed a minute, I kept skating. I skated hard enough that walking to my car was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do since I lied and told someone I enjoyed The Notebook. I rubbed a substantial amount of Icy Hot into my knee when I got home and ignored the sharp pinching sensations.
I immediately regretted ignoring that pain the next morning. The second I woke up, I felt like my leg was caught in a death trap from a foreign film. Bending my knee would send shooting pains into my calf, and any attempt of straightening the leg or lifting it made me howl and sob from the pain. I frantically dialed the team sports doctor and begged to come in immediately to see him.
Two hours later, I was laying on my back on the exam bed in his practice, trying to play down how much pain I was in. He told me I most likely ripped the meniscus and would need to sit out for a month.
A month.
My fresh meat curse was kicking in; something terrible always happens that causes me to not make it to assessments. This piece of spoiled meat started sobbing on the exam table. I can’t go through this again; I can’t sit through another bout and watch girls I started with play the games that I wanted to play. I can’t build up this much confidence to have it come crashing down. I’m never meant to skate with the big girls, I guess. This is it.
Well…I’ve had a couple weeks since to gather my thoughts, ice my knee, and buy out the Icy Hot company. The meniscus is slightly torn but it just needs RICE and time off of it, no surgery. I don’t know why my first reaction to anything bad is “it’s the end of the world”. Surprisingly though, this time the overreaction only lasted about three days. I’m now walking on it and capable of bending my knee more, which is wonderful. I’ve also had time to do something I didn’t do the last time I got injured- talk to other injured girls.
I get discouraged very easily, I don’t know if anyone has noticed. But I believe anyone would be discouraged just as easily if they were left alone with their thoughts like I allow myself to do almost 100% of the time. When I don’t wallow in my stress, when I actually reach out into the community that I’ve put myself in, my will to push through becomes so much stronger.
I’m positive that this time around, my frustration and exhaustion with this injury and most likely needing to go through Fresh Meat again comes from absolute, unconditional love for roller derby. Because I now know and accept that, no matter what injury or unfortunate event happens in my life that keeps me away, I’m going to come running back to the people, sport, and atmosphere that makes me the happiest.
I will probably be fresh meat until the day I die, though. Maybe I’ll play a game in after that.
See you in hell.
Kitten Tarantino
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