Psychlogical Effects & Responses to Injury in Sport

Putting a plan in place to deal with injuries or illness in your sport is a necessity. Mapping out your psychological & physical return to action that ensures your mental wellbeing should be a priority on your road to recovery.

It is firstly imperative that you identify and acknowledge the emotional responses that you may experience to the injury and manage those individually. These could be sadness, isolation, irritation, lack of motivation, anger, frustration, change in appetite, sleep disturbance or disengagement.

Accompanying emotional responses may also be psychosocial responses such as:

•       Negative self-talk

•       Uncontrollable intrusive and negative thoughts or images

•       Inability to concentrate

•       Self doubt

When dealing with injuries to athletes, no matter the age or experience, its is important to recognise that emotional reactions will nearly always accompany them. These reactions may resolve by themselves over the time of acceptance, or will become increasingly problematic. This in itself will have an impact on the recovery and rehabilitation of the injury.

There are 4 key things that you can do once an injury has occurred and diagnosis received in order to develop your psychological strengths, overcome physical weaknesses and enhance rehabilitation, such as:

•       Accept the injury and set small realistic goals with the physio and support network

•       Educate yourself about the injury

•       Dismiss mistruths and speculation regarding the injury

•       Use your time away from the sport to develop psychologically and embrace different environments and opportunities.

The Coaches/Manager & Parent Role

As a coach, manager or indeed as a parent in some instances, dealing with an athletes injury, it is important to:

•       Monitor emotional reactions and changes in behaviours

•       Identify the correct psychological support services that the athlete may need and involve the right people at the right time

•       Call upon qualified personnel to educate the athlete and indeed you as a coach or parent regarding emotional reactions to injury and recovery.

•       Engage the athletes social support network with things that they find relaxing, fun and non-stressful.

  Another point to remember is that the levels and types of emotional reactions that the athlete experiences over time changes; from the initial onset of injury, through rehabilitation, to return-to-play.

Reiteration of the fundamentals regarding self-management to the athlete are a great way for them to maintain a psychology that allows them to process, plan and prepare for the possibly long road ahead. Reiterate and reinforce to the athlete to:

•       Be prepared for the injury recovery process. The injury recovery and rehabilitation process will be variable due to characteristics of the injury, treatment provided, presence of complications and any psychological issues.

•       Allow themselves to be educated by professionals that an injury is best managed on an individualised basis. Include your coach in your injury recovery and stay involved in the group/team or environment to avoid isolation.

•       Use specific interventions such relaxation, goal setting and healing visualisations. These can be very important and indeed rewarding, as injured athletes can experience considerable stress throughout the injury and rehabilitation process. Psychological as well as physical strategies will enhance the recovery process.