Injury

When I was a junior in high school, I went through one of the hardest years of my life. I was playing varsity softball, when something unexpected changed my life. During our first game of our season, I slid into home plate and scraped up my whole right leg. I had my sliding guard on the wrong leg. After I did that, my coach told me that I needed to change the guard to my other leg before the next game. Well naturally I didn't because I was stubborn, and it was the smartest thing I had done so far that day. We won our first game and we started the second one fifteen minutes later. In the bottom of the third a girl was stealing second base, so as I started to see her running I covered second base. As the catcher threw the ball to me, I noticed I was going to have to move away from the bag four or five steps to get it. While I was attempting to catch the ball, I had one leg planted into the ground and the other in the air. That is when it happened. The girl slid into my planted leg, breaking my tibia and fibula. The pain was excruciating, I had no idea what was happening. I was rolling around, on the field, holding my leg. As I was doing this I recall the umpire telling me to be still, and wait there until my coach got to me. What seemed like hours for her to get to me was actually a matter of seconds. When she came to me and asked what it felt like, I told her that, "it feels like bones knocking together." So they carried me off of the field, where I had to wait for an ambulance for twenty minutes. When they got over to me, they had to cut off my cleat, sock, and sliding guard. Looking down the only thing I could see at that point was what looked like a softball protruding from my leg. When I got to the hospital the doctor told me that the only thing that saved my bones from breaking through the skin, was the protective black sliding guard wrapped around my leg. This sliding guard would have not been there, if I would have listened to my coach. With the luck I was having that day, I had to be taken by ambulance to my hometown to have the surgery done. This was because there was not an orthopedic doctor on call at that hospital. I ended up having a titanium rod and screws put into my bone. It was the most painful experience that I've had up to that point in my life. I was out of school for a month and a half, so they sent a tutor to my house so I could keep up with the work. Once I got the ok from my doctors to go back to school, I had to be in a wheel chair. This injury played a huge role in my life, it taught me to not take advantage of the things I have. When I say this, I mean everyday most of us are able to walk, to run, to jump, etc. We never stop to appreciate how lucky we are to be able to do these things. There are people in this world, who have either never had this pleasure or will never have the pleasure of doing these things again. Unfortunately it sometimes takes dramatic experiences like these, to realize how lucky you are to be able to do these activities.