I used to be able to run, jump, and hear my name being shouted among the crowd as I scored double-double after double-double, but that soon all ended. Within just a few hours I had just had that all ripped away due to a season ending injury: tearing my ACL. Sorrow sneaks in like a lion hunting for its prey in the tall grass of the savannah.
Days go by and the depression of not being able to play the game that I have had my whole life starts to dig its claws deeper into my mind, raising the doubt I wish would not have existed. Whatever I did I could not seem to shake the feeling that I would never get back to the player that I was before my surgery.
While crutching around campus one day a woman just suddenly appears in the courtyard. She is a short woman with curly brown hair that has a caring mother type of vibe about her. I was so confused because I could swear I knew who she was, but for some reason I couldn’t put my finger on it. I asked her who she was and she just seemed to laugh at me, which seemed to strike a nerve within me. She then parted her lips in a shocked sort of way and said “wait, don’t you recognize me?”
“Not one bit.”
“Angela quit playing games, you know exactly who I am.”
“No I don’t”
She saw my confused look and shook her head and said “oh dear. It's me, Lady Rehab.”
“Who is that?”
“Don’t worry about that just know that I am here to help you”
“How are you going to be able to help me?”
“If I understand you and your sickness properly, the situation is one in which you are longing for your previous good fortune. Yes? (Boethius 27)”
“Yes, I want to be able to play basketball again! I will do whatever it takes.”
“Then follow me.”
She leads me into Tine Davis Gymnasium where there is a small room tucked into the corner of the stairs that leads to the upstairs part of the gym. Lady rehab opens the door and motions for me to come inside. Once I step into the room, I see all this equipment everywhere. Ankle weights, a bike, stem machines, and so many more. I am a little hesitant at first seeing everything in her little workshop, but then she sits me down and tries to talk to me.
“What seems to be the problem missy?”
“I just don’t completely understand why I am here.”
“You are here to get better physically and mentally.”
“I’m fine, I don’t need your help.”
“How do you expect to get better, if you don’t expect the help that has been sent by God?”
“It's complicated.”
“Explain Ang. I can’t help you if you don’t let me.”
“It's just I’m never going to be the same player I was before this happened.”
She stared at me straight in my face and said “quit feeling sorry for yourself.” I was shocked when she said this. “Yeah you heard me right. You have a right to feel hurt and sad, but that is not what you get to allow to define you.”
“You don’t understand what it feels like to have the only thing that you are good at taken away from you.”
“But that's just the thing, it isn’t taken away from you. You have the ability to come back stronger than ever. First we will have to work on rehabbing your body.”
“Alright, I’ll give it a go.”
After five months of going to therapy in her little room for three hours a day and five times a week, my body was finally much stronger than it had ever been and physically I was ready to get back on the court. However, my mind was still holding me back. I didn’t fully trust my leg enough to play a pick up game.
Lady rehab found me sitting on the bleachers by the court and said “Why the long face?”
“I just don’t feel like I’m fully ready to play yet.”
“You are physically but you still don’t believe in yourself. God put you into this position so that you would lean on Him more than you do on yourself.”
“That is much easier said than done.”
“All you have to do is ask for His help, it’s really not that hard.”
“I’ll give it a try.”
For the next couple of weeks, I reached out to God out for help and by the time the upcoming seasoned rolled around I was back to kicking butt and taking names just like I never tore my ACL.
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