Hey Everyone!

Well, it's official...I'm the Angel of Injury. Which is pretty funny, because I feel like the Angel of Insecurity. Since Wednesday my boss and I have seen: a broken ankle (Wednesday) on our Starting running back (and he started at something on defense too), a torn ACL on our starting quarterback/defensive back(Thursday), a broken shin on a freshman from a visiting school (took 6 pins to fix it because he thought he just had a cramp and tried to walk off the field-Friday afternoon), a possible broken shin on our starting o/d lineman (turned out to be a high ankle sprain-Friday night), and today a possible broken forearm on a JV player from a visiting school.

The worst part is, I have become extremely tentative. I was starting to get my confidence back on Friday when I looked at our quarterback. My ACL showed a stop at the point where a torn ligament wouldn't, so even though all signs pointed to that, I was fairly confident his ligaments were there and reassured him the ligaments looked o.k. Coach too. However, I iced him and brought him inside, just to be safe. Bill (my boss) was in here and I had him look. He got a stop too, but not a great one. He was fairly certain the ligament was gone or about to be, so we arranged for him to see our Doc the next morning, who confirmed Bill's assessment. I haven't been able to get over it.

My only reassurance is that I have done everything right in the safety of the athletes, even if our coaches think I'm not to be trusted alone with their players. (Not that they do, I guess I just feel like they do.) I dealt just fine with the broken shin at our freshman game...it was pretty easy with no tests needed...it was a no-brianer and the ambulance had already been called when I arrived. Just the sacrifice of my knees while I knelt next to the kid for 45 minutes while we awaited the ambulance. Didn't look at all at the high ankle sprain Friday night. And did everything right by the possible broken forearm today. Everything except ask for a second opinion in front of our Freshman coaches (well, I pulled Bill aside and we walked over to the kid on the other teams sideline).

Bill keeps reassuring me that I've done everything well and some of these thing will just take me time in "getting back in the swing of it". I'm sure he thinks for someone who's been out of the training profession as long as I have, that I'm doing pretty well for my first month. I'm just disappointed in myself. I swear I was better as a Senior in college (8 school years ago) than I am now. I know I was sharper then. I also have to keep reminding myself that I had many years of training, classes and hands-on then all fresh in my mind; Now I'm dusting off memory stores that haven't been used in 3 or 4 years. Of course a "mushy" stop on an ACL is gonna be the same as a "stop". And of course, every once in awhile I'm gonna need reassurance that "weird" pop when someone makes a fistis not "normal" and should get an x-ray. I just wish I could thoroughly convince the part of me that is hard on myself; the part that wants the trust of the coaches and athletes, when I don't have it completely in myself.

I think the test on John really rattled me. I was feeling a little put off already because most of my on-field evaluations, Bill would show up and take it over, even if I had been on the same track he was...or trying to move the athlete as quickly as possible. I wanted a little show of confidence in me, and also, to not send a message to the coaches that the "important" injuries were ones I couldn't handle; that my own boss, someone they trust, had full confidence in me. (I've also been having the problem that whenever I assert myself and tell someone to do something in treatments (like get an ice bag and go there), Bill yells at them, or tells them not to do it. Not intentionally to contridict me, I realize, but sometimes I just wish my word could stand...as long as it's not a blatant show of rule-breaking or something I could get fired for doing or saying. And then John got hurt. I had the spotlight all to myself...and fell flat on my face. It has been haunting me since Thursday. While part of me wants to dust off and work harder to show everyone (coaches, but I feel like I need to work twice as hard to gain Bill's trust, as well. He leaves me alone and lets me do things on my own, so he must trust me some, but I wonder if deep down he's going...what the hell happened to this girl?!?!?) I am not complete fluff, the other part of me doesn't have the confidence that I can do it and not just continue to fall on my face, thereby making things look worse.

Needless to say, my body is taking the brunt of my emotions. Especially today, when I stood for 3 1/2 hours in a hot, crowded gymnasium of 2500 people to hear our Vice President speak, getting up at 5am and am now, just about to head home. I've been thinking some mac and cheese might just do the trick. For today. Now I gotta try and gear up for tomorrow...and hope the confidence and the knowledge comes from somewhere soon!