This article won third place in the 2022 Michigan Interscholastic Press Association spring awards ceremony.
A letter from the editors,
Mental health is an issue that impacts millions of individuals every year, yet despite the relevance, it tends to be a topic avoided in discussions. As a Roar staff, we are working to break the stigmas around mental health issues and cover stories that deal with this difficult topic.
We strive to write articles that matter.
The article below is the starting point for a section we are working to develop thoughtfully and purposefully, regarding mental health. Two athletes decided to share their story with editor Olivia Austin about their experience with mental health when it comes to sports.
Olivia Austin, Doretta Schat-Beimers and Victoria Scovel
Every day during swim season for sophomore Evan Arnold was a long one. She would have to wake up and go to morning practice until having to attend school from 8:20-2:20. After school, she would return to the pool and then would use all ounces of her free time after practice for homework and other priorities in her life.
This is an all too familiar daily routine for many athletes, especially those who are higher level or serious about their sport. Factors like time management, the pressure that they can put on themselves and other leading factors can cause an athlete to be anxious or overwhelmed.
student athletes at Northview.
“I’ve been struggling a lot with motivation as well as a lot of anxiety and stress when it comes to not just practicing and competing, but even when thinking about my sport,” Arnold said.
Arnold, who received 16th in the 100 freestyle and was a part of the 3rd place winning state swim team this year, says that in the past six to eight months, she has found it hard to establish goals for herself and to maintain her love for swimming like she used to.
“I’ve been trying to come to terms with it, but I find it hard because I feel like I’m just being lazy and need to try harder,” Arnold said. “It’s still hard, but recently I’ve been trying to take less time forcing myself to practice and more time to focus on other parts of my life and just use practicing to stay in shape.”
Arnold mentions that some of her lack of motivation for swim is due to the pandemic. Those who made the state swim team had their season extended from four months to seven due to the pause Governor Gretchen Whitmer had on sports finals this past fall. But she also says that that burnout, which is common among those who specialize in a sport early or are overtrained, is also a leading factor for her.
“There would be some weeks where practices were really hard and going to practice was always an internal struggle,” Arnold said. “ I’ve definitely thought about quitting at times, which is pretty upsetting to think about.”
She isn’t alone either. Junior cross country runner Isabel Toole experienced performance anxiety for the first time this past fall. Since cross country is an individual sport, she believes that was a factor into her anxiety.
“I had put a lot of pressure on myself to perform well in my races. I also felt that there was pressure from others on me in hopes to improve each race and I didn’t want to disappoint them,” Toole said. “That led to me getting such bad anxiety before each meet because I didn’t want to disappoint others as to how I ran and if I could’ve done better.”
Toole had never experienced the levels of anxiety she was having until she went to her first day of conditioning over the summer, and it wasn’t something she noticed right away.
“It was really nerve racking at first and I didn’t know what was happening because this had never happened before,” Toole said. “ I had already put too much pressure on myself in hopes to have a good season right off the bat. I wasn’t feeling good before and during the run and it wasn’t until we were doing strides at the end when it had hit me.”
Toole comes from an athletic family, specifically a family of runners. Both of her parents were runners and her brother Joe Toole, who graduated in 2020, broke a track and field school record in the 4×100 meter relay with three other alumni and was honored All-Conference and All-State for that same relay in 2019.
The pressure was on for her to live up to the expectations.
“I felt like people expected me to be a great runner since I come from a family of runners and so I didn’t want others to look down upon me and didn’t want to upset others,” Toole said.
Toole also admitted to having burnout at a certain time during the season.
“I was getting tired of dealing with anxiety before every meet each week. It got frustrating because I had been running for multiple months and this was the outcome,” Toole said. “I felt like I wasted a season worrying too much that I was getting tired of the repetitiveness of stress over a meet rather than having fun.”
In the end, both Toole and Arnold agree that it is important to talk about athlete mental health and there are many resources out there for athletes to seek help.
One way is through confidence building programs. Many athletes who struggle with performance anxiety often are struggling with their confidence, especially after a rough game or meet.
The Chosen Mentality Program, started by former Grand Valley State University basketball player and owner of The Chosen Ones Wes Trammell, is a way for athletes to learn how to develop a positive mindset and learn how to look at everything from a mental perspective.
“I [believe] that the mental side of the game is just as important, if not more, than the actual physical side of the game. I just want athletes to know that and to help equip them with that,” Trammell said.
In the program, athletes will learn about what happens when they get in their head and how to move past it, training the mind to be “mentally tough,” positive self talk, coming up with pregame/meet routines, setting priorities, how to overcome tough moments and leadership skills.
“It’s a good community to feel supported and to talk about things you wouldn’t really talk about with friends,” Trammell said.
Trammell also brings up the fact that it is important for athletes to get ahead of the problem before it happens.
“A lot of people say ‘I won’t seek help until I need it,’” Trammell said. “I think we all should be prepared, so be proactive instead of reactive. You don’t want to wait until it’s too late and something breaks you down.”
He’s not the only one who believes this either. Clinical sports psychologist Dr. Eddie O’Connor said something similar.
“We don’t have to be ‘sick’ to go to a doctor necessarily,” O’Connor said. “We want fitness, people to eat well and sleep well because we want to maintain health. We want to [be able to] look at mental health in that same way that people can be active participants without [mental health conditions] and have it be something we do just to be our best.”
When O’Connor treats his athletes, he tries to make them feel that the anxiety is normal and that they worry because they care. He adopted a philosophy called the “fire alarm response.”
When an athlete gets into a situation where they start to feel anxious, their job is to recognize and check it out, tune into it and decide if it is a false alarm or if they have to look into it just like someone would do if they heard a fire alarm.
“Most times when you have heard a fire alarm, it’s a drill or someone accidentally burned something or the batteries are dead. You don’t respond to it by running out of the building,” O’Connor said. “I teach my athletes that their anxiety is because you care and the more you care, because of the risk of losing or making a mistake, that will never go away, it’s going to be loud.”
O’Connor believes that the impact on student’s mental health can be due to the environment of the team and coaches and because of this, he tries to promote healthy environments among all teams.
“Sports are really an opportunity for growth and development but there isn’t anything inherit about sports. People say ‘sports are good for you.’ Sports are just sports, how we operate it and function in it actually makes the difference,” O’Connor said.
To register or to learn more about the Chosen Mentality program click here and to learn more about the services O’Connor offers click here.
If you want to talk to someone about your athlete mental health, fill out the form below to talk to author Olivia Austin.
