Overcoming an Injury

Four More Steps Toward Recovery

Once you're clearer about what's going on within you, there are several things you can do to optimize your recovery:

1. Determine your needs and build a team to meet those needs. Perhaps you're the kind of person who just needs a great doctor. On the other hand, you might benefit from support and guidance from such people as a physical therapist, alternative healthcare practitioners, a coach, a trainer, family and friends, a counselor or therapist, or clergy.

   Since it's critically important to see health care professionals with whom you feel highly comfortable and trusting, you may need to get clearer beforehand on what affects your feelings of comfort and trust. Is it the person's approach to treatment and recovery? Their bedside manner? The cost? Whether they're on your insurance plan? Whether they've been referred to you by someone you trust?

   And don't forget: you're on the team, too. How you relate to yourself during your recovery--your self-talk, how you manage your emotions, your expectations--may make the biggest difference of all. Speaking of which...

2. Set and reset your expectations for the recovery process/time as accurately as possible. Having healthcare professionals who you trust will certainly help with this. It may also help you to get educated about your injury via other sources. Arnie Baker's Bicycling Medicine, Andy Pruitt's Complete Medical Guide for Cyclists, and Brian Halpern's Knee Crisis Handbook are examples of books that I've found helpful.
3. Minimize any decline in your physical fitness. You may be off the bike, but you may not be completely prevented from doing any sort of physical exercise. Physiologically, exercise will tend to help combat any mood or anxiety problems that you experience as a result of the injury. Plus, if you can see and feel that certain non-injured areas of your body are staying strong--or perhaps even getting stronger--your outlook will tend to improve.
4. Take inventory of your core mental skills and use them. You're still in training; recovering from injury is just a different kind of training program from the one you're used to. All of your five core mental skills, some of which may need rehabilitation themselves, can make a big difference as you heal.

Goal-setting: Reset (or suspend) your cycling goals. If they're out of synch with the reality of your recovery process, you're likely to create stress, frustration, or even hopelessness. Apply your goal-setting and goal-management skills to your recovery program. And, extending point No. 2 above, be careful of goal-creep!

Self-talk: What kind of coach would you like to have supporting you every step of the way through your recovery? Shamelessly paraphrasing Gandhi, who said, "be the change you wish to see in the world," I urge you to strive to be your ideal coach. Encourage and support yourself; don't decide that's the domain of other people on your recovery team.

As you heal, use self-talk to reinforce your growing confidence and trust in the injured area of your body. If you're getting down on yourself, telling yourself you can come back sooner than you should, or freaking out because you're distorting what's happening (or what you think will happen) in your recovery process, it's time for an intervention. And you're the one to intervene. Stop those thoughts, replace them if necessary, and use your anxiety-reduction techniques to decrease the negative self-talk's fuel.

Managing Emotions: Injury tends to be a big catalyst for anxiety. You may be afraid that you'll miss a ride or race, miss the season, or never ride again. As you begin riding during your recovery, you may fear a re-injury, another crash, or not reaching your goals. Your anxiety may be a drain, and your energy, motivation, and confidence may suffer. Remember, anxiety (an "out of control" feeling) and control often go together; turning the screws on your healing process isn't the only way to exert control. So, if you notice yourself driving too hard to heal more quickly, it may be your unwitting response to stress. You may need to aim your control in a different direction--one that still reduces your anxiety.

Bad crashes can occasionally create a more complex challenge than anxiety: true, clinical trauma. Judith Herman, in her landmark book Trauma and Recovery, notes that "recovery [from trauma] can take place only in the context of relationships; it cannot occur in isolation." If you feel it might be useful to be assessed for clinical trauma, your friends, your doctor, or (in the U.S.) the free Psychology Today service are examples of potential sources for a qualified mental health professional.

Concentration: It's critically important that you stay focused on your recovery plan. And yet there may be more distractors than ever: pain, thoughts fueled by your anxiety, pain, frustration, pain, and that list of honey-do's that's so much harder to avoid now that you're off the bike. Notice when you've lost focus (or listen to someone on your team when they tell you), identify the triggering factors (eg. a situation that stresses your injury or evokes your crash), and have ways to refocus that are matched to the triggers.

Communication: This one's more important than ever. You'll need to be communicating well with your recovery team, managing the flow of information (and possibly pressure) with riding partners or teammates, and sharing what's happening with significant others. Decide who would benefit from hearing about the injury's effects on you and share that. Be respectful yet assertive with health care professionals. And be aware that your communication may be affected at times by any stress you experience.

Here's to your health!