student sample essay
Sports Injuries
It is a proven fact that more women are injured by ACL than men. In fact, women between the ages of 15 and 25 are more prone to this type of injury. I am one of those women in that fact. Since I hurt my knee, I have started learning more and more about why it happened and how it could have been prevented. When someone finds out they have this sort of injury, they want to know what should be done about it. ACL injuries are usually caused by playing sports of some kind. When the injury is diagnosed the patient then will decide a course of action for treatment.
Sports are a popular thing in most young people’s lives. I started playing soccer at the age of three and played it until my injury. Sports was a huge part of my life until that day. It was Valentine’s Day in 2003, I was playing basketball for my high school team. Part way through the game my knee gave out on me and I fell to the floor. It was one of the most excruciating times of my life. The pain shot through my whole body as if I had been thrown into a lake with water below freezing. It probably looked stupid how I stood there and the next moment I fell. The next thing I knew, I was being carried off the court. After the game was over I went to the emergency room. It was then that I found out I had an ACL injury.
There are four major ligaments in your knee. The ACL is called the anterior crucial ligament. It is the most common ligament tear. The reason a person tears their ACL is by sudden stops and quick turns on your knee. Recent studies show that most female athletes playing soccer and basketball are three-to-four times more likely to tear their ACL than males. Part of this is because women don’t know how to exercise properly. Their main focus is on their quadriceps. Many women should learn how to use their hamstring muscles as well. Another reason is that when women run they tend to land flat footed instead of landing on their toes. So maybe some injuries could be avoided if women learned to exercise the correct way.
After finding out you have a torn ACL, there are choices regarding treatment. You can have surgery or you can live with the injury. My doctor told me that generally patients over thirty choose not to have surgery because they are less active. Someone my age has a lot of active life ahead of them to be living in pain and with a weak knee. He suggested to me that I have it done so that my knee wasn’t in pain or unstable all the time. ACL reconstructive surgery was probably the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced outside of the original injury. You are given pictures of your knee before and after when you wake up from surgery. You are also given the chance to purchase your surgery on tape. I ended up staying in the hospital overnight as I was so drugged up that I couldn’t wake up. When I finally did and all the medicine woe off, I wished I hadn’t woken at all. The pain was horrible. After surgery you are required to have months of rehab.
Rehab was something I’ll never forget. It’s similar to kindergarten. You have to learn all over from the beginning. I had to do the start of my rehab in the pool because I couldn’t hold myself up. Once they get you on the ground though, it’s quite embarrassing. You have to learn to walk again. That was probably the hardest part for me. I couldn’t put my heel down first. Another big day for me was when I rode the bike and I got the pedal to go all the way around. After about four months of therapy, going three times a week for three hours each time, I had gained all my strength back I had finally completed the final phase.
After having the surgery and weighing out my options I believe that surgery is the best thing to do after tearing you ACL. It allows us teenagers to someday chase our little ones around the house without worrying about our knee. Also it just helps us to go on living a normal life. The best outcome from tearing your ACL would by going through surgery and rehab. Those are the two things to get you back on the road of life.
