Personal Narrative: My Life As A College Athlete

I had spent most of my childhood happy, without much pain or adversity; as a result, the moment I learned I did not make the Junior Varsity volleyball team my freshman year, I was especially devastated. When I showed up on our first day of tryouts I was excited. I looked forward to playing volleyball all summer with my friends. I worked hard, and I felt really confident at the end of the two weeks; certain that I had made the Junior Varsity team. The coaches took me to a secluded room and sat me down to explain which team I had made. I was almost already thanking them, not realizing that they were telling me, "We think that your skills at the moment would shine best on JV2; work on your technique and practice being a leader.”

How did Roger Banister break the 4 min mile? How did Dennis Kimetto run a marathon in 2:02:57?

Perhaps if it were not for my sister, I would have not been at Clayton State University as a student or an athlete, or even yet a student of sociology. The student-athlete is by no means what I expected. I actually did not know what I was expecting until the first day of practice for cross country and I truly thought I was never going to be able to handle school and running at the same time. Everything my sister had done, always seemed like it came easy to her. If it were not for her guidance and support, I probably would not be where I am today. Paige always pushed me and made me become the person I could be in this world. In addition, this is the semester I never once thought I would get to because of the many doubts I had along the way

My clinical rotation for the fall semester of my junior year is with the King’s College Men’s soccer team. As an athletic training student, I hold a lot of responsibilities regarding the prevention, evaluation, diagnosis, management, and treatment of these student athletes. Most of my daily activities can be separated into three groups, the pre-practice, pre-game, during the activity, and post- practice and post-game.

Instead of feeling pressure to conform as a student at the University of Georgia, I have found that being in college has made me value the importance of a higher education more so than I ever had before. During high school, my primary goal was to play well enough to receive a football scholarship. At that time, my focus was not on academics. However, since I've arrived at the University of Georgia, my entire concept of the value of a college degree has slowly changed. Rather than seeing just football in my future, I can now picture myself as a football player with a college degree. Consequently, instead of having a negative impact on my personal growth, college has helped me broaden as a person.

As a child, I was taught that with hard work and determination I could achieve anything. Unfortunately, this is a myth, and limitations are a part of being human. I was forced to accept this reality during my junior year of high school. Ever since I was a little girl, I looked forward to playing varsity basketball on the orange and black court at Dalton High School. Finally, during my third year of high school, I was given the chance to start as point guard on the girls’ varsity basketball team. Suddenly, my dream turned into a nightmare, and I was sitting on the bench watching other girls play the game I loved. Gretchen Wald, a teammate, was experiencing the same problem. Luckily, she remained by my side throughout the experience. Together,

Growing up an athlete I had always been in above average shape. I was a healthy weight with toned muscles but, like most teenagers, I was eating garbage. I loved cheeseburgers and ice-cream and everything in between. For years I was telling myself this diet was ok due to the fact that I worked out. It wasn't until my sophomore year when I stated wondering how great I could be if I ate correctly. I decided to get a food tracker app and count calories. I was going to stick to a strict eating plan making sure I was only eating 1200 calories a day and eliminating snacking all together.

Many student athletes at Kennedy have played a sport throughout all four years in high school, and many don’t plan to continue their experience after they graduate. Towards the end of high school, student athletes are faced with the dilemma where the high school sport they have played, will be continued in college or parted with.

There are several reasons why I am athletic. The ways I am athletic and stay athletic is through training and playing football, basketball, and baseball. First off, I train to get into shape. I do push-ups, sit-ups, pull-ups, and many other exercises like that. Also, I practice all the different sports and do different workouts to get better. The first sport that comes around is football. I play quarterback and linebacker and have been very successful. The past two years the teams I have been on haven’t lost a game! Next, is basketball, and it is my favorite sport. I have played it for all my life and still play it today. I play point guard and I like to shoot. During my basketball years, I have made many buzzer-beaters and

As a little girl, I was the child who would never let go of my parents. If anyone ever glanced over at me they would catch me either wrapping my whole body around my Mom's legs or begging my Dad to pick me up and hold me. Even worse, if any adults dare took the chance to come over and talk to me I would hide my face, thinking they couldn’t see me so I would never have to talk to anyone. I was shy. Simple as that, talking to people was something I feared the most.

As an individual who has an appreciation for the game of football, nothing would be more thrilling to me than playing under those Friday night lights. As a child, I had idolized the players from my home town football team. I’ve always dreamt of one day being in their shoes, playing in front of a crowd full of people. Once I began my high school football career, I was very eager to play Varsity. Little did I know, from freshmen to junior year I would be plagued by injuries that would not allow me to participate. I was on the verge of giving up and quitting football altogether. It would have been simple for me to give up, but I was not going to let my childhood dream and years of commitment go to waste. My senior season, I was able to conquer

Even with all these insecurities in volleyball I decided to try out for my high school team. I wanted to play as many sports as possible in high school and figured what better way to start off my career than with a sport I became slightly familiar with in middle school. Volleyball camps and tryouts began a couple of weeks before the beginning of my freshman year. I started with the camps thinking it would help me gain skills that would help me in tryouts. The camp definitely helped but I shortly began to realize that this was way more serious than any volleyball I had participated in before. I realized I was going to have to put in a ton of hard work if I was going to succeed in making the team because I was not only going up against other

Ever since I was a little kid basketball was my life and I absolutely loved it. From going to 1st grade camps, and looking up to the high school coaches to becoming one of the coaches. I always loved everyone on my team and made many long lasting friendships from basketball that I still have today. My freshman year or sophomore year had to be the best years of all. I got voted captain both years and was both competitive and driven. I wanted to play college basketball so badly and was going to do it. My ACL and MCL injury impacted my mental and physical health in both positive and negative ways.

I believe that most of my professors would look at me and think that I am active, but I think that they would be surprised to know about my football career. Having the chance to play professionally for the Canadian Football League, while taking 19 credit hours, would be something that they would probably be surprised to know about. In terms of traits, I think that they would find it somewhat surprising that I am naturally a shy person. In class, I like to stay active in conversation and participation because we may potentially be graded upon this. Outside of the classroom, I am typically more reserved. I am usually more focused on things that I need to get done in order to succeed, as opposed to joining a group of people for coffee and chatting.

I am student-athlete at Truman State University. As I student at Truman, I have taken part in various efforts to make the campus more culturally inclusive by being actively involved with the Multicultural Affairs Center (MAC). I led the MAC’s efforts in organizing and planning the opening and closing ceremonies for the Martin Luther King Collegiate Challenge.