Assignment 21 - Averi Ricks - Hurting My Shoulder

This past volleyball season, I hurt my shoulder while serving. Right after, I could barely lift my arm to set the ball, which was a huge issue because I'm a setter. I was able to set normally again after about a day, but I couldn't hit or serve. I thought that it was just something I could shake off and that I'd be back to serving and hitting in no time, but instead I couldn't do either for about two or three months. Not being able to serve sucked because it meant I got a little less playing time and I also couldn't practice my serve, which I had been working on a lot at the time. Not being able to hit also sucked because hitting is really fun and I always hit every chance I got. I got pretty discouraged during these months because it was really annoying having to ask people to serve for me during drills and I wasn't able to hit when there were chances for me to. I had been going to the athletic trainer before every practice to work with him, but eventually I had to start going to actual physical therapy twice a week to work on it. In the beginning, I would serve at least once during practices to see if it had gotten better, but of course it never did. I had to learn to be patient, because my eagerness was hurting my shoulder more. As I'm dealing with my ACL tear now, I'm telling myself to be patient and not try anything out of my current abilities because I don't want to set myself back any further like I did with my shoulder injury.