I was a Stanford women’s basketball player when I experienced a mental health crisis. Here are four things that need to change in college sports.
Stanford soccer player Katie Meyer recently, the anger I felt broke my heart. Our stories and experiences are not the same. But I do know what that moment of crisis and panic feels like.
Rooted in my own experiences, here are four things that universities and everyone else who works in college athletics need to do to support student-athletes.Athletes train to perform, compete, and thrive under pressure. This pressure doesn’t go away outside of training and competition. In non-sport environments, the ability to perform under pressure mutates into an internal pressure to perform all the time.
Anyone working alongside college athletes should consider these nuances in the way identity, pressure, performance, and mental health concerns are intertwined. Take a step back and examine the standards, expectations, and procedures that you hold your athletes to.
There is a common notion that those who are in therapy or seeking treatment already are in crisis, which isn’t true.