In the September 2025 Bark survey, more than a third of injured athletes—36 percent—make their return before they’re fully healed. The pressure of performing to the best of their ability and contributing to a team when an injury happens can have an underlying pain that lacks the same support and recognition as the physical one.
When athletes have long-lasting injuries, making the decision of when to come back and when to stop becomes a risky game. Junior Julia Povio has been on varsity tennis since her freshman year, being in the top five seeds every year. She has been a staple player for the team. When she had a skiing accident her sophomore year, resulting in a partial anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tear on her right knee, Povio started a long journey of physical therapy to heal in time for her junior tennis season.
“We were playing [at practice] and my knee buckled again, and it hadn’t buckled in two or three months,” Povio said.
The recurrence of her injury resulted in Povio having to answer the question many athletes find themselves facing: the choice of helping her team or helping herself.
“I was leaning towards being there for my team more than myself. That pressure of wanting to be at practice, and wanting to play and be in matches, made me just keep pushing through it, making my knee weaker and weaker,” Povio said.
For athletes like Povio, having to step away from the sport is more than just missing games. It’s missing a part of their identity.
“I have been playing tennis my whole life, tennis has always been my identity, so it’s really scary to think that I could just be getting worse, and not being as good as I always have been. It’s a difficult thing to process.” Povio said.
Junior Hunter Stein is in his first year on the varsity football team. With the whole season ahead, Stein had his shoulder hit by someone in practice, slightly tearing his rotator cuff, ultimately taking him out of playing for the past two months.
Getting injured just days before his first game, Stein acknowledges the emotional pain that accompanies the injury.
“Getting injured affects [me] because I know what it feels like to be in the game, and it was really fun to be playing, and I want to get back to that,” Stein said.
The support that athletes get with the physical pain that comes with an injury often isn’t the same when it comes to the mental injury that occurs as well.
“There’s definitely some mental challenges in [getting injured], just getting through the day, knowing you can’t play and just have to watch,” Stein said.
Stein felt as though the line between wanting to be the best an athlete can be at a chosen sport while taking care of oneself can become blurred, often leading to worsening prior injuries.
“I’ve been trying to play through [my injury], but it just keeps getting worse,” Stein said.
The continuation of this pressure to perform, even though injuries don’t just hurt the athlete for the time they are playing their sport, carries on with them, with prior injuries recurring and setting them back with long-lasting pain, noticeable through everyday life, even after the season is over.
