I woke up on a Thursday thinking it would be a normal day. I got up and started getting ready for school, then came home and got ready for practice. In the car on the way to practice my dad was in a good mood, he had a big smile on his face and was talking to me the whole car ride.
   Heading to practice I was pretty excited because it felt like a nice day. When I got there the environment felt good. The gym was sitting there with the sun setting behind it and the bloomed trees next to it. My dad next to me was wearing his work jeans, and his work boots with a neon yellow shirt on and his face needed a little shave but his facial hair wasn’t too long. Walking into the gym I could tell that it was going to be a good day because not a single person walked in the gym with any bad energy, it was all positive for once.
   As I was about to do my skill my coach looked away and then I did it. As I landed it I felt something go wrong in my knee. As my coach was running over to me I couldn’t help but notice the fear in her eyes as she saw me lying on the ground in pain. Her eyes were big and her face looked scared, she was wearing black leggings and a sweatshirt with her hair up in a bun, as she was running over to me her sweatshirt was pushing against her and her hair almost fell out. Time felt like it was moving slowly for that moment but I knew something was wrong by just the look on her face.
   At the end of the practice my coach got my dad and explained what happened. Then going home I was in so much pain I knew something wasn’t right. My knee hurt super, super, super bad. The pain of it was so bad I couldn’t get comfortable just laying there on the couch.
   Early in the morning a few days later I had a doctor’s appointment to check my knee out. As he was feeling around I got super nervous. He had on a white doctor jacket with almost grayish colored jeans on, feeling around my knee.
   Days later I got the feedback back and they said I sprained my mcl. After hearing that news the thoughts in my head were going crazy.
After receiving the news that I had to do physical therapy I knew that I would be able to recover pretty fast. Physical therapy really helped because they showed how much your knee really does for you. My first thought walking into physical therapy was that I was nervous because I had never done anything like that before. So as I approached the building it was a small building that was pretty cold inside. The walls were red and gray for Ohio State, and there was working out equipment everywhere but it was still a clean place. The place smelled like lemons and cleaning supplies but it wasn’t a bad smell. But the place felt like a safe place because no one there had negative energy and they were all there to just help you.
   A few weeks went by and I was making progress but it was small. They said if I don’t try a little harder then it could really be a long time before I go back to practicing. There were long nights where me and my dad would just talk about my knee and how it’s really affected what I do and those conversations weren’t easy, because I just wanted to be back already.
   “You have to start pushing yourself a little harder because if you don’t then you will never make the progress you need,” said my dad.
   “Look I know that but it’s just hard to get over the fear of reliving my injury because I was in so much pain when it happened.” I stated.
   Nights like those weren’t fun for either of us. During the time of my recovery it was really hard to stay positive, because I just wasn’t making the progress I needed.
   “You need to start putting more weight on it and push yourself to do more so you can get out of your head about your knee.” the doctor said.
   “But what if it hurts too bad to do that?” I asked.
   “Don’t push yourself too hard to where you get hurt again but push yourself to the point where you're a little out of your comfort zone.” the doctor stated.
   Until one day when I was going to physical therapy I got good news. They said my progress was increasing by a lot all of a sudden. As I listened closely to the doctor say that I could feel the joy and excitement fill my body. That was honestly the best news I had gotten in a while.
After being able to do more stuff on my knee like jogging and jumping, I knew it wasn’t going to be long before I came back.
   Coming back to practice full time was really challenging at first because I was kind of out of shape from my injury. So some things were a little tuff. At one point at one of my practices I overheard my coaches talking about me just wishing that I would have pushed myself a little harder to come back sooner. With them saying that it really upset me but that also made me want to push even harder to prove to them that even an injury couldn’t stop me from being the best one on the team. In the evening during one of my first practices back everyone was so happy that I was back, it was a cool night with a pretty sunset and the garage doors were open letting in a nice breeze that kept us cool during practice.
   It was just a sigh of relief as I was finally back into doing what I love most. Sometimes as I was recovering I just wanted to give up but I just knew I couldn’t because I was almost there.