Traversing the Youth Sports Injury Landscape

“Injury is part of the sports package,” observed Carrie Jackson, certified mental performance coach (CMPC).

“When you’re privileged enough to call yourself an athlete, at some point there’s a good chance you’ll be going through an injury,” continued Jackson, an expert on the mental aspects of sports injury, during an interview for this post.

That’s a critical reminder for youth athletes and their parents. If you’re going to go into the kitchen, be prepared for the heat.

What can be done to prevent injury to young athletes and best guide them through the recovery process should an injury occur?

Let’s explore.

Overuse Injury Prevention

A common—and preventable—source of youth athletic injury is sport specialization, according to Jackson. Coaches, in collaboration with compliant parents, have turned their sport into a year-round commitment, which can lead to physical overuse injury, not to mention mental stress and burnout. Some young athletes are playing on multiple teams in the same sport during the same season, and/or playing several sports simultaneously.

Bad idea. Beware of the physical and mental hazards of such practices.

Sports injury expert Carrie Jackson, CMPC.

Source: Carrie Jackson, used with permission

“With the professionalization of youth sports, it’s become big business, and a lot of this is year around, so it’s all fed into each other,” explained Jackson. “The coaches are telling me (the young athlete) that if you don’t show up to practice, you’re going to get kicked off the team.”

“There’s a whole system that supports the idea that ‘(the coach’s) sport is the most important’ and you have to do it year-round if you want to have any chance of playing in college, getting a scholarship, or playing professionally,’” continued Jackson.

Many parents buy into this flawed and toxic system, believing that this is what they must do, signing up for year-round sport training programs for kids, some way too young for it. It is all well-intentioned, trying to ensure that they give their children every opportunity to excel, but it’s a dangerous endeavor.

“Before (in past years) it (sport) was very seasonal,” said Jackson, “so there were times for recovery and times to get into different sports. It was more well-rounded, both physically and mentally."

Not anymore.

Exercising Parental Sensibility and Authority

It’s time for parents to stand up for their children’s physical and mental health by refusing to go along with the sports-as-a-business specialization craziness. Let the coach know that they are not in charge of your child’s life.

The research is clear; kids are not physically or emotionally ready to specialize in a sport until 14 years of age at the very earliest, and—according to the research—it is the athlete’s decision to devote themselves to one sport, not the coach or the parents. Let the young athlete decide.

Parents can also limit kids to one sport and team at a time. Whatever sport is in season should be the commitment priority. Resist the temptation to sign up for multiple, overlapping sports. As for off-season training demands, let coaches know your child will be participating in a sensible, manageable way, especially if the child is playing another in-season sport.

Navigating the Stormy Seas of Youth Sport Injury

“Injury is not just a process of recovery, it’s a process of discovery.”

That gem of wisdom is from Irish professional mixed martial artist Conor McGregor. Unfortunately, parents can do things in a manner that interferes with both the recovery and discovery process.

“Kids are resilient,” Jackson observed, “but when they see their parents overreacting, they (the kid) think, ‘Oh, I’m supposed to be more upset about this,’ and how they feel about their injury and respond to it might shift—in a bad direction—all because of how the parents are reacting to the injury.”

If parents take things in stride, so will their injured athlete.

“I try to normalize what they (parents) are feeling,” explained Jackson regarding how she works with parents of injured young athletes. “This is your child, and your primary job is to protect them, so this makes sense what is showing up (thoughts and emotions), and one of the things to recognize is that this is your own emotion, your own anxiety, versus what your child is feeling. Manage your own anxiety so you can be open and be present for understanding what your child is experiencing.”

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Parents keeping their own emotions in check will allow them to respond constructively to the injury situation and not make things any worse than they already are. Maintaining an emotion-free perspective enables the child to effectively approach their injury.

Parental Coddling Perils

Obviously, parents need to be involved in their child’s injury recovery, but overdoing their involvement can interfere with both the physical and mental aspects of the recovery process.

“A big dynamic with parenting in general is helicopter parenting, and we see it trickling down to youth athletics,” Jackson said. “It’s all out of care and love, but not realizing that (parents) are interfering with the process of growth.”

Kids are naturally creative and resourceful. Know when to assist and when to let kids do it for themselves.

So much of the physical and mental recovery process is up to the young athlete, and while parents and other involved adults need to lend appropriate support, much of the process can’t be done by anyone but the athlete themself.

“Coddling leads to kids not being given the opportunity to flex their resilience muscle,” Jackson explained, “and resilience is very much what you need in those moments when you are injured. (Young athletes) have not been given the opportunity to do that for themselves because of the helicopter parent dynamic.”

Final Thoughts

Parents are instrumental in the prevention of sport injury and in supporting their young athletes through the physical and mental recovery process but understand the lines between what adults can do and what the young person must do for themself.

Help your budding Wayne Gretzky or Serena Williams avoid overuse injury by putting the brakes on overzealous youth sports coaches coercing you and your young athlete into the year-round youth sports training craziness. Also, one sport and team at a time, please. Avoid overlapping sports commitments.

Let kids decide to specialize in a sport, not you or some dollar-chasing coach or youth sports administrator.

When injury strikes, keep parental emotions in check. That will keep the injury in its proper perspective and not make things any worse than they already are for the young athlete. Be supportive in the injury recovery process but remember that the bulk of the injury process is up to the athlete.

Assist—don’t coddle—allowing your young athlete to flex and exercise their "resilience muscle." As 19th-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche put it: “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”