One of a dancer's biggest fears is getting injured. Especially a major injury because it could stop you from doing the one thing that you live to do. When you are a student, taking time off from dance due to an injury can prevent you from improving as much. When your in a company taking time off due to an injury can be frustrating because when you take time off their is someone else stepping in and doing your parts. So, it's natural for dancers to fear that when they come back they would not get their same great parts because they already have a replacement. In most cases this doesn't happen, but every dancer has that fear in the back of their mind.
This year was my first time getting injured and I couldn't dance for three weeks! I can honestly say that it was not a fun process. One day I was in class and I could feel that I was having an off day. Certain steps weren't going as well as they usually do and I just wasn't feeling as strong as I usually do. We got to jumps and it was a pretty challenging petite allegro combination (petite allegro is a series of small jumps). Towards the end of the combination I landed on my right foot in a weird way. It hurt a little afterwards but not that much so I just kept dancing for the rest of the day. The next day when I woke up I could barely even walk and I couldn't even get through a full technique class! But we just started rehearsals for our annual winter show performance so I tried to push through the pain being that I didn't think the pain was that big of a deal. Towards the end of the week my foot and ankle were swollen and bruised and the pain started becoming pretty severe so I decided to go to a physical therapist to see what was going on.
When I went to the physical therapist she told me that I pulled a muscle in my calf and foot and then strained ligaments in my foot. She told me that I shouldn't have kept dancing on it because I just made it a lot worse. Because of the reaction my foot had to me dancing on it, the physical therapist told me that I shouldn't dance on it for about three weeks. When I heard this I was pretty disappointed in myself because what would've taken around one week to heal was now going to take take three weeks to heal because even though I was in pretty severe pain, I decided to keep dancing. I just kept thinking, if I wouldn't have done that one jump in class I would not be injured.
My injury happened on one of the worst possible times. Because of the time it happened I couldn't participate in two of the shows my class was performing in. This was really hard for me because I have never had to sit out of a show before, let alone two!
After three long weeks of going to physical therapy and rehabbing my foot, I finally got permission to start taking class again. But even though I could take class, I had to gradually get back into it. Only now I can get through a full class. Finally, I can focus on improving us much as I can and just get the most out of every class I take.
I wasn't the only one injured at the time. Quite a few of my other classmates were also injured at the same time as me. Our teachers are wondering why so many of us are getting injured. Personally, I think it is because everyone is tired. At the time most of us were rehearsing for First Friday, Winter Show, Nutcracker, and competition. When you are tired it is really easy to make a little mistake that you usually wouldn't. For example, landing in a weird way from a jump or a turn. Therefore, I think we all just need to make sure that we are getting enough rest and we eat foods that are going to fuel our body for our long and hard days.
Even though being injured was not fun and the recovery process was very tedious, I do not totally regret my injury. It taught me so much more about my body! It showed me what my strengths and weaknesses are and what to do to prevent further injury.
