Getting Hurt

On June 28th my whole entire world was flipped upside down. This day changed life as I knew it and sent me into the world of the unknown. Friday started out just like any other summer day. I had lifting in the morning with a bunch of my friends and teammates. After that I went to lunch with one of my friends and hung out before having to head the fields. I was so excited because this weekend the tournament was in Rochester. Many of my friends and family were going to come and watch me play because we rarely get the chance to play this close to home during the summer.

The Danes typically do not start until after Father's Day weekend so I had the opportunity to play with the Royals in a few early season tournaments.  Several of my former teammates still played for them so I wanted to watch them play this weekend if I got the chance. I headed over to McQuillan Fields because the Royals were playing before I had to warm-up. Even though I was not playing with them I still went in the dugout to hang out with the kids on the bench. I love bantering back and forth with the girls I have played with forever. Soon I had to go to a different field to start warming up for our game. I was feeling amazing during warm-ups. The past couple weeks I had been seeing the ball very well. In the previous tournament in the Quad Cities I hit five homeruns in five games. On the season I was averaging one homerun per every three at-bats. You could say that I was on a hot streak that I really wanted to continue.

The rest of pre-game was the same. We ran through all of the same drills and were ready to play. People from this area have always questioned why I chose to play for the Danes instead of a large program like the Sting. Playing this close to home I wanted to show them how good we were and why I love playing for the Danes. Finally getting this chance I was so excited to get out on the field. I was the lead-off hitter in the top of the first. I was walked on five pitches so I jogged down to my spot at first. On the fourth pitch of Abby Klopp's at-bat I was given the steal sign. When I slide, I slide hard, especially if there is someone blocking the bag. When I saw the shortstop coming across the front side of the bag I slid into her hard just like I had done so many times before. There was a big collision and she went flying backwards. I popped up to see where the ball went because I saw it sail over my head as I slid in. The throw had not even been close and the ball ended up in short right center field. Then I look down and see the shortstop still laying on the ground. The umpires call time for the game and the tournament trainer comes out to help her off the field. During this I jog over to my coach and notice that my foot does not feel right. When I made contact with the other girl the ball of my foot was jammed backwards towards my shin. It was pretty much numb and tingling but didn't hurt excessively. Based on my pain I thought that I had just sprained an

ankle like I had so many times in basketball so I tried to just jog it off. I returned to second and on the next pitch Abby hit a double to left center. Sprinting home my foot did not feel right so when I went into the dugout I asked for it to be taped. After being taped I tried to go out and play defense but it hurt a lot to plant on it after throwing. My coach decided to just sit me for the rest of the game, it was only Friday night and the most important day is Sunday. Once I took my shoe off to ice my foot inflated like a balloon. My teammate helped me out of the dugout and onto one of the picnic tables so that the trainer could look at my foot. Based on my pain they said that it was only a bad sprain, I may want to go in just in case to get it looked at but they did not think anything was seriously wrong.

I woke up the next morning and in between my toes was black and blue. On the inside arch of my foot there was a dark red line with bruising. It still killed to walk on so I borrowed a pair of crutches from my grandpa. After not being able to walk in the morning I decided to sit out the rest of the tournament. At the time it was frustrating but playing in the end of the season and nationals was much more important to me than just one normal tournament. Sitting out the rest of the weekend was torture. I don't like having to sit out for an inning or two to begin with, much less eight games because I am hurt. We made it to the Championship game after playing six games on Sunday. I was so proud of my team but I still wished that I could have been out on the field with them. Next weekend I told myself. I will be back and everything will be normal. Little did I know this is not how things were going to end up.