“This is your last chance. Go drop some time,” my coach said. One more shot. I try not to freak myself out. So many things could go wrong. I quietly remind myself that I deserve to be here. I’ve trained for this exact moment. But nothing can stop the doubt trickling into my mind to throw me off my game.
Anxiety is something for me, as an athlete, that controls me. I’ll work hard all season for everything to go down the drain because I struggle to overcome it. For me, when I have smaller swim meets and there’s not much pressure around them, I have an easier time dealing with my stress. However, when we get to our end-of-season meets, which typically end up being our biggest meet, I choke.
One of the biggest times my anxiety got the best of me was at the state swim meet during my freshman year. At the regional meet two weeks before, I was in the best headspace possible. I was motivated and ready to swim fast. Mostly because I knew I wanted to make state and I stepped up to the plate. However, I was very nervous to be at my first state meet. I was a freshman and it was super nerve-racking to swim against seniors, especially the fastest ones in the state. I was changing into my technical elite racing suit with my teammates and everything seemed fine. Then all of a sudden I ripped my suit. I started to panic. I had ripped it. My brand new tech suit. The other suit I brought wasn’t as new as this one. I started to get into my head about not having the tech suit I needed. This made me so nervous to swim. After I changed I went to warm up and I just didn’t feel good in the water. Instead of getting over myself and locking in, I let my anxiety control me. I ended up adding three seconds in my 200M which wasn’t fast enough to make it back to finals the next day. I had my 100 fly shortly after and with my headspace I knew it was not going to be good. Just like I thought, it went horribly. I added a second and of course, did not make it back to finals.
Even though I do struggle with anxiety, I have had times where I am able to control what is happening in my brain. I have found tricks and methods to deal with anxiety so that I am able to perform the way I know I deserve to.
One of the biggest things I have found that helps me be in control of my thoughts is having good people around me. Certain people in my life I view as positive lights and it helps me to surround myself with them. People who motivate, push and help ground me. When I am at a swim meet and hear my teammates talking negatively about what they have to swim or how they don’t want to be there, I tend to reflect the same behavior. However, when my teammates are positive and excited to be at a swim meet it helps me get in a “YEAH! Let’s do this!” kind of mood. Another thing I have found that can help take some of the nerves away is visualizing my race either right before I compete or in the days leading up to it. This takes away the bad thoughts of ‘What if I mess something up’. Having a race strategy ready to go is a big way to help me know what to expect. When I am stressing about a meet coming up before my actual race day, I like to read a book or do something to get my mind off of it. I find that when I am constantly thinking about a swim meet in the week leading up to it, I’ve thought about it so much that by the time I get to the meet, I am mentally drained.
After months of trying new things to see what works and what doesn’t, I have found my methods. It works for me every time now. At the end of July, I went to my biggest swim meet yet, and I did the best out of all of my meets. Learning about anxiety and living with it has been hard but being surrounded by people who want to see me grow and figure out how to conquer it, has completely changed my view on it.
Anxiety will always be something that is there for me. As time goes on, and I learn how to live with anxiety I notice small improvements in my performances. No matter how much it may try and control me, I will always fight back.