Injuries are great, amazing, absolutely totally awesome. I guess your all probably think I’m some delusional alcohol drinking, drug smoking teenager by making this statement, but with my personal experience in the area of injuries you will all see how great, amazing, absolutely totally awesome injuries can be.

My story begins in the winter of 2013 when we were all year 7, start of rugby season in fact, this was the start of it all, first broken bone, first torn ligament, first real pain I had ever felt. I remember this so vividly, it was in the first few minutes of the game and I took the ball into contact and got held up. The next thing I knew a boy about twice the size of me dived at the out side of my knee. Crack, crack, crack as my knee hit the ground while my foot was still planted in the dirt, I don’t think legs are supposed to do that. Three cracks in my leg, one in my tibial growth plate and two in my fibula. I described it as three sticks breaking in a row. I was in complete shock shaking on the ground and balling my eyes out. I remember them cutting my skins off to check my femur that was broken which I was very mad about because they were brand new, they even said that would by me a new pair. To this day I am still very mad at the fact that they haven’t. This was a serious break in a full leg cast for nearly 12 weeks and was on all the pain killers under the sun for about 3. Finally i got out of my cast and then slipped over on some ice with on crutches and tor my MCL which was no easy pain. But in saying that i don’t think that the pain was the hardest part of the whole injury it was the mental side of things, it was the fact that i had to mentally pick my self up off my ass and start to do some serious rehab. this was hard but it also became something i really really strive to do. I was so fired up and told my dad that after this injury i would become fitter faster and stronger then i ever was.

Year 8 was the best year of my life almost 1 year of full on rehabilitation and i was in great shape, at this stage i was second in the country at the 400m, i came second in the Otago cross country and i had made the Otago rugby under 65kg rep team when i was just over 50kg. After this year or two of my life my mind had changed for ever and now i do believe injury’s are great. What this injury did to me was not only gave me a very hard working and strong mentality but set my up for my future serious injuries that are bound to come.

Year 10, 2016, verging into spring. Rugby league. Nasty sport this one. This injury isn’t about how my mentality changed towards injuries and how it made me stronger. This injury is about how I turned into rugby weapon. How on bloody earth did an injury turn me into a threat on a rugby field, LIKE HOW!? well let me tell you a little secret about how to become a weapon then shall I, all you have to do is slip the AC joint back tearing some ligaments on the way and putting it in a sling for a few weeks with out putting anything back in place. What this does is it pushes the collar bone up and then sets there so have a really big strong pointy collar bone that sits up on the top of my right shoulder. As I said this injury turned me into a weapon in the rugby field like literally a weapon because it physically hurts people when I jab my bony shoulder into them while making a tackle.

Here I am right now, standing in front of you injured… once a again, knocked down… once again. Rugby… once again. 6 weeks ago I Ruptured tib fib ligament in my ankle pulling some bone out of place with lots of bone bruising and still getting stronger once again. It seems to be every injury I come across I build the ability to be humble, I gain more perseverance, more work ethic. These are qualities that are not only important in sport but also transfer into everyday life and transform you into a much more mature human being.

So in my personal experiences in the area of injury’s I have a hard working and strong mentality for future injuries and obstacles that will come in my future, I have been created into a weapon on the rugby field with a big old pointy collar bone and I have gained humbleness and perseverance that have translated into my life over the years. This is why I believe injuries are great amazing, absolutely, totally awesome. And if this doesn’t give you an excuse to life your life on the edge, so what you love and maybe get injured in the process I don’t know what will.

Cheers.