On August 26th, 2022, my year was changed for the worse. As I started my first football scrimmage at my new school, I was injured on the first play. As me and my family raced to the emergency room, all I could think about was not being able to play. Ever since I was a kid, football was my whole life. When I wasn’t playing, I was training to play, and all I could ever think about was football. I didn’t know what else to do.

In youth sports, the aspect of the athletes mental health is underappreciated and overlooked. Nobody really even considered the athletes mental health, and always prioritized their physical health. This on-going issue lacks resources to solve it, and is only looked at at the professional level. In youth and non professional sports, coaches and teams only really started considering and taking this ongoing mental health issue seriously when 2 brave female athletes spoke and acted out against this. An article in 2021 written by Liz Clarke details Simone Biles and Naomi Osaka’s experiences, and breakthroughs with mental health. In 2018, Simone refused to return to the USA gymnastics training center due to a team doctor sexually assaulting her and numerous other young athletes. These assaults made Simone feel powerless, and ultimately led to her decision to not return. Following this incident, Naomi skipped the French Open's mandatory news conferences, citing their impact on her mental health. These brave women’s actions were described as an “a potential paradigm shift, forcing sports governing bodies to help safeguard athletes' mental health.” These breakthrough actions inspired thousands of other athletes around the world to speak up, and “sparked a discussion that is long overdue."

In relation to these athletes speaking up, it has sparked research to be done. Injuries in athletics were now known to have long lasting mental health affects, questioning if athletes were forced to play under bad mental health conditions. Playing under these conditions would be a major issue, questioning an investigation into youth coaches. An article in 2015 written by University Wire found a link between concussions and depressions.  The 8th most common injury was associated with a 3.3 fold increase in the risk of depression, a long lasting mental health issue. Also, injuries were found to increase athletes' risk of prescription drug misuse, which lead to long lasting addiction and misuse of other drugs in a 2015 article by SAMHSA. 

In Conclusion, youth athletes mental health is overlooked, and coaches who overlooked their mental health need to be trained to identify and respond to athletes mental health problems.

Works Cited:

Del Vecchio, Pablo. Sports and Mental Health. , 2015. ProQuest, proquest.com/government-official-publications/sports-mental-health/docview/2250295763/se-2.

Clarke, Liz. "A 'Wake-Up Call' for Sports and Mental Health." Washington Post, Jun 02, 2021. ProQuest, proquest.com/newspapers/wake-up-call-sports-mental-health/docview/2536053863/se-2.
"Sports and Mental Health: What You should Know: [5]." University Wire, Oct 02, 2015. ProQuest, proquest.com/wire-feeds/sports-mental-health-what-you-should-know/docview/1719342987/se-2.