One in four college students live with a mental health disorder. Many of us have, or know someone who has struggled with depression, anxiety or stress management. As part of Mental Health Awareness Month, women's basketball sophomore Jordan Sanders shares, in her own words, her personal experience to help break the stigma about one of society's most pressing issues.



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Imposter
Written by Jordan Sanders

We wear these masks to make everyone else feel comfortable.
 
People are often uncomfortable with the intangibles; feelings, thoughts, the mind, love, faith, hope, ideas, anything abstract. It's often hard for people to understand the things they can't see. Mental health is one of these intangibles, as it is undetectable by the human eye and not perceptible by touch. Because of this, mental health is commonly overlooked especially when compared to one's physical health.
 
As an athlete, physical health is very important. A healthy body is needed to meet the rigorous demands of your respective sport. But what about a healthy mind? Being a women's basketball player, I have experienced first-hand the mental strain that can come about in athletes in their endless efforts to meet not only the demands of their sport and daily life but also the expectations of coaches, teammates, mentors, family, peers, spectators and even oneself.
 
My Experience
Most of my life it seems as though I've been getting praised for my talents and receiving athletic honors with no idea as to why I was getting them. "I don't deserve this" I would tell myself or "you're not actually that good." Early on, I had engrained these ideas in my mind for reasons totally beyond me. My therapist blames it on Imposter Syndrome while many others just believe me to be ungrateful and unappreciative, but I now know that I have just been hurting. The way I present myself doesn't always actually represent how I'm truly feeling. Nobody ever really knows how I'm feeling. It's not uncommon for those that are hurting to act totally different than they actually feel, which is why for many, it doesn't make sense for people with the lives that many dream to have, to struggle. If they're acting ok, then they are ok, right? No. I was 16 years old when I was diagnosed with Clinical Depression. From an outsider's perspective it makes absolutely no sense for me to be depressed. To feel sad, lonely and not good enough for anybody or anything. I'm playing basketball at the level many wish they could and doing many things that I know many people from my hometown of Springfield, Missouri wish they could be doing. It took me a long time to actually accept that I was struggling and to accept that it is ok to not be ok. I've been through many ups and downs the past few years but I've still been able to be successful in school and basketball. But with the success came many more incomprehensible problems.
 
Of course life isn't perfect, but my life has been generally good. As I started to become more successful I started to become more depressed, developing anxiety and eventually isolating myself as to not be bothersome to people. Because that's what I thought I was, a bother. I was struggling in silence, I thought I could never tell anyone about how I was feeling or what I was thinking. Not because I was ashamed but because I just did not understand, so I put on a mask as not to bombard anyone with my problems, my existence.
 
The Mask
As an athlete I've always been taught not to show emotion, but to play with a type of inner anger or intensity, all while keeping composure with the expectation to remain stoic in the face of anything upsetting. Along with this, many involved with sports preach the importance of being present, being present refers to forgetting about everything but your sport during practice and while competing. Almost every day I am expected to forget about everything but basketball, during the 3-hour time slot of practice as well as the occasional 40-minute game period. Through my participation in athletics I've learned the unwritten rules for sports and for life. Out of habit I have begun to incorporate the rules of sports into the rules of life. While some are very useful in life, others are not.
 
There are certain things you do in your sport that you can't or shouldn't do in life and vice versa. It's common for things to only be applicable in certain situations and this was something I had to learn to decipher. I've been a part of a sport since I was four years old, and it has become a big part of my life. As a result of this I've taken so much of what I've learned through sports and applied these things to my life. Some of this has been very helpful while some of it has not and may have even been hurtful. I did these things all in an effort to maintain society's image of what I should be like, unknowingly allowing this "image" to define me.
 
The Image
There's a certain "image" that all athletes are expected to fit and someone with anything less than perfect mental health does not fit that image. Speaking on athletics in particular, negative mental health status is rarely ever talked about and often looked down upon. In sports, character is judged by "mental toughness" and many are often considered mentally weak for expressing emotions that don't mesh with the somewhat unwritten rules of emotional expression in sports. It is the expectation that athletes have it all that prevent many from reaching out for help. Mental Illness or any kind of mental distress does not fit the image of the athlete, the "jock." The idea that the athlete with the perfectly honed body and accompanying skill is in some way imperfect does not mesh with societal expectations. So, many athletes suffer in silence, they play ball, swim, jump, and run but inside they are not whole, they are hurting, I was hurting. This lack of wholeness, this hurting often goes unnoticed.
 
The Business
It's no secret that athletics is run like a business. Many benefits come from the success of individual athletes and entire teams and organizations, causing many to become so focused on performance that the mental health of many athletes is easily overlooked. With this sort of business comes the actual work, athletes being the ones who bear most of the workload. As an athlete I know how easy it is to fall into the routine of "the business." Eat, practice, sleep often seems to be the most common routine. With getting stuck in this routine it's often hard to take the necessary time needed to check in with yourself. As you are so preoccupied with your sport, as well as meeting the expectations of coaches, mentors, managers, spectators and even yourself. From an outside perspective many athletes are viewed as entertainers or a means of receiving benefits for higher ups rather than actual people.
 
Removing The Mask
Sports culture is not conducive to mental health. While mental health itself is intangible, making it hard to understand, it should be given more of a physical presence. Because of sport cultures lack of recognition towards mental health, many athletes feel they can't speak up about how they're actually feeling to avoid looking "weak." So much focus is put on the athlete's performance and physical health that their mental health is seen as less important. Physical and mental health are equally important and it's time that everyone recognizes this. While more recognition doesn't necessarily mean every athlete that is struggling will open up, it will likely allow many to feel more comfortable sharing their struggles.