McKenna Braegelmann - University of San Diego Softball

The Words I Wish I’d Heard

I owe the sport of softball a lot, it has given me my best friends, my closest family and it landed me a pretty cool scholarship playing college softball in the beautiful city of San Diego. It has given me everything yet at the same time it has taken almost everything from me… even my life, on more than one occasion.

Throughout the years I have battled numerous mental illnesses. I suffer from PTSD, anxiety, depression, bulimia/anorexia, and suicidal ideation. None of this has been easy, but the most common feelings associated with all these illnesses are fear and lonliness. At the beginning, I had never felt more alone. I felt isolated from everyone in my life and felt that I had to hide this side of myself because no one would understand the pain I was in. I put on a face, the “ I’m fine” face, I attempted to be the light in everyones life so no one would feel the same way as I did. I struggled silently for a long time when I did not have to. I wish someone would have told me that.

I wish someone had told the scared, 14 year old me who had just been hospitalized for a skull fracture and brain bleed after taking a line drive to the head that she would be okay, instead of being told that she could die.

At 16 years old, I developed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I would suffer panic attacks while pitching. Flashbacks constantly filled my brain, and I was so afraid to pitch and to get hit again that I developed the yips. I could not throw a strike to save my life.

I wish I did not hear the words I had to ‘get over it’, or that I was ‘overreacting’ and being way too dramatic’. I wish no one told me that I was selfish for crying, or that if I kept that up I would not be successful at the next level.

I wish someone would have told me that developing PTSD and reacting to my triggers was not a choice. I wish someone told me it was okay to feel my emotions, it was okay to cry, it was okay to be afraid, to feel unsafe and more importantly it was okay to not be okay.

At 18 years old, I went to college, and got diagnosed with general anxiety disorder, I was afraid to use my voice, so I stayed silent. I was afraid to talk to groups of people, and since I was afraid to speak, my voice sounded shaky when I would. I would replay what I was going to say over and over in my head so that I did not embarrass myself by saying the wrong thing. I had a drive to be perfect, a drive to never make mistakes, to get perfect grades, to be great athlete, the best daughter and an amazing friend. In my head, failure was unacceptable.

I wish someone told me that in a game of failure, and in life, it was okay to make mistakes, mistakes allowed for growth, that they would make me a better person and player.