Falling Out of Love to Fall Back In

By: Kimber Hower

In light of recent events and the passing of so many beautiful souls, I could not help but feel sick. Sick because of the lack of change in our sports, sick of how people keep ignoring the problems surrounding student-athletes’ mental health, and sick that I have likely had similar thoughts and struggles as those who are no longer with us. From 2019 to 2022, I have gone through life changes on and off the lacrosse field. I have felt pain, heartbreak, and hopelessness. But I have also felt love, care, compassion, and the rarest attribute of athletics that some collegiate athletes don’t get to experience anymore: fun. In trying to share my story and put my thoughts and experiences into written words, I struggled to find the language. Then, I realized that it is because I had already written them. Over the span of a year, I wrote two separate letters to myself and for myself. The first letter was written at a time that I was so low, when I considered a way out, as many of these athletes are now tragically turning to. The second letter, however, was written during the time I began to feel love, trust, and compassion from those I was surrounded by. If you do not take much from this post, take this; a year can make all the difference. To my fellow student-athletes reading this, the system is broken; many of the people involved are broken; however, that does not mean you are broken too. Seeking help and taking a step away from the things that no longer made me happy saved me. Putting myself first saved me, and my biggest piece of advice is for you to try and do the same. You are not alone, you are worth it, and you are loved by so many. You may not see it now, as I once did not, but I see it now. And you will too. 

Falling Out of Love - 2020

What is love? According to Webster’s dictionary, love is “to feel affection or to experience desire.” In life, we come to love a plethora of things: people, food, places, art, nature, experiences, and in my world, sports. When people have something they feel a certain way about that is indescribable to most, we replace that speechless feeling with one word. Love. 

Growing up I have come to love sports: the community, the relationships it brings, the adrenaline rush, and of course, partaking in it. There’s no other feeling like it. To love a sport is to give yourself to it. You let it consume you with all the good and bad that come with it. This love drives you to want to work harder, to push yourself beyond what you thought you could ever handle. Because with the risk of giving up a part of yourself, comes rewards. Right? Not always. 

One can dedicate themselves to a sport. Be relentless. Have the fire to compete that few contain. But with this dedication comes trust in those around you. You put your hard work and love for the sport in their hands to do whatever they see fit with it. This can be used to make a player the best possible version of themself, or, it can break them. But what does break really entail?

Break: “to destroy the unity of completeness.” To break someone is to slowly take what they think they own. To piece by piece break them down until nothing is left. To break someone’s passion for a sport is to take the joy, the compassion, the competitiveness, and the most treasured thing of all, the love away. Each day you wake up comes a different symptom of heartbreak. Maybe it’s a lack of motivation. Maybe it’s sadness. Maybe it’s anger. And, eventually, maybe it’s resentment. You come to resent and dislike a sport that you spent a majority of your life loving and being a part of. Now that you’ve come to resent the sport, something that you feel defines you as a human, you come to resent yourself. 

Resenting a sport doesn’t happen overnight, it comes in bits and pieces. It takes time. Like breaking down a puzzle. With each piece being taken off the board, you begin to see the whole picture less and less, until one day you wake up and realize there is nothing left of the puzzle. There is nothing left to give. There is nothing left to cry or be happy about. There is nothing left to love. 

But the question is when the puzzle is gone, what do you do? Try your hardest to put the pieces back together so it somewhat becomes an art piece? Discard it and go buy a new one? Or stop playing the game altogether? Questions. All you’re left with are questions and the faces of all the people that helped you build that puzzle.

So you sit there at that table with those people that you love so dearly and decide. Do you leave the table and start a different one? Or do you stay and rebuild it?

Falling in Love - 2022

In describing the word “love” a year ago, I had to find a way to define the word. I now realize that I was going about it all wrong. Coming to this place I get to call home in upstate New York, I now realize love has a much different definition than what I had thought. Love, when truly felt, cannot be defined; it has to be a feeling. 

I read somewhere that, “love is when a person makes you see things that you didn’t notice earlier. Love is when a person gives a new direction to your life so that it helps you grow. Love is when someone helps you find beauty in the simple things. Love is when someone fights for you. The beauty of this word love is that it can never be defined. It can only be felt. It is the thought that you can literally give up everything just to see those people happy. This my dear, is love.”

In learning the definition of this beautifully endless word, I also learned leaving a table that is full of seats of people who don’t love you the right way is ok. It’s ok to walk away. In this, I realized that some people walk into your life for a reason, and others for just a short season. But those who stay, that is where the real love is.

Leaving that table for me was full of heartbreak and fear. The fear of starting over. But with the help of amazing coaches and others, I began to slowly put the puzzle pieces back on the table. I began to look at this beautiful game we play and remember why my 10-year-old self fell in love with it in the first place. When I think about lacrosse, I no longer feel pain and resentment, I now feel joy. I smile because I can now play it for the right reasons and enjoy what it was meant to be all along: a game. I look at this sport now and see coaches who have faith and love for me not only as a player, but as a person. And that is the most beautiful gift of all that I have found in these people: the gift of family. 

The puzzle is not yet complete. I can now confidently sit here and say that it is ok to start over when the pieces don’t fit. It is ok to search for something better, something that will bring you joy in your heart. 

To simply say thank you to these people I have now found is not nearly enough. It feels like such a little statement, a small sentiment, for something that means so much more to me. For now, those two words are all I have, because my team and I have unfinished business. The love we have for each other in this program is something not many others have, and I cannot wait to finish writing our story, my new beginning, with these people I get to call my family.