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Track and Field Athlete Intervention with Dr. Burt Giges

Host Hi Burt I understand we are about to see you working with an athlete. Can you tell me a little bit about the situation?

Dr. Burt Giges Yeah, Megan is a young runner who has been running for about 10 years. Six months ago she had a disk problem in her back. And she has been completely rehabilitated from that. And this is her first race after that injury.

Host Good, so let's go see how it works.

Megan Alright, can you come over here please?

Dr. Burt Giges Hi! Megan

Megan Hi!

Dr. Burt Giges How's it going?

Megan Not so good. I have my first race today, and it's been since my back injury and I am really nervous. I am much more nervous than I usually having before races. And I can't see to calm myself down.

Dr. Burt Giges When was the back injury?

Megan About six months ago.

Dr. Burt Giges And how's it now?

Megan It's completely healed and I have been training ever since it's been healed. And my training has been going really good but I haven't actually raced and competed since the back injury.

Dr. Burt Giges Any pain now?

Megan Absolutely no pain

Dr. Burt Giges So what is the nervousness about?

Megan I think a lot of it just am I going to be able to compete at the same level that I was before. And if I am not, what is that going to be like, if I can't stay up with my up the competitors that I used to be able to.

Dr. Burt Giges So before your injury you were competing to your own satisfaction, everything was going okay for you?

Megan Definitely!

Dr. Burt Giges Do you have a requirement of yourself that in this very first race you will get back up to that level?

Megan I guess not a requirement but I guess is a hope.

Dr. Burt Giges Hope is good, hope is good. But you do not think it's a demand inside yourself that you better do as well otherwise trouble?

Megan Probably not that critical.

Dr. Burt Giges Okay tell me one thing. Well what is the thought that you have in mind if you do not do as well this time as you did before your injury?

Megan If I do not do as good and I am going to be embarrassed. And people are going to be like well she should be competing the way she was before. And I wanted to be... what if I can't meet my own expectations and others.

Dr. Burt Giges And you people you care about, and are knowledgeable, are going to say she should be able to race this first race the way she raced before?

Megan Probably not.

Dr. Burt Giges But are you saying that?

Megan Yeah I guess yeah.

Dr. Burt Giges It doesn't sound like that. Who will make it okay for you to race this race to whatever level you can do it, even if it didn't match up favorably with your last race when you were tough physically?

Megan I guess being able to go out there and be completely focused. And in the zone that I like to be in when I am running. Or I am not feeling the pain that I am completely into the race. And its almost like I do not hear the spectators, I do not hear anybody around me. I am just... if someone is ahead of me, I focus I am going to get them. If I am leading then I focus on like increasing the gap behind me. And that has like the optimal place like to be when I am racing.

Dr. Burt Giges And you would like to have that experience now?

Megan Definitely.

Dr. Burt Giges And when you have a race and you have that experience you say nothing counts, everything outside the view is background, nothing is foreground.

Megan Right.

Dr. Burt Giges What would it take to make the past to injury background?

Megan Almost pretending like either it didn't happened or like when I am running like seeing that past as I am like running away from it.

Dr. Burt Giges Yeah okay but it did happen?

Megan Okay

Dr. Burt Giges But let's take your second thought that it's past and this race is going to be running the bad in the past.

Megan Right, almost like being spectator like the back injuries is like someone behind me, like I have passed it. I have already gone passed that, and seeing whole body completely healthy.

Dr. Burt Giges That great. Can you do that right now? Maybe you can close your eyes for a minute and can you see yourself passing the injury as you are running and having it fade into the background.

Megan I can like see it all disintegrate.

Dr. Burt Giges You see as disintegrating, fading into the background fading, fading, fading. And now can you bring your focus back to your race and whatever you look out when you are racing, runner ahead of you or?

Megan Yeah I can see myself winning, nobody is ahead of me.

Dr. Burt Giges Okay so you are going and nobody is ahead of you, and what do you focus on when you are in lead?

Megan Like the track ahead of me not looking right down, I am looking out.

Dr. Burt Giges Okay, so let that happen now, look out and can you give it what you got?

Megan Yeah I can focus on my breathing and like my arms are really relaxed.

Dr. Burt Giges And where is the injury?

Megan It's obviously not. I was not even thinking about it, I was in the lead.

Dr. Burt Giges You were not even thinking about it.

Megan Yeah.

Dr. Burt Giges Okay, you want to open your eyes now, would you like to take that review?

Megan I think so. I think that will really help like because I was just been thinking about the injury and its importance and that I had in my life. And having it not even there, when you said, "Where is it?" I am like, "I wasn't thinking about it".

Dr. Burt Giges If it should come up during the race, do what you did here, watch yourself passive and let it go back into the rest of the background.

Megan Okay I think that is good, I think I was denying the fact that was even there before.

Dr. Burt Giges Yeah that did not worry, because it was there.

Megan Right

Dr. Burt Giges Right because when you got something to cope with the injury, if it should come up and it may not come up.

Megan Right, and I guess I am less worried about that and more worried about it mentally just getting in my way of worrying about it.

Dr. Burt Giges Okay well now you know what to do?

Megan Yeah.

Dr. Burt Giges Alright I talk to you after the race.

Megan Thank you so much.

Dr. Burt Giges I know okay. See you later.

Megan Bye I think that it has worked with warming up.

Dr. Burt Giges Alright finish up, alright so long.

Megan Bye Burt. Thank you.

Host Well Burt how do you think it went?

Dr. Burt Giges I thought it went quite well. One of the things that came out of it was how creative an athlete can be without realizing it.

Host Yeah I know is how quickly she responded to, the different cues that you have given her and she just immediately went, yeah.

Dr. Burt Giges She was concerned that she wouldn't race in this first race after injury, as well as she had when she finished before injury. And the idea that she came up with when I asked her that how she might deal with her anxiety about that. She said if she could put it behind her, and that gave me a clue which I decided to follow up on and to concretize to make that in actual experience for her right here, right now. And so I had her close her eyes let her experience of running past the back injury. And the back injury receded into the past and that seemed to help her, make a little bit of shift.

Host Sure, I know it's in your writing you talk a lot about entry points?

Dr. Burt Giges Yeah, an entry point would be an opportunity where concerned here is the athlete saying something that looks like a point where you can go a little bit beneath the surface will help the athlete make a little bit of the shift in the perception of it. And her saying I want to put the past behind me was exactly for me an entry point. I said "Oh I am going to go with that. So I followed her and then I lead her into the guided fantasy.

Host At the beginning again it seem like you were changing meanings for her and doing some reframing?

Dr. Burt Giges Yes the first thing I repeated for her in a way that she could hear it instead as you say it was, if she expected herself to race as well in this first race back as she had before the injury. And she sort of qualifies it, and said yeah, yeah maybe not, maybe not. So I sorted softening of that of that then I know it would be okay to move forward. She wasn't stuck on that.

Host Thanks a lot for sharing your work with us.

Dr. Burt Giges Okay, good.