Competitive Tennis Gave Me Social Capital. It Also Gave Me Debilitating Anxiety.
This blog is published in collaboration with our friends at The Hidden Opponent!
I had my first anxiety attack at 13 years old on the tennis court. I was playing someone a year younger who I’d taken lessons with since age 8 at the private tennis club where I’d attended summer camp for almost as long, but this match was different. I couldn’t stop crying, my thoughts were racing, my heart was pounding, and I was uncontrollably shaking. Losing felt unbearably humiliating – like the absolute end of the world.
After I lost the match – trying unsuccessfully to hide my tears while playing on court 1 in front of bleachers packed with family, peers, and coaches – my mom came into the bathroom to console me. I vaguely remember her telling me these intense feelings were because of all the new hormones I had as a teenager. I took that to mean if other tennis players struggled like this, they hid it much better than I did.
My hometown was an upper-middle-class New Jersey suburb with high expectations. I began taking tennis lessons at 8 years old after my parents realized soccer wasn’t a good fit – I was afraid of both the ball and intense physical contact. I was naturally athletic and, over time, became a decent player but was certainly never going to “go pro.” So, my parents and I set our sights on the high school varsity team and, ultimately, college tennis.
I began playing USTA (United States Tennis Association) weekend tournaments around the tri-state area at 14 years old – first Level 3 and then quickly moving up to Level 2. I was the best female tennis player of my grade in town and gradually became known among my peers for my skill. I wasn’t popular, but I largely met the beauty ideal, had plenty of friends, and was respected for my athletic abilities.
At high school tryouts my freshman year – trying out for a women’s team that was coming off a Level 4 State Championship – I unexpectedly defeated one of the starting seniors and landed the position of third singles. Few freshmen started on my school’s varsity sports teams and the feat earned me lots of praise from classmates, teachers, and the other adults in my life.
Throughout my high school career, playing varsity team tennis and solo USTA tournaments to build up my sectional ranking before college, I continued to battle undiagnosed and untreated anxiety. The anxiety had bled into a variety of different components of my life – sports, school, interpersonal relationships, and music (I played the oboe), but tennis was the biggest trigger. At some point, I began to develop and engage in rituals to calm the unrelenting obsessive thoughts during matches. Before each point, I would walk in a counter-clockwise circle, knock on my head 3 times (to unjinx myself), tap my racket on the ground once while I swayed back and forth in “ready position,” and bounce the ball 3 times before serving.
Tennis, specifically singles, is a solitary sport. You’re the only person on your team. There’s no one else to sub in if you’re having an off day or to coach you into staying mentally tough. When you play well and win, this is great – you get to take all of the credit for your victory. But on days you play poorly and lose, there’s no one else to blame but yourself.
As I got older, it became less and less socially acceptable to start crying in the middle of a match (or even practice!) because I wasn’t happy with how I was playing – something my dad made sure I knew. There were absolutely players who were much more skilled, but often I’d feel like I was playing myself instead of the person on the other side of the net. I wouldn’t physically lose to my opponent – I’d mentally lose, unable to prevent my catastrophizing mind and uncontrollable emotions from careening off the deep end. Every match became a battle against a building anxiety attack. When I won, I’d feel only relief. Relief that I’d defended and preserved my dignity. Relief that I was a winner, instead of a wimpy, emotional failure. Just relief. Nothing more.
How could I have fun when my self-identity and self-worth had become interchangeable with my performance on the court? I had long stopped enjoying tennis. I enjoyed succeeding at something and receiving praise, admiration, and respect because of it. So, of course, I became emotional when I played poorly. There was so much more on the line than a simple tennis match.
I was recruited to play D3 varsity tennis at The College of New Jersey. The college was moderately small – around 5,000 students – and my freshmen peers and I quickly learned that you had to either join a sports team or Greek life to access the larger social scene. I didn’t make the starting singles lineup as a freshman but uncomfortably accepted a third doubles spot. I had no doubles experience but felt immense relief that I could continue to lean into my tennis identity as I navigated the brand-new environment.
Halfway through freshman year, I began to develop an eating disorder. I’d struggled with disordered eating and poor body image since early high school, but the transition to college was the final trigger. By the following spring, the illness had escalated and my parents had intervened – I’d been forced into therapy and seen a doctor who diagnosed me with Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (since renamed to Other Specified Feeding or Eating Disorder) and benched me in perpetuity for my low heart rate. A year later, I entered residential treatment and finally received the missing diagnosis of Generalized Anxiety Disorder. I was 22 years old and had been experiencing debilitating anxiety for 9 years.
My eating disorder came to serve many purposes. I’d originally begun using disordered behaviors in pursuit of health – something I knew I’d receive social validation for – but it also gave me an acceptable “out” from tennis. I’d unintentionally discovered a way to retain my spot on the varsity team without having to regularly defend it. I could blame someone else for not playing – it wasn’t because I was wimpy, ill, or a bad player, my doctor was just being dramatic.
Truthfully, it hadn’t even occurred to me that I could simply stop playing tennis after high school. Who was I outside of tennis? How else could I secure social capital at college amongst thousands of new peers I wanted to impress? How could I feel special; be respected and admired?
I briefly found some of that in the eating disorder – I was “good” at eating healthy (TW: weight loss), exercising regularly, and losing weight – but my body and, ironically, health were deteriorating. Consequently, healing from my eating disorder involved a lot more than becoming able to eat “unhealthy” foods and prioritize actual physical well-being over regimented exercise. I also needed to feel all my feelings without judgment (something I’m still working on), accept and manage my anxiety disorder, and form a new self-identity.
Today, 11 years later, I consider myself fully healed from the eating disorder. I also take daily medication for my anxiety and have a toolbox of healthy coping strategies to ride out the waves of big feelings that still occasionally rise. My relationship with tennis is also vastly different. I no longer play competitively, instead intentionally using tennis as a way to socialize and move my body. I’m even able to have fun!
I frequently wonder what life would’ve been like if I’d been diagnosed and treated for anxiety when I first began showing symptoms at age 13. Would I still have developed an eating disorder at 19? What would my tennis career have looked like? Would I have enjoyed college? Of course, I have no way of knowing what could have been, but I doubt I’d have become as empathetic as I am today. I also doubt I’d now give mental health talks, manage Project HEAL’s blog, or sit on the board of a suicide prevention organization. I am who I am today because of my mental health struggles; and, for the first time in a long time, I really like who I am.
