No more pain and suffering in silence

“I thought as an athlete I better not complain about pain. That’s a massive part of being successful in sport – coping really well with being in physical pain. I thought ‘I can’t talk about my pain because then I’m weak’.”

These are words spoken by New Zealand Cycling Champion – Kirstie Klingenberg – in an article which looks at her journey to an endometriosis diagnosis, whilst pursuing an elite cycling career.

Pain and suffering are a big part of sport. Even my own relationship with running – which I do as a hobby and for pleasure – often involves pain and suffering! In elite sport, this is magnified even further.

To reach the top an athlete will push their mind and body to the limit and, inevitably, a degree of pain and suffering is part of the deal – it’s part of getting faster, stronger, fitter. However, it absolutely does not mean that all pain and suffering should be normalised or even celebrated as part of an athlete’s journey to their best performance. In sport, we have to stop placing judgement on women’s health issues and, instead, raise the standard of support and care of female athletes around health, wellbeing and performance.

The silence that has long surrounded female-specific factors, such as symptoms of the menstrual cycle, breast pain or pelvic floor dysfunction, is largely because female athletes don’t want to be judged as weak or inferior to their male counterparts. It’s that judgement, and the subsequent silence, which perpetuates the shame and stigma surrounding these topics.

Let’s remove the stigma and get talking

How do we create an environment in sport which feels safe and free from judgement – an environment which allows girls and women to openly discuss female-specific factors before they become the reason she misses training, loses confidence or, worse still, leaves the sport? It’s what we call a ‘psychologically safe environment’.

In 2012, Google set out to find out what makes a perfect team, code-named ‘Project Aristotle’. After years of analysing data and interviews from more than 180 teams across the company, Google found that the foundation of a high-performing team wasn’t as much to do with the skill level of each individual, but was largely dependent on the environment and culture within that team – which they described as psychological safety. Simply put, a psychologically safe environment is one where people feel safe to take risks, experience failure and be vulnerable in front of one another, all without the risk of shame or judgement. Research which translates these findings from business to sport demonstrates that creating psychological safety facilitates athlete learning and engagement, improves athlete wellbeing and reduces athlete burnout.

So, here are my top tips for creating a psychologically safe environment for female athletes…

1. Build your confidence

One of the biggest barriers to conversations, particularly around female-specific topics like periods, premenstrual symptoms, urinary stress incontinence, is a lack of confidence on both sides. For example, the male coach lacks confidence because he may not know enough to be able to have a useful conversation, and the athlete lacks confidence in the male coach’s knowledge of female-specific topics. This usually results in a permanent avoidance of any discussion and silence is not a good foundation for a psychologically safe environment! No one has to become an expert on hormones or pelvic floor function, but an awareness of these things and how they influence women in sport, and even knowing the right words to use, gives everyone confidence to be more open to the conversation. See our course Active Women: The Essential Knowledge.

2. Use empathy

It’s really hard not to cast judgement when you don’t have a lived experience of what someone else is going through. I’ve heard female coaches say, “I always trained through my period pain, so why can’t my athlete?” and I’ve heard a male coach ask, “Heavy legs – really – are you sure she’s not just being lazy?” Because all menstrual cycles are experienced differently by every woman, it’s really easy for other women to judge because what the other is describing isn’t their own lived experience. And for men, who have no lived experience at all, it’s often even harder not to place judgement on something they don’t understand.

That’s when trust and empathy come in. If an athlete tells you she can’t get out of bed because of menstrual pain, you need to think about a time that you’ve been bed-ridden with an ailment, and then you’ll be able to reply, “That sounds awful, I hope you feel better soon. When you do, I’m sure we can work together to find something that might help”. When an athlete is missing her lap splits and tells you that she always feels bloated and heavy on this day of her cycle, surely the best thing to say is, “Let’s work on something else today, and leave this session for a couple of days when you’ll really be able to get the benefits from it”, rather than chastising her for being a slow-coach.

3. Don’t go in ‘cold’

I bumped into an athlete a few days after I’d delivered an education session to her coaches about the impact of the menstrual cycle on performance. Before I even told her I’d been there she said, “Did you do a session here last week? Because the day after, my coach came in and started asking me about my cycle and periods, completely out of the blue”. It doesn’t matter how good your relationship is with someone – it may be your daughter, a fellow athlete, or an athlete you are coaching – this stuff is often intimate and private information. These topics are taboo at the best of times, and for athletes wanting to appear strong and capable, they can find it even harder to talk about. My tips are to have a ‘soft launch’ of these conversations by sharing a relevant podcast or an article – maybe even this one! It demonstrates that you are open to learning and talking about these topics. And it gives you a common reference point from which to start future conversations.

4 .Be prepared to be vulnerable

You might get the words wrong, and the first time it might be embarrassing. Vulnerability is an amazing gift. If you start with, “I might get some things wrong, but I’d like to try and help you with this”, you’ll get a double whammy of demonstrating a growth mindset for yourself, as well as making that athlete feel safe and supported.

5. Use role models

Using role models really helps influence how open athletes are when it comes to sharing female-specific factors that are affecting training and performance. I often find that older athletes, who are more comfortable in their skin, can often help model the sorts of conversations we want athletes to be having with a coach, or with each other. When an athlete openly says to their coach, “If I look a little flat today it’s because I’ve got really heavy legs – sometimes I get that the day before my period”, and the response from the coach is positive and supportive, it shows others that this is a safe space to share that information, and it will have a better outcome on training. Or when an older athlete shares her own experiences when it was difficult to receive feedback in the days before her period, or the strategies she found to alleviate problem symptoms, it creates a safe and supportive space where athletes can share, learn and grow together.

By creating a psychologically safe environment for female athletes, the more you’ll be able to normalise the conversation around female-specific factors which may impact their performance. And, with honest and open conversations it’s a chance to understand so much more about the female athlete, work out ways to overcome the challenges they face and realise their true performance potential.