Injuries keep us away from what we love to do. Whether it’s running, lifting weights, playing tennis or soccer or any physical activity, it’s hard to sit on the sidelines recovering from an injury. As much as you might want to get back quickly, you must make sure you have fully recovered so that you don’t return from an injury too soon.

In this video, I discuss four potential risks if you return from an injury too soon.

Reinjury if you return from an injury too soon

If you try to push back before an injury has fully healed, you might just injure that body part again. A hamstring injury is a good example of an injury that is prone to reinjury. Make sure to take enough time for the injury to heal so you don’t set yourself all the way back to the beginning.

Longer time to full recovery

Often we see patients who try to return when they are at 60% recovery. They can play or exercise but not as well as they would like. By returning that early, they slow their recovery and end up taking even longer than it should have to get back to 100%.

Long-term issues

Many sports and exercise injuries are not serious and need surgery. If you take them seriously and do what you need to do to get over them, you can return in a few days or weeks. But if you ignore it, you could turn what should have been easy to overcome, such as tendinitis, into a long-term problem that could even need surgery, like an area of degeneration in the tendon – tendinosis.

Pain later in life

Probably the best reason to make sure you fully heal is to preserve your long-term health. You want to be healthy enough to play with your kids and run or lift weights in your fifties and sixties. Take injuries seriously now and do what you can to recover fully.

Also read:
Tips to recover from training and competition like elite athletes
Don’t increase your training too quickly
How can I fully recover after injury?