One day in dance class, the teacher asks the class to do a triple pirouette. Bri executes it perfectly, but this wasn’t so easy for Bri. Brionni Briggs is a sophomore at Rocky Mountain High School. She is a dancer, and she dances for the Rocky Mountain Diamond Dance Team. She has always danced since the day she can remember, but unfortunately, she tore her ACL at the age of 14 causing a stop to her dancing career.
Dance was Bri’s first love. At the age of 5 she started dancing and she fell in love with it. When she first started dancing at a studio, she loved it but as she got older, she slowly started losing her love for dance and it started building up stress on her. After a while, she decided that she needed a change. She then started dancing at Studio C. She regained her love for dancing. It didn’t feel like a chore to her anymore. But dancing for a studio was a big commitment. Right after school she would have to go to dance and practice for 2-3 hours, having hardly any time for other things like homework or school activities. It was a busy schedule for but she loved it, so it was very heartbreaking when she got injured.
In the winter of her 8th year, she tore her anterior cruciate ligament (ACL). It happened when she was on a ski trip with her family. She was having a fun time and decided she wanted to go on a jump. When she went on the jump, she landed in an awkward position causing excruciating pain in her right knee. She then thought it was a small tweak, so she continued to dance on it. For about a month she had been walking and dancing on it, but she was still in pain, so she decided that she needed to go to the doctor. After she got her MRI, she discovered that she tore her ACL. This was devastating for Bri, knowing that she couldn’t dance anymore made her extremely upset. However, Bri had the biggest support system around her. She said, “My biggest supporters were obviously my family. I spent a lot of time with them because I was always home and then I also had good friends who would help me get involved, even though I couldn’t do much.” After surgery she worked hard trying to recover because the only thing she wanted to do was dance again.
Bri started going to physical therapy as soon as she could. She started going to Rock & Armor and began working very hard trying to recover. According to Uchealth.org, “Although some exceptional athletes can return to sports in six months, a more realistic scenario after an ACL tear is a recovery time of at least eight to nine months.” Her biggest goal was to dance again because that was her passion. She didn’t really know life without dance. On physical therapy, she said, “It was interesting how they did it because I got to really strengthen my leg better than it ever has been and it took a long time, but it didn’t take as long as the doctor said.” With her determination and dedication, she was able not only heal her leg faster but also make it stronger than it ever has been.
When Bri recovered it was when she was about to start high school, and she really wanted to get back into dancing. She then heard about the Rocky Diamond Dance Team, and she thought that it would be a fun opportunity to join a dance team with all her friends. She still wasn’t ready to dance on it, but she talked to the head coach and got a spot on the team. She had to sit out most of the time, but she still loved supporting her team. She was having a hard time with mental blocks. She wasn’t sure if she could really trust her knee again. Bri said, “The first time I was totally clear to dance. It was hard to really trust my leg and do things even like a cartwheel but then after a while it just became second nature again.” Those mental blocks didn’t stop her from doing what she loved. She continued to work on her trust and ability with her knee because all she wanted to do was dance.
Her biggest motivation through her recovery was just getting to dance again. It’s what she loves to do, and she doesn’t know what she would do without it, and she has learned to be very grateful for the fact that she is healthy enough to dance again. Bri loves dancing and loves her team. Joining the rocky dance team gave her a second family and gave her the greatest support system she has ever known.
