Owen Wright Still Working Toward Recovery

Owen Wright finally entered the water last week to belly ride a wave in and it brought into focus just how much the traumatic brain injury at Pipeline in December 2015 has affected the former world title hopeful, according to a story on ABC News Australia.

Sharing my journey – I went for my first surf a couple days ago. It was the funnest thing in the world. Funny thing is… i couldn’t get to my feet. So I just layed there. It was about knee high and the drop was.. well there was none but it felt like I was dropping into 10ft teahupoo. I finished the wave and I was so stoked I let out a hoot and claimed it and high fived kita. 5 mins later I was on the beach and started to think about what I actually did and started comparing it to what I used to be like or what everybody else was doing out there… and started to question why cant i….this I found started to ruin my experience and change how I really felt. It made me realise that ……self improvement is necessary but to focus on camparison of what used to be, what others can do or why you’re not good enough is detrimental to the now; negative emotion in your self will hinder improvement and happiness. Simple statement …. challenging to practice

A photo posted by Owen Wright (@owright) on Mar 22, 2016 at 5:55pm PDT

Wright is reportedly working with top specialists who have told the surfer that it may be a “long time” before he feels “normal again.” We hope his recovery continues to go well and look forward to seeing him back in the lineup even if it isn’t in a competition jersey.

[Link: ABC News]