Injuries

As an adult skater, I often wonder whether we get injured more often than young skaters? In my experience, I would say yes... but I think part of it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. I am scared I will fall and hurt myself- therefore I fall and hurt myself. I wonder if other adult skaters have this problem?

In the first month of skating, I fell into the splits- I tore my groin muscle and ended up with a giant hematoma and a swollen leg for about 2 weeks. Luckily, with ice/heat/compression/pain killers... it wasn't that bad of an injury. Also, while I happen to injure myself in fairly spectacular fashions, none of my injuries are ever long-lasting (knock on wood!). Over the last nine months, I have fallen at least a million times. My latest injury is a growing chronic bruise on my right elbow/forearm- I have managed to fall on it twice in two weeks and I keep knocking it into things- ouch! Bruises I can handle, but they tend to make me fear the what if... what if something more serious happens the next time...

I think as adults, sometimes we tend to be more tense when we skate, thus when we fall, the injuries are more intense than younger skaters who I've seen literally bounce when they fall. It seems to be they don't have any fear- and it's a good thing! I've been working on my fear of falling, but it seems to creep up on me when I'm doing waltz jumps or left over right forward crossovers with speed. Those are the bane of my existence currently. Does anyone have any advice?

Tomorrow is my powerstroking class- the class I seem to fall the most in. I'm in class with a bunch of younger skaters who all skate so much faster and fearlessly... and I am constantly falling or almost falling. I count it as a success when I manage to not fall! So wish me luck... and any advice on how to get over my fear of falling would be much appreciated!