With the conversation around mental health becoming more prevalent, especially in sports and college sports, Texas State made the important decision to better support its student-athletes.
In the fall of 2022, the Texas State athletic department hired Dr. Emily Cabano as the department’s first sport psychologist to help student-athletes work through their mental well-being and sports performance.
The Texas State athletic department has worked with the counseling center for years and collaborated with them to create the position of sport psychologist.
Tracy Shoemake, Executive Senior Associate Athletics Director, explained, “We worked with the Counseling Center leadership to create this position while the needs for services have increased.”
A feature about Cabano that made her stand out in the decision to bring her on staff was that she is both a sport and clinical psychologist which Shoemake knows, “will cover all the needs of our student-athletes.”
Her extensive experience in education will also be able to benefit staff and coaches with the mental side of sports.
Cabano understands the athletic cultural implications and the pressures that athletes face because she was a gymnast at the University of Arizona. While there, Cabano and the team had a sport psychologist available to them that focused on team building, but she can now see how having someone available to focus on individuals would have been even more beneficial.
“I think that mental health and performance work are part of growth as a human being and growth as an athlete,” Cabano said. “It is always great to have somebody help you grow.”
Cabano moved into a coaching position at the elite level following her collegiate career. It was at this time when she noticed how much the mental side of sports impacted the athletes she coached. She felt that there was more work to be done, particularly with the long-lasting effects the student-athletes encounter.
While completing her master’s degree Cabano was completing an externship at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado City, Colorado. She got to learn from one of the preeminent psychophysiologist and sport psychologists in the country, Dr. Lindsay Shaw.
“It was an amazing opportunity and something that shaped the way that I work with athletes and the way I see physiology as an important area of intervention,” Cabano said.
While at the Olympic Training Center, Cabano also had the opportunity to get board certified in biofeedback and neurofeedback. The science of biofeedback allows someone to see a patient’s heart rate, breathing pace, skin conductance, how hot or cold someone’s hands are, and muscle tension through sensors. From these tests psychologists can teach athletes to regulate these things when they start happening.
Prior to beginning her work with athletes again, Cabano worked at the Madigan Army Medical Center where she did extensive trauma work in group and individual settings for active duty military service members. While the culture between athletes and service members is different, Cabano can see how the same principles of her work apply to both groups.
Cabano points out that student-athletes face the same things that students in the general population do.
“Athletic culture really emphasizes being strong, independent, and tough,” Cabano explains. “So sometimes you'll have athletes that are really struggling, but they are still going to practice and getting everything done. That's one of the main differences, I would say.”
At Texas State Cabano meets with student-athletes in individual settings as well as team settings. When working with student-athletes one-on-one the session is geared towards their specific goals which can include a combination of sports psychology and clinical psychology. When working with a team the sessions are more general, skill based, and more educational with a fun and lighter feel.
Cabano wants to let people unfamiliar with the collegiate athletics space to understand that there is intense pressure and demands, and athletes have needs like everyone else.
“My hope is that the work that we do improves their play on the field, but also helps them to be the person that they want to be and thriving in whatever career they choose.”
