Young athletes in Qatar often struggle with identity loss and mental health challenges after leaving sport, but many eventually rebuild new paths and rediscover purpose beyond competition.
During the COVID-19 lockdown, many teenage athletes were left training on their own or waiting for in-person programs to return. Basketball player David Carmona, 21, stopped training for seven months altogether.
Before the pandemic, Carmona played for Al Rayyan SC, where he would board a team bus at his high school at 3:30 p.m. and eventually return home at 9:00 p.m. five times a week for five years. Since then, he hasn’t had a single hour of formal training and has only taken part in non-competitive matches.
When matches resumed in 2021, Carmona was moved from the starting lineup to the second and third units. In his first match back, Carmona said he walked on the basketball court with the mindset of an elite athlete and the body of a retired player.
“I was a shell of what I used to be as an athlete,” Carmona said. That game, he said, was when he decided he would no longer pursue a professional career.
“I felt like a huge chunk of who I am was gone, because to me, ball was life,” he said. “I kind of fell into a big slump of just not doing anything.”
Carmona’s experience reflects those of young athletes in Qatar whose athletic careers ended abruptly due to injuries, academic priorities, mental burnout or conflicts within the sporting environment that reduced their motivation to continue.
Psychologists describe this transition as one that can be associated with decreased self-esteem. Four of the six interviewed former athletes described lives in which social milestones were consistently traded for daily training. Three interviews revealed that educational transitions often became the natural endpoint to elite sport, as athletes struggled to balance sport with academics and were forced to choose their long-term career paths.
Identity crisis
According to Sahbi Ben Aziza, a handball coach at the Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) Academy in Qatar, the transition from athlete to non-athlete often happens between the ages of 17 and 21.
“Performance directly impacts self-esteem,” Sahbi said, adding that young athletes think to themselves: “If I play, then I am worth something. If I perform well, then I am respected.”
A 2019 study by the British Journal of Sports Medicine found that one in four of retired elite athletes experienced symptoms of anxiety and depression, highlighting the psychological difficulty of the transition.
Because the daily schedule of training takes priority over a young athlete’s social life, sport is their primary community, according to Sahbi, who added that an athlete’s closest relationships are often with teammates. Sahbi said that leaving the sports community and team support can lead to social isolation.
One former athlete interviewed said that he didn’t have friends outside of his training because he didn’t have the time to upkeep those relationships. Another interviewee said she had to miss birthday parties because her sessions ended at 10 p.m.
Carmona, the former basketball player, said he read self-help books and sports books, journaled and talked to other athletes in the same position to help him cope after leaving the sport.
He said he did not speak with his coaches about leaving, describing the decision as a mutual understanding.
“You should just let yourself feel it,” he said, referring to the grief he had about leaving the sport.
Carmona, and now a junior at Texas A&M University at Qatar, said his time away from basketball helped him realise his passion for engineering. “There are also other sides of me that I’ve kind of neglected,” he said.
But, he said, he still loves the sport. Last semester, Carmona joined his university’s basketball team.
Learning to Adjust
Marina Homsi, an assistant sports psychologist at Actonians WFC, said former athletes often move through denial and frustration as they learn to adjust.
Homsi said that the process can be isolating, particularly when athletes watch former teammates continue competing, noting that a support system of family and friends is crucial to the adjustment.
Their whole life is about sports, Homsi said, so many interpret the transition as personal failure rather than change. “It leaves many questioning their direction, especially when they are used to shaping outcomes through effort.”
Allowing space to feel difficult emotions is key to adaptation, she said. “Acceptance also often begins once athletes recognise that the skills developed through their sporting career, such as discipline, competitiveness and time management, can be transferred into new areas of their lives.”
Homsi said this period can allow former athletes to explore new interests and identities outside sport.
Learning to let go
Haya Diyab, 20, a former Qatari epee fencer, trained twice a day for four hours since she was eight years old. After placing last at the 2019 Arab Championship in Kuwait when she wanted to be in the top three, her disappointment only fuelled her commitment, as well as abandonment of her social life.
She said she rejected hangouts with friends, had fencing lessons during exam seasons, and changed her diet. But Diyab said the constant pressure and intense training left her mentally and emotionally drained.
After five years of this lifestyle, in 2024, Diyab decided to leave the sport.
In the first weeks, Diyab said she felt empty. “Fencing was the place where I would run away from school stress, anxiety, and anger.”
She said she viewed the time away as temporary, telling herself she would eventually return to fencing. But over time, even though she missed the routine, she began to appreciate the distance from the stress of elite training.
Diyab is now studying Global Health and Social Science at King’s College London. She plays squash recreationally and is part of the Qatari London Student Society, where she organises events for Qatari students and volunteers with refugees from Gaza.
“I believe that after starting university and moving to London, I also slowly started finding a new me,” Diyab said. “I know that it was the right decision for me.”
Pako Elseehy is a student journalist at Northwestern University Qatar whose reporting focuses on sports, human-interest stories, and visual storytelling through photography.