Health & Fitness
Head Injury Hits Home, Puts Youth Sports in Perspective
Head injuries are a serious matter, whether concussed or not. Time is the best medicine. This is a couple of my experiences with my kids,
My wife and I are parents of two children that are athletes. That could be a scary stand alone comment in itself. As parents, we all hold our breath at any given time while watching our kids play sports. Some of us have allowed them to play "banged-up" or sick. GUILTY!!
Our son is a "retired" distance runner, now in college. Growing up he played Little League Baseball (I was his coach) , youth basketball and captained his cross country and track teams while in high school.
I once let him play with strep throat when he was 11 years old (he went 2-3 that day BTW.) He ran with sore hamstrings and vomited many times after his distance races.
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Our daughter is also fine athlete, playing the three major sports in high school (she is now a sophomore) soccer, basketball and her best sport, softball. In her first varsity softball scrimmage last year, she got hit with a pitch on elbow and was asked to come out by the coaches and she said NO.
I can count on my right hand, the times my son took a charge on the basketball court when he played in a high school division rec league. Many of those times, his head hit the floor. One time I remember him diving for a loose ball near the scorer's table and hit the metal table with his noggin.
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His freshman year he tried his hand at lacrosse. He never played it before that fall season, but being a good athlete and having speed, he was convinced by friends he would make a good lacrosse midfielder.
Ball skills were not his forte for sure. Picking up the ball could be a challenge, he needed to look down at the ground. Well one day, he looked down just a little too long.
Some experienced kid from a rival high school across town saw this and took the opportunity to just level my son. SMACK!!! I watched from the stands and waited to see how he would react.
He stood up and took two steps and went down to one knee. This was repeated until he made it to the sideline under his own power. WHEW!! I walked over and checked his pupils and he checked out fine, just a little PO'd.
Luckily he never had any symptoms of concussion.
Fast forward to this past Monday at our daughter's JV soccer game at the other rival cross town high school (there are three high schools in town.) She and one of her opponents were going after a 50-50 ball and collided. Our daughter, all of 5'1" and 100 lbs and the other kid, who is around 140 lbs both went down, but our girl fell backward and hit her head on the ground.
In a scene from 5 years prior, she rolled over, got up and took a couple steps and stopped and bent over hands on knees. Uh oh, not good!! She made it to the bench under her own power. I waited a few minutes to give her some time to recoup, than I saw her arise wanting to go back in the game only to have the coach point back at the bench. The right move.
I made my way over to the bench to check her eyes and they were the same as the others on the bench (yeah that was a strange request, but felt it was a good comparison) and the pupils were normal, WHEW!!
Our family doctor advised that she does not have a concussion (she passed all concussion tests physical and verbal), but the school is treating it as one. She has to go through some physical tests to determine if she can resume playing. No shortcuts. No arguements from us, only our daughter is complaining. She still has a small headache and her neck is sore. We are not rushing this. Our son never had any of these symptoms, this is new territory for us.
If it were a sprain, I'd say tape it up and play. If it were a cut, I'd say bandage it up and play. We are talking a possible head injury, and there is no way we are rushing this one, no matter how long it takes. No way.
I just hope all parents heed this advice for head injuries, it could have a lasting impact that the child will have to deal with long after they leave your house.