Concussions in football: The personal impact

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Former Lowell quarterback Kurt Monix survived his high school career without a concussion, he suffered three last year with Manchester College. | Jeffrey D. Nicholls~Sun-Times Media

Updated: August 19, 2011 6:55PM

Kurt Monix couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Watching the game film, he saw some guy wearing a No. 5 Manchester College jersey taking a handoff and picking up a first down. Then he saw that same guy haul in a pass for another first down. A play later, Manchester scored.

That guy in the No. 5 jersey was Monix.

And he didn’t remember any of it.

Monix had suffered a concussion earlier on the drive, taking a monster helmet-to-helmet hit to his temple while going for a pass over the middle. He was briefly knocked out cold.

And when he came to, even though the world was a little wobbly, he stayed in the game.

He’s a football player, after all.

“If I ever get hit hard, I get up as fast as I can to not show I’m hurt,” the 2009 Lowell grad says. “And the coaches saw me get right back up.”

Even when he got to the sidelines after the score, and it quickly became apparent something was very wrong — “I couldn’t even stand up straight,” he says — Monix thought little of it.

Take a few days off, he figured. Get right back out there, he assumed. Certainly not going to miss a game, he said.

He had no idea what he was in for.

The next few months became a blur of crippling headaches and major decisions, as Monix wound up suffering a frightening three concussions — two playing football, one while wrestling.

His quality of life diminished.

His grades suffered.

But his perspective grew.

“Through the whole experience, I definitely realize that education is your future, not sports,” Monix says. “Sports isn’t everything. It makes you realize you won’t be playing sports forever, and you need to worry about your health. If you asked me that question in high school, I probably would have given you a different answer.”

It’s a scary thing to endure a concussion, and the sometimes lengthy recovery process. To have blank spots in your memory. To struggle to focus on a simple television show, to get lost in your homework. To wonder if the world will ever stop spinning, if the headaches will ever end.

Every player’s experience is unique, but the emotional toll is almost always the same.

Pain and panic

Demetri Blanco was in a full-blown panic. Or, as he puts it, he was “freaking out.” In his rattled mind, he had just time-traveled — from just after halftime to the fourth quarter, and Andrean’s 21-7 lead in the 2010 Class 3A regional against South Bend St. Joseph’s had just turned into a 21-21 tie.

Blanco — who played for more than a quarter after suffering a concussion at some point after halftime (nobody knows for sure when) — had just snapped out of whatever “zombie” trance he was in, and couldn’t grasp what had happened.

“It’s mainly just a blur, but I remember coming to the sidelines and yelling, ‘What happened?’ I just didn’t understand.”

The 59ers called a timeout as it quickly became obvious something was wrong. While his father, Pete, tried to calm Demetri down, the Andrean athletic trainer shined a flashlight in his eyes and asked him to recite the alphabet.

Then they took his helmet away. The mix of confusion and anger overcame Blanco as he helplessly watched his team lost 28-21, like it has so many other athletes in his position.

“I definitely cried over it, it was tough,” says Blanco, who’ll play for Valparaiso University this fall. “I knew my team needed me, and I guess I didn’t understand why I couldn’t go back out there. To not be able to go out there and give everything I’ve got, that probably hurt me more than the hit and the concussion did.”

Frustration and fear

The immediate feelings of panic and anger usually subside as the initial effects of the concussion calm down. But the emotional toll of the concussion is just beginning. Frustration takes over, and it can last for days, weeks — even months.

Frustration at the lingering pain. At the dizziness and confusion. At the inability to do anything to expedite the healing process and get back on the field.

“You never want to miss time,” Monix says. “You’ll always do anything to get back out there.”

But Monix learned the hard way that he shouldn’t have been in such a hurry.

After suffering his initial concussion, he was largely symptom-free within a few days. A team doctor said it was up to Monix whether he could play, and he decided against mentioning the occasional headaches — “nothing serious,” he shrugs — and chose to play the following week.

He emerged from the game unscathed. Though he noticed on film that he was “sluggish.” His routes were sloppy, he was a step slow and he was making stupid mistakes he normally doesn’t make.

“I never put two-and-two together, though,” he says.

So he played again the following week. And on a simple screen pass, while trying to go down safely ahead of a tackle, he was kneed in the back of the head by a defender.

“Everything went numb for a second,” he says.

Yet again, he bounced back up. Yet again, he stayed in the game. But once he got into the locker room at halftime — and his coaches and teammates saw him staring vacantly into space, unable to put a sentence together, randomly wandering off mid-conversation — he was done. For the game. For the season.

Some figured for his career.

Some hoped for his career.

“I thought to myself, we really need to think about if this is worth it or not, to keep doing sports,” says Monix’s mother, Ingrid. “I know he has the passion for sports and he wants to be out there. And I know a lot of NFL guys take hits like that, too. But they’re playing for money, they’re playing for a living. Kurt wasn’t.”

But Monix still wasn’t willing to give up sports. Even as his homework became harder. Even as his impeccable grades suffered. Even as he spent much of November and December keeping a lengthy journal of every headache he had.

Some were regular “take a Tylenol” headaches. Some weren’t.

“The concussion headaches, it was a nerve on the right side of my neck, all the way up my ear to the top of the eyebrow on the right side,” he says. “It felt like my head was in a microwave. The pain was unbelievable.”

Monix finally shut it down for good after suffering a third concussion during his first wrestling match of the season, taking a run-of-the-mill thump on the head. He decided to take the rest of the year off to give his brain and body time to fully recover.

But he’s returning to the football field this fall.

“I do have a fear every time he’s out there,” Ingrid Monix says. “I was concerned last fall and I’m going to be concerned when he’s out there again. But he’s going to play some smarter football.”

Smarter and safer

The headaches eventually go away. So does the dizziness, the confusion. But the fear? The fear of reliving the trauma, of missing more time, of long-term brain damage? That fear is one lingering effect of a concussion that some players can never get past.

But if you want to keep playing, you pretty much have to.

So Monix will play smarter football, yes. But not timid football. He says he’ll probably step out of bounds rather than lower his head for one or two extra yards. He’ll be more aware of the players around him and more prepared to duck or dodge an opponent.

But you can’t play scared. Any football player will tell you that.

“I personally don’t think much about hurting myself,” says Lowell senior Austin Magley, who suffered a concussion during two-a-days last year. “I’m just worried about how I’m going to get the tackle, how I’m going to make the block. If you play like you think you’re going to get hurt, then you’re more likely to get hurt. You just have to move on.”