Quote:
Originally Posted by Mark in Idaho
If you take anti-nausea meds to hide your concussion symptom of nausea, you have no way to tell if your brain is recovering. The same goes for pain meds.
You should not be on the mat/training floor if you have any symptoms.
If you are totally symptom free without meds for a month, activities might be considered. This is known as Return to Play. This has been well researched with goals of athletes returning to the sport at the earliest time. It only reduces risks of Second Impact Syndrome and injuries due to coordination/balance deficiencies. It does not mean your brain has recovered.
btw. Doctors prescribe meds to treat your symptoms/complaints, not to help you heal/recover.
Concussions NEVER heal. We can recover from the obvious symptoms but the brain will always have the injury.
Neck holds may cause you to work to strengthen your neck but the area at risk is unstable even with good muscle tone. As you try to resist a choke, you put strain on the cervical joints with your own muscle action. I actually had a doctor who used my own muscle strength to move my cervical vertebra. He held my head steady and had me try to turn my head. He claims it would help. It actually made my condition worse.
The ligaments at C-1 and C-2 are the weakest part.
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Thanks for the response. I'd been approved by a Physio, Doctor and Sports Doctor to return to BJJ. I was told to monitor symptoms closely though. I was going great it was just that one knock that set me off.
Yeah I agree about doctors prescribing for symptoms not to help heal. I don't take any meds before training so I can monitor my symptoms I may take some after.
I'm interested why you say concussions never heal. I understand that the brain takes longer than the "initial 2-3 weeks" where most/all obvious symptoms resolve, but from what I have been told talking to concussion therapists etc they said they do heal, just can take a long time, sometimes a year or longer to FULLY heal.
My physio has been to a lot of seminars and courses related to concussion, some with all the latest research and he said that they still don't officially know if you have one or not as 10 different things mimic concussion, when you are truely healed etc.
SO you might be correct that they never fully heal, but then you might be wrong too. The sad thing is in the medical world they still don't know a lot about concussions, the long term effects, what leads to CTE etc etc.
My physio has had at least 17 concussions and probably more and is in his late 50s and he is doing absolutely fine.
I also know a few people who have had 1 or 2 MAJOR ones and are dealing with issues years later.
It really is **** because I miss not worrying about my head like I do. And for me, it is hard to say exactly how many I have had because 1 or 2 MAY or MAY NOT have been concussions.
My timeline from when this all started looks like this:
April 2020: Fell of Motorcycle and hit my head, broke my collarbone. No concussion doctors said however I did go unconscious but it was not from the impact I was conscious for like 5 minuets until one people tried to sit me up and I blacked out. At the time, never thought I had a concussion, no symptoms etc but looking back, from what you and others have said it may have caused some head trauma.
November 2020: First official concussion: Took a knee to the eye during sparring. Not knocked out, felt off, was off work for 8 days. Couldn't look at screens or do much of anything for about 6 days. Returned to BJJ 3 weeks later and was 100% fine. Again looking back I wish I had taken 2 months off.
March 2021: Second Concussion (Potential): Was lying on my back and my opponent was drilling a grip break for armbar. If you've not seen an armbar position have a look at the "spiderweb position" in BJJ. I was the guy on the bottom and the opponent basically bounces/drives their thigh into your head which cause you to lose your grip. My head basically bounced a few times off the mat (not very high and soft mat), but I knew something was wrong again.
This was a "potential concussion." I didn't feel right but I went to work 2 days later at a new job as well and took on a lot of information and did everything normal. I just didn't exercise and I was dealing with neck tightness/headaches and dizziness if I jerked/bumped my head.
So this could have been a concussion or it could have been whiplash or many other things.
And finally: May 2022: Potential Concussion 4 - I've been off BJJ for a year, doing other sports and while I have been dealing with issues I've been better and better.
This "concussion" happened when my opponent just wrapped his arm around my head to control me and it bumped the back of my head. THis was not that hard and the only "issue" I had with this one was I was wobbly when walking out after training. However, I kept training after this one as I felt fine. The diziness could have been because I hadn't eaten for 6 hours before training, lack of water, adrenaline or whiplash or concussion/
So for this one it is really hard for me to say it was a concussion as I felt 100% fine 2 days later anyway.
My doctor and physio both said I had to treat it was a mild concussion and my doctor is now telling me to quit BJJ.
He told me to quit not because of the concussions but because of my anxiety and the fact I will always worry about bumps to the head during training.
I'm kind of depressed right now and I'm unsure if i have had 1 concussion or 4 concussions in the last 2 years.