Lucy and Dmom,
My son and I had an appointment with his doctor yesterday. It did not go as well as I had hoped. This doctor is a sports medicine physician, neurosurgeon, concussion specialist who sees many, many, PCS victims. He has also written many books, a consultant to national boxing associations etc etc. He sees alot of famous local atheletes who have suffered multiple con cussions. My point in telling you all this is that he still thinks it would be O.K for my son to wrestle again. I know that it is ultimatelty still in our control but i was hoping he would not reccomend it. He said he would not want to keep someone from a passion and it was clear to him that my son was very passionate about returning to wrestling. He said it really was an intermediate sport in risk factors for concussions and that driving a car was also a risk. He was happy that he was not having symptoms and that he thought it would be o.K to go back to wrestle. When I talked to my son on the car ride home, he told me that if he could not wrestle, then he would have nothing in his life to look forward to. I realize that he is 16 almost 17 and immature but his feelings are very strong about this and he becomes very emotional. I am afraid of the reprocussions of forcing him from it. This is now going to be very tricky. I am thinking about letting him work out with the team and seeing how that goes. I pray that this does not end in disaster. You should see how excited he is to start training with the team again. Maybe he will realize how foolish this is in time. The doctor was saying that usually the kids that are injured do not want to go back to the sport. He was quite encouraged that my son has been able to run and work out without symptoms, this is the reason he is not limiting his sport participation. I understand that there is a fine line between protecting and keeping safe and then also living a happy life. I will keep you informed on where this is going.
Nancy