I’m dr. Chris Nowinski most insights
come out of mutually shared experiences
so tell me if this is familiar to your
life you graduate from Harvard in 2000
where you played football and you decide
you want to sign up for a reality
television show on MTV called tough
enough where 13 people live in a house
together and compete for a contract to
become a professional wrestler with WWE
and while you’re on the show you have a
match with the trainers and one of the
trainers decides to go old school with
you and take it from a professional
wrestling match into a full out of salt
who’s this familiar for anyone is it
just me am I the only one
okay well then to make it a mutually
shared experience let me show you what
happens
so what you don’t see happens next is I
roll out of the ring and I’m wandering
around in circles and I’ve got this
thought on a loop in my head that I
can’t get out
that’s when did I go to the beach I
don’t remember going to the beach but I
have sand in my mouth and I’m chewing on
sand and I don’t remember going to the
beach and then 20 minutes of that and
boom it hits me I’m not chewing on sand
I’m chewing on my teeth he chipped my
teeth when he punched me in the face and
he gave me what I now know who was a
concussion or a brain injury but I
didn’t know that that was important and
I didn’t know that that was serious and
I didn’t tell anybody and it didn’t hurt
me then and I ended up making it to the
big time and I was on WB’s Monday Night
Raw and I played a guy everyone loved to
8:00
they called chris harvard’ and all was
going very well until I got another
concussion but I still didn’t know that
it mattered and so I didn’t tell anyone
that my head was throbbing and I didn’t
tell anyone that I felt sick every time
I got the heart rate up and I kept
wrestling for five weeks until I got so
bad that I had to stop because I
developed post concussion syndrome and
ended up with about a 15 year headache
and it wasn’t until I found a doctor
that I realized what I’d done wrong the
doctor told me it wasn’t the concussion
itself that really was the problem the
problem was I didn’t speak up and I
didn’t tell anybody and by continuing to
get hit in the head I essentially ruined
my brain and so I thought gosh it would
have been really nice if someone would
have told me that at any point in my
18-year contact sport career I would
happily have taken a week off if I knew
it would save my brain and so I thought
you know what other athletes need to
know this too and so I ended up writing
a book called head games footballs
concussion crisis in 2006 and I started
a found a
the concussion legacy foundation in 2007
and we’ve been telling athletes to speak
up when you have a concussion raise your
hand and take yourself out and for the
last ten years everybody’s been doing
that the CDC’s messaging for kids it’s
better to miss a game than to miss the
whole season what they’re telling you as
parents talk to your kids about taking
themselves out of the game when they
have concussion and it’s great and it’s
the right message but after ten years we
found it doesn’t work most athletes are
still not reporting their concussions
and we probably should have known why
but there are two real problems to this
philosophy one is that athletes don’t
always want to come out of the game so
when Calvin Johnson the great NFL player
retired he was brutally honest and said
we didn’t tell our coaches about our
concussions we wanted to keep playing we
wanted to be there for our teammates an
honorable thought something hard to
overcome to change that culture the
second problem we probably should have
seen coming and that is when you have a
brain injury and your brain is the thing
that’s supposed to recognize when you’re
injured you can’t recognize your own
brain injury
it’s that loop again so of course you
might think you’re chewing on sand when
you’re chewing on your teeth because
your brains injured so it’s hard enough
for me to realize that what I was hurt
imagine what it’s like for your 11 year
old child when they head up all the
wrong way and they suddenly don’t
realize what’s going on are they gonna
have the wherewithal to self diagnose
their own brain injury as an 11 year old
and then overcome the stigma of pulling
yourself out of a game probably not it’s
a losing strategy and if we don’t change
that the problem is kids keep getting
hurt and so the solution to this problem
like most problems could be found in an
old book when I was working on head
games I had heard there was a diary kept
by a Harvard football coach from before
my time and I thought I’m gonna read
this thing and find out that they even
talk about concussions decades ago and
what blue
away was not only with concussions
throughout this book but the coach and
the team doctor gave a speech to the
team before the season we got everybody
together and they said in case any man
at any game gets hurt by hit to the head
so does not realize what he’s doing his
teammates should at one since his time
be called and the doctor come onto the
field to see what’s the trouble
they said don’t let your friends play
with the concussion
does anybody remember getting this
speech when you were an athlete at any
point in your life not a single hand
raised in this room this is wisdom lost
to history wouldn’t surprise you if I
told you this is from the Harvard
football coach’s diary in 1905 1905 bill
Reid gave this speech and it has not
been heard since and the problem is this
is hurting kids
this is Rowan stringer Rowan stringer
was a rugby player teenage rugby player
in Ottawa Canada who got a concussion
but she was one of the best players in
the team and they had a game of three
days later and she wanted to play and so
she didn’t tell her parents and she
didn’t tell her coach she did tell a
friend but the friend didn’t say
anything and she went out and played and
she got hit in the head again and she
got what’s called second impact syndrome
and she died and this happens to a
handful of teenagers every year I think
the problem was her friend didn’t know
what to do this is her friend’s version
of the events think we did talk about it
being a concussion
he was obviously diagnosed we never
would see a doctor or anything but that
was what we had sort of concluded on our
own what was your advice to her in those
text messages I told her she should
probably tell someone about it get it
checked out she wanted to play the last
game so we decided I told her um if
things didn’t get any better if they got
worse than after the game she should
definitely go see someone but obviously
we never got to that imagine how both
those lives would be different if she’d
heard that talk and that’s part of the
inspiration for why the concussion
Legacy Foundation launched a program we
call team up speak up to fight
concussions we are essentially bringing
back this hundred year old speech
because Harvard football coach Bill Reed
had it figured out did we now have the
academics understand why this speech
works it uses what’s known as the
bystander intervention model your kids
know this because that’s what they’re
taught at anti-bullying classes this is
all about changing social norms instead
of hiding concussions you talk about
them and probably the smartest part we
are taking a what’s a boring public
health message and we’re framing it as a
cool be a good teammate message which
every coach wants to talk about so we
ask every coach before the season has
just spend one minute one minute
giving a speech to their team with these
three essential points good teammates
look out for each other especially when
it comes to concussions you’re expected
to speak up to a coach or a team leader
if you think your teammate has a
concussion and you can save your
teammates career like mine or you can
save their life like Rowan’s the good
news is we’ve had tremendous success
since we launched this campaign we had
over 250 organizations sign up this year
to take part and team up speak up day
that covered five million athletes we’re
talking about some of the big ones us
lacrosse had team up speak up with us a
rugby team up speak up week right now it
is USA
hockey’s team up speak up week and I
have Jeremy Roenick out there spreading
the good word inspiring coaches to
invest one minute in trying to save
their athletes careers we have a lot of
fun on team up speak up day we ask
coaches to film the video and post it on
social media so we can watch it we had
participation in 49 out of 50 states
verified where we just these speeches
come in they’re creative they’re fun and
we’re literally watching them dust off a
speech that has been heard in a hundred
years and share it
and it’s amazing and it feels good but
we need you because every child needs to
hear this speech before every season
because every team is new and every
coach relationship is new and we need
coaches giving this speech and so we ask
everyone to sign up that team up speak
up dot-org to learn how to give this
speech be reminded to give the speech
because we all know a child playing
sports that we care about it could be a
child it could be a youth coach it could
be your grandchild and they’re going to
get hit in the head and they may end up
being that kid wandering on the
sidelines chewing on their teeth in need
of help and you’re gonna have to hope
that their teammates have been trained
to speak up thank you [Applause]
come out of mutually shared experiences
so tell me if this is familiar to your
life you graduate from Harvard in 2000
where you played football and you decide
you want to sign up for a reality
television show on MTV called tough
enough where 13 people live in a house
together and compete for a contract to
become a professional wrestler with WWE
and while you’re on the show you have a
match with the trainers and one of the
trainers decides to go old school with
you and take it from a professional
wrestling match into a full out of salt
who’s this familiar for anyone is it
just me am I the only one
okay well then to make it a mutually
shared experience let me show you what
happens
so what you don’t see happens next is I
roll out of the ring and I’m wandering
around in circles and I’ve got this
thought on a loop in my head that I
can’t get out
that’s when did I go to the beach I
don’t remember going to the beach but I
have sand in my mouth and I’m chewing on
sand and I don’t remember going to the
beach and then 20 minutes of that and
boom it hits me I’m not chewing on sand
I’m chewing on my teeth he chipped my
teeth when he punched me in the face and
he gave me what I now know who was a
concussion or a brain injury but I
didn’t know that that was important and
I didn’t know that that was serious and
I didn’t tell anybody and it didn’t hurt
me then and I ended up making it to the
big time and I was on WB’s Monday Night
Raw and I played a guy everyone loved to
8:00
they called chris harvard’ and all was
going very well until I got another
concussion but I still didn’t know that
it mattered and so I didn’t tell anyone
that my head was throbbing and I didn’t
tell anyone that I felt sick every time
I got the heart rate up and I kept
wrestling for five weeks until I got so
bad that I had to stop because I
developed post concussion syndrome and
ended up with about a 15 year headache
and it wasn’t until I found a doctor
that I realized what I’d done wrong the
doctor told me it wasn’t the concussion
itself that really was the problem the
problem was I didn’t speak up and I
didn’t tell anybody and by continuing to
get hit in the head I essentially ruined
my brain and so I thought gosh it would
have been really nice if someone would
have told me that at any point in my
18-year contact sport career I would
happily have taken a week off if I knew
it would save my brain and so I thought
you know what other athletes need to
know this too and so I ended up writing
a book called head games footballs
concussion crisis in 2006 and I started
a found a
the concussion legacy foundation in 2007
and we’ve been telling athletes to speak
up when you have a concussion raise your
hand and take yourself out and for the
last ten years everybody’s been doing
that the CDC’s messaging for kids it’s
better to miss a game than to miss the
whole season what they’re telling you as
parents talk to your kids about taking
themselves out of the game when they
have concussion and it’s great and it’s
the right message but after ten years we
found it doesn’t work most athletes are
still not reporting their concussions
and we probably should have known why
but there are two real problems to this
philosophy one is that athletes don’t
always want to come out of the game so
when Calvin Johnson the great NFL player
retired he was brutally honest and said
we didn’t tell our coaches about our
concussions we wanted to keep playing we
wanted to be there for our teammates an
honorable thought something hard to
overcome to change that culture the
second problem we probably should have
seen coming and that is when you have a
brain injury and your brain is the thing
that’s supposed to recognize when you’re
injured you can’t recognize your own
brain injury
it’s that loop again so of course you
might think you’re chewing on sand when
you’re chewing on your teeth because
your brains injured so it’s hard enough
for me to realize that what I was hurt
imagine what it’s like for your 11 year
old child when they head up all the
wrong way and they suddenly don’t
realize what’s going on are they gonna
have the wherewithal to self diagnose
their own brain injury as an 11 year old
and then overcome the stigma of pulling
yourself out of a game probably not it’s
a losing strategy and if we don’t change
that the problem is kids keep getting
hurt and so the solution to this problem
like most problems could be found in an
old book when I was working on head
games I had heard there was a diary kept
by a Harvard football coach from before
my time and I thought I’m gonna read
this thing and find out that they even
talk about concussions decades ago and
what blue
away was not only with concussions
throughout this book but the coach and
the team doctor gave a speech to the
team before the season we got everybody
together and they said in case any man
at any game gets hurt by hit to the head
so does not realize what he’s doing his
teammates should at one since his time
be called and the doctor come onto the
field to see what’s the trouble
they said don’t let your friends play
with the concussion
does anybody remember getting this
speech when you were an athlete at any
point in your life not a single hand
raised in this room this is wisdom lost
to history wouldn’t surprise you if I
told you this is from the Harvard
football coach’s diary in 1905 1905 bill
Reid gave this speech and it has not
been heard since and the problem is this
is hurting kids
this is Rowan stringer Rowan stringer
was a rugby player teenage rugby player
in Ottawa Canada who got a concussion
but she was one of the best players in
the team and they had a game of three
days later and she wanted to play and so
she didn’t tell her parents and she
didn’t tell her coach she did tell a
friend but the friend didn’t say
anything and she went out and played and
she got hit in the head again and she
got what’s called second impact syndrome
and she died and this happens to a
handful of teenagers every year I think
the problem was her friend didn’t know
what to do this is her friend’s version
of the events think we did talk about it
being a concussion
he was obviously diagnosed we never
would see a doctor or anything but that
was what we had sort of concluded on our
own what was your advice to her in those
text messages I told her she should
probably tell someone about it get it
checked out she wanted to play the last
game so we decided I told her um if
things didn’t get any better if they got
worse than after the game she should
definitely go see someone but obviously
we never got to that imagine how both
those lives would be different if she’d
heard that talk and that’s part of the
inspiration for why the concussion
Legacy Foundation launched a program we
call team up speak up to fight
concussions we are essentially bringing
back this hundred year old speech
because Harvard football coach Bill Reed
had it figured out did we now have the
academics understand why this speech
works it uses what’s known as the
bystander intervention model your kids
know this because that’s what they’re
taught at anti-bullying classes this is
all about changing social norms instead
of hiding concussions you talk about
them and probably the smartest part we
are taking a what’s a boring public
health message and we’re framing it as a
cool be a good teammate message which
every coach wants to talk about so we
ask every coach before the season has
just spend one minute one minute
giving a speech to their team with these
three essential points good teammates
look out for each other especially when
it comes to concussions you’re expected
to speak up to a coach or a team leader
if you think your teammate has a
concussion and you can save your
teammates career like mine or you can
save their life like Rowan’s the good
news is we’ve had tremendous success
since we launched this campaign we had
over 250 organizations sign up this year
to take part and team up speak up day
that covered five million athletes we’re
talking about some of the big ones us
lacrosse had team up speak up with us a
rugby team up speak up week right now it
is USA
hockey’s team up speak up week and I
have Jeremy Roenick out there spreading
the good word inspiring coaches to
invest one minute in trying to save
their athletes careers we have a lot of
fun on team up speak up day we ask
coaches to film the video and post it on
social media so we can watch it we had
participation in 49 out of 50 states
verified where we just these speeches
come in they’re creative they’re fun and
we’re literally watching them dust off a
speech that has been heard in a hundred
years and share it
and it’s amazing and it feels good but
we need you because every child needs to
hear this speech before every season
because every team is new and every
coach relationship is new and we need
coaches giving this speech and so we ask
everyone to sign up that team up speak
up dot-org to learn how to give this
speech be reminded to give the speech
because we all know a child playing
sports that we care about it could be a
child it could be a youth coach it could
be your grandchild and they’re going to
get hit in the head and they may end up
being that kid wandering on the
sidelines chewing on their teeth in need
of help and you’re gonna have to hope
that their teammates have been trained
to speak up thank you [Applause]
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