Counting the Days While My Mind Slips Away

by Ben Utecht

  I remember waking up on the ground with a bloody nose. My coaches talked to me, then did a few tests to make sure I had not sustained a neck or back injury. Then the coaches had me sit up.

  Back in Minnesota my mother heard the announcers say, “All right, he’s talking to his coaches. It looks like he might be okay.” My mom slumped down in a chair, emotionally exhausted. On the screen I stood up and was helped to the sideline. “Thank God,” she prayed. “Oh, thank you, Jesus.” She didn’t finish watching the game.

  My coaches helped me to my feet. I felt groggy and disoriented. My ears were ringing and my head was pounding. The trainers walked me back to the locker room, where they did a few basic tests. “You have a concussion,” one said, “that’s all. It sure looked like it could have been something bad.” I wanted to go back into the game, but the trainers didn’t let me. “We should have you sit out the rest of today, just in case,” one said. I took off my pads and changed into some sweats, then returned to the sidelines.

  The moment the wedding service ended, my dad rushed next door to our house. He flipped on the television and switched to the game. Play had resumed. The camera focused on the Minnesota sideline, where my dad saw me sitting on the bench in street clothes. A coach sat next to me, talking with me. My day was over, but at least my father could relax. It looked like I was going to be okay.

  •  •  •

  This was my first diagnosed concussion. Fifteen years ago, when this injury occurred, I didn’t know much about concussions, including their symptoms, treatment, or long-term effects. Basically, a concussion occurs when the brain collides with the skull. Our brains float in a protective bath of cerebrospinal fluid. Our brains are soft; the skull is hard. When the head snaps violently, either from a blow to the head or from the head being whipped about suddenly, the laws of physics take over and the cerebrospinal fluid is not enough to keep the brain from slamming into the skull. If the impact is violent enough, the brain can be bruised, which shows up on a CT scan or an MRI. Doctors refer to that as a traumatic brain injury. In a concussion, the injury to the brain may not show up on any scans. Commonly no apparent bruising can be seen. That is one reason why a concussion is called a mild traumatic brain injury.

  And that’s exactly how concussions were regarded during my playing time, as something mild. Unless someone got knocked out cold, like I did, we never even thought of these injuries as concussions. We all just referred to them as getting our bell rung, or getting lit up. You get your bell rung when you get hit so hard you see stars or you feel disoriented for a moment. It wasn’t until I started researching concussions in 2009 that I learned these are the symptoms of a Grade 1 concussion (and there are three grades, or three levels of severity). When I include bell rings, I now understand that I cannot count the number of concussions I suffered going as far back as junior high. Back then we had a blocking drill called Bull in a Ring. In this drill, one player got in the middle of a circle of players. On the coach’s signal, everyone started running in place. The coach walked around the outside of the circle, then tapped one guy on the shoulder. This guy then took off after the guy in the center and tried to knock him off his feet. I came away from those drills with my bell rung more times than I can count. I usually had a headache as well, which is another concussion symptom, but I never thought anything of it. The headaches went away and I kept on playing. Getting your bell rung was no big deal.

  It wasn’t just me. That was the culture of football in regard to head injuries fifteen years ago. That doesn’t mean no one knew anything about concussions when I was knocked out against Baylor on September 16, 2000. Research into concussions and football goes back to the mid-1980s. University of Virginia neuropsychologist Jeff Barth did the first study of concussions in college football in 1984 with the University of Virginia, then expanded the study the next year to include 2,350 players from the Ivy League schools and the University of Pittsburgh.I The book League of Denial, by Mark Fainaru-Wada and Steve Fainaru, gives a very detailed history of how concussion research in football, both good and bad, took off after Barth’s initial study. During the 1990s researchers discovered that concussions were far more widespread than anyone had believed before, and that they had more serious long-term effects than previously understood. Researchers started studying former players and found that many exhibited the kind of “punch drunk” symptoms associated with former boxers who had spent too much time in the ring. In 1994 the NFL even established a committee to study concussions and find ways to make the game safer. Already, many researchers, like Dr. Robert Cantu, were speaking out, saying concussions must be taken far more seriously. In an interview I conducted with Dr. Cantu for this book, he told me that there is nothing mild about mild traumatic brain injuries. Traumatic is traumatic and should be treated as such.

  I knew none of this when I suffered my first documented concussion. When I heard the trainer tell me I had suffered a concussion I thought it was about as serious as a paper cut. On the Monday after the Baylor game I went through the rudimentary concussion protocols in place at the time, passed them, and returned to practice either that day or the day after. The next Saturday I was back in the lineup at tight end against eventual Big 10 champion Purdue and their quarterback Drew Brees, now quarterback of the New Orleans Saints. We lost the game. I only had one catch, which was not unusual for a tight end back then. The position was still transitioning from primarily a blocker to a receiver.

  I started the rest of the season. We ended up with a winning record and played in the Micron PC Bowl in Miami, held in the same stadium where I would one day play in Super Bowl XLI. All in all, I had a really good season for a first-year player. Not many freshmen see a lot of playing time. I not only played; I started every game that season. When the season ended, I wasn’t thinking about concussions or injuries or anything else. Honestly, I wasn’t even thinking that much about my schoolwork. I was already focused on the next season and building on what I had started in my redshirt freshman year. As a team, we had gone to back-to-back bowl games for the first time since 1960 and 1961. This was why I had come to the University of Minnesota. I wanted to be a part of something special, and now I was. It was a great place to be for a nineteen-year-old boy like me.

  * * *

  I. Mark Fainaru-Wada and Steve Fainaru, League of Denial, Kindle ed. (New York: Crown Archetype, 2013), chapter 2.

  CHAPTER 5

  GASTON

  I CALLED MY DAD ONE day in early November, a little over a month after the Baylor game. “Dad, I think I found the girl I’m going to marry,” I said.

  “What?” my dad said with a tone that told me I had his full attention. “Where? I mean, who is she?”

  “Her name is Karyn,” I said. “She’s just . . . I’ve never met anyone like her before.”

  “Where did you meet her?”

  “At the FCA Halloween karaoke party. From the moment she walked in the door I couldn’t take my eyes off of her,” I said. Even today, I can still picture her in her costume that night. She wore an orange seventies disco-style jumpsuit with big white polka dots on it. Just thinking about her that night makes my heart race. I immediately went over to introduce myself to her, which wasn’t easy because she seemed to be trying to avoid me. It turns out that she was! When I finally got close enough to introduce myself she said, “We’ve met before, Ben, but you probably don’t remember.”

  I wish I could blame the blow to the head in the Baylor game for my mistake. As soon as she said that, I remembered we had met, or at least she had met me. I had looked right past her that first meeting. In my defense, I had a girlfriend back then, but that was no excuse for my really bad first impression. “I am so sorry about last time,” I said.

  “It’s okay,” she said, and I hoped she meant it.

  I knew I had to think fast to change her perception of me. Ask about HER! I thought. So I asked, “You are on the golf team, right?” As it turns out, Karyn wasn’t just on the golf team. By the
time her college career ended she was named team captain and academic all-American.

  “Yes, that’s right,” she said.

  “So how is your season going?” I asked.

  “Our season is over,” she replied.

  “Uhhh . . .” was all I could get out. Karyn just gave me a wry grin. I think I salvaged the moment by asking if I could get her some punch. My trip to the punch bowl was the farthest I let her get away from me that night. By the end of the evening I asked for her phone number and if she would mind if I called her sometime.

  “If you want,” she said with a little smile; if I wasn’t hooked already, I now was. However, her tone of voice didn’t really give away how she felt. I couldn’t tell if she wanted me to call or not.

  I didn’t waste any time finding out. I called her the next day around five thirty. “Hi, Karyn. It’s Ben. Ben Utecht.”

  “Oh. Hi, Ben,” she said with a note of surprise.

  “If you haven’t eaten yet, would you like to go to dinner with me and another couple of my friends?” I asked.

  “Sure, I would love to,” she said. Only later did I learn that she had already eaten dinner.

  In spite of what I told my father, I didn’t approach this dinner as any kind of romantic encounter. I may be a hopeless romantic, but I did not truly believe that I was going to marry Karyn after spending a little time with her at a college karaoke party. However, I knew I wanted to get to know her better, and I hoped she might get to see the real me.

  My friend Jake and his date came along with Karyn and me to a place called J. D. Hoyt’s. All through the evening we all talked and laughed a lot. When I learned Karyn loved Disney movies, Jake and I sang every Disney song we could remember. Because I wasn’t trying to make a love connection, both Karyn and I were free to just be ourselves. I didn’t approach this date as a romantic encounter, but I have to tell you, by the end of the night I knew there was something very special about her. After we left the restaurant I walked her to the door of her sorority house and told her good night. We didn’t have a good-night kiss or anything like that. The moment just wasn’t right. The whole evening had just been fun.

  But afterward I couldn’t get her out of my mind.

  The more I thought about her, the more I realized she was exactly the kind of girl I had always hoped to find. She had a great sense of humor. She was smart and loved to have fun. And from what I had already learned about her, I could tell she had a rock solid faith. She didn’t seem to approach God like some religious duty. I could tell she had a real, personal, intimate relationship with Him. On top of that, she was a topflight athlete who could probably clean my clock at golf. If I had made a checklist of the qualities I had hoped to find in a girl, she would have marked all the right boxes.

  That’s when I called my dad and told him I thought I had found the girl I was going to marry someday. I do not mean I had already fallen head over heels in love with her. However, I knew that if I spent more time with her, that was exactly what would happen.

  That may be why I froze and didn’t call her again for a few weeks. More than once I picked up the phone but I couldn’t bring myself to dial her number. I ran into her at FCA functions, and I always talked and kidded around with her. Okay, I was flirting. I couldn’t help myself. But then I never pursued her. I know I confused her to death with all the mixed signals I sent her way.

  Part of my hesitation in letting her know about the growing feelings inside me came from the fact that I had just come out of a yearlong relationship when I met her and I was a little hesitant to jump into another relationship that could turn serious. Looking back, I realize that’s more of an excuse than a reason. I think the real issue had nothing to do with fear but with me. When I was with Karyn I felt like I didn’t measure up, like I didn’t deserve someone like her. She didn’t do anything to make me feel that way. In fact, she did the exact opposite. My insecurities all came from deep inside myself. Deep down I was convinced that if I pursued her romantically, I would do something to hurt her and blow any chance of a future together.

  Like a lot of people when they first go off to college, I was trying to figure out who I really was and who I wanted to be. A war was going on inside me. I felt pulled between the person my parents brought me up to be and the guy who felt a huge charge when the older guys on the team asked me to go out for beers after games. Beers after games led to dipping my toe in the campus party scene. I’m not going to lie, I liked it. I liked the way people reacted to me as a football player, especially when I had a really good game.

  Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t suddenly start living up to all the stereotypes of a preacher’s kid. In a lot of ways I remained who I had always been. All my life I had stood up for the underdog. That didn’t change. I also tried to conduct myself with integrity in everything I did. Again, I did not change. However, consistently living out my faith was always a challenge. In some ways I reduced my Christian walk down to generally being a nice guy and nothing more. I didn’t pray as much as I should have, not unless something bad happened, like another injury in a ball game. If I read the Bible, it was because I felt like I had to so that I could check it off my to-do list. I had strong faith but wavered on pursuing a real, dynamic relationship with God. I was just a good guy who liked to have a good time without hurting other people. That was enough.

  Straddling the fence always felt uncomfortable and it made me hesitant to pursue a real relationship with Karyn. I knew she wanted someone who was the real deal when it came to faith and commitment. Honestly, right then, I wasn’t that guy. However, my hesitance didn’t stop me from accepting her invitation to accompany her to her sorority’s formal dance.

  •  •  •

  About a month after we went out to dinner Karyn called me for the first time. I don’t think I had called her since that first invite to go out with some friends. We definitely had not gone on another date. However, I gave enough of an “I’m interested” vibe when we talked at FCA events that she felt confident I would accept her invitation if she asked me to go. Of course I said yes.

  When I picked Karyn up for the dance, she greeted me at the door in a long blue sequined gown. She wore her long blond hair in the updo girls often get for proms and formals. All I could say was, “Wow, you look beautiful.”

  “You look handsome yourself,” she replied. I had on my best suit. We made a good-looking couple that night, if I do say so myself.

  I don’t really know what my intentions were that night. When we danced, I wanted to be with her. She made me laugh and I did the same for her. The two of us just seemed to fit in such a natural way. I tried not to convey the wrong message, I tried not to lead her on, but I got caught up in the night. Late in the dance Brian McKnight’s “6, 8, 12” came on. I took Karyn in my arms and we danced across the dance floor. As the music played, I looked down at her and began to sing, “It’s been six months, eight days, twelve hours since you went away. I miss you so much and I don’t know what to say.” The look in her eye told me I had made an impression.

  After the dance we rode a bus back to her sorority. She squeezed close to me as we rode along. When I walked her up to her front door, she turned and looked up at me. Whew. This was the kind of magical moment where first kisses are born. I hugged her and said, “Thank you so much for inviting me. I had a wonderful time.” Then I leaned in toward her. She looked up at me. She closed her eyes as I leaned down closer, only to have me kiss her on the forehead and say, “Well, good night.” It was the perfect ending to a perfect ending, if by perfect you mean the perfect way to send the ultimate mixed message. That was me, Mr. Relationship Confusion.

  •  •  •

  I didn’t call Karyn for months afterward, which confused her even more. In the meantime, my life got even more complicated. In my redshirt sophomore season I had a solid year statistically even though we didn’t play that well as a team. We lost some close games and ended up 3-7 on the year going into the last game of
the season, against our biggest rivals, the University of Wisconsin Badgers. Our rivalry with the Badgers goes back to 1890. Unfortunately, we had lost the last six games. With our poor record, we went into the game as heavy underdogs. But as the old saying goes, that’s why you play the game. Early on I made a seventy-five-yard catch and run for a touchdown. Later I went up in the end zone and made a one-handed forty-five-yard catch for another touchdown. We ended up winning the game 42–31. The ESPN announcers broadcasting the game interviewed me on national television after it was over. Me! They reserve those interviews for the stars of the game, and on this day, that star was me.

  The Wisconsin game, on top of the season I’d had, put me right in the middle of the discussion of up-and-coming college tight ends. College football talking heads on television buzzed about how I was now one of the favorites for the next year’s John Mackey Award, which is given to the top tight end in the country.

  One afternoon I was sitting in my dorm room when the phone rang. My roommate answered the phone, then handed it to me. “This is Ben,” I said.

  “Hi, Ben, I’m”—the guy gave me his name but I don’t remember it—“and I’m a sports agent. Let me tell you, I followed the season you just had and I am excited about your prospects for next year. I believe you have the potential to be one of the first, if not the first, tight ends taken in next year’s draft.”

  I nearly dropped the phone. I could not believe my ears. “Really?” is all I could say.

  “Yes, really. Now I know that NCAA rules keep you from signing with anyone until you formally declare for the draft, but I hope when you do you will keep me in mind.” He then went on to tell me all his firm had to offer me, including avenues into the world of entertainment. “We know you are a gifted singer and that that might be something you want to pursue after football,” he said.