Boys 2 Men

Just last week, I got this from a long-time reader.  I felt it was worthy of sharing in its entirety.

“Football gave my boys something I could not.  Wow, that has been hard to write and hard to admit. 

Let me start this story and tell you that I was a rabid athlete, from a long line of rabid athletes.  I played every sport that I could play….I played baseball on the boy’s team at Southside at age 8..then my parents found out there were actually girls softball teams that played on fields instead of the cow pasture on Huffstetler Road.  I played football daily in my yard with my older brother, neighbors, visiting all-stars such as Ray Porter, Big Chris Whitehead, Little Chris Whitehead and others. 

I woke up every day in the summer to get my chores around the house done and then sat waiting on Ken Shepard Sr. to open the Lanier Gym at 10 am where I stayed until he would run us out.  I went to Greenback gym where my uncle is a legendary coach in that community (Bill Satterfield), for any opportunity to play against Kim Berry and hopes to get some coaching time from the revered Coach Ken Byrd.  If I heard that Dawn Marsh was anywhere in Springbrook playing basketball, I went to get beaten by her every time. 

Before you assume my parents were like the new show ‘Little Tykes,’ with my dad driving in the car with me running beside shouting ‘run Forrest run’…it wasn’t like that.  The drive to play, compete, and win was all mine.  

So with that history, if you would assume that both my boys left the hospital in Peyton Manning Jerseys you would be wrong.  I wanted my boys to be physically active.  I coached them both in Soccer, being the only mother in the league for several years.  They swam every summer for Green Meadow.  They both played baseball, have more hours on the trails in the Great Smokey Mountains than most adults, and often can be seen on the local lakes in our Sea Kayak.  In other words, they are very active. 

So when both the boys asked to be signed up for football, I froze.  I talked to old coaches, Joe Huff, to men in my life that played football, my mother who watched my brother take hit after hit on Friday Nights.  After much discussion I tried to find a team that would have some of their peers on it so at least they would continue to make memories with the friends they are around in our community.  I went to the sporting goods store and bought the safest mouthpiece, gel pads, and socks I could find. 

The boys were playing football.   The first practice I was nauseated.  Not for fear of safety, but feeling that they were losing precious time that they could be reading great novels, listening to great music, eating great food, engaging with great people.

Surprise:  The game of football and more importantly the coaches gave my boys something I could not give them..gasp.  I saw them go to practice with enthusiasm, say yes sir and no sir to a male authority figure, push themselves physically every day, not give up, learn organization skills to get homework done in order to get to practice, and come home exhausted every day with a feeling of accomplishment from pushing themselves both mentally and physically. 

I watched them learn the game and love the game.  I watched them get their rear ends handed to them, and get up and do it again.  I watched them walk with pride on and off the field when they were in uniform.  I spent the year walking the sideline at every game, not saying a word, but unable to sit down.

I watched my sons take a small step into manhood.  I watched my younger son accomplish a victory in the Super Bowl where the coaches got every player to play at their personal best every player, because it was their only hope of winning. 

I am now a football mom…last weekend my youngest son summed up his thoughts as we got out at Everett Park for a basketball game--he glanced over at the football field and told me “Mom, just seeing the football field makes my mouth water.” 

And if you see Coach Latham, Coach Dockery, Coach Overman, Coach Marcus, or Coach Ricky Maples, thank them for teaching the young boys of Blount County the love of the game and leading my boys into manhood, even though the thought of them being Men makes my eyes water.”  (April Satterfield-Stadel)

Wow!  I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Texting and Forrest Gump

I'll issue a spoiler alert right now:  This has nothing to do with sports or athletics or being healthy but might have everything to do with living longer.  Yes, I know you're in the sports pages and maybe this is not what you turned here for but this is some serious stuff.

I just sat behind a jeep that was sitting behind an SUV at a red light.  Actually it was a red light that turned green and then turned red again before any of us moved.

You see, the SUV driver never moved, even though the light was green.   The jeep driver never blew her horn but did at one point throw up her hands in desperation.  I didn't want to blow my horn either because I didn't want the jeep driver to misinterpret my toot.

So we all sat there. 

And then finally when the light turned green for the second time, the jeep driver blew her horn and the SUV driver raised up her head and then VERY slowly pulled through the intersection.  

The jeep driver turned right and I followed the SUV driver through the intersection.  At the next intersection, I was able to pull up beside her.  What I saw was a middle-aged woman busy on her smart phone.  I can only assume she was texting.

Now I try and not jump to conclusions but I'm pretty sure that she missed that first green light because she was busy texting or reading an e-mail or on Facebook or something.   And if that isn't "distracted driving," I don't know what is.

Monday of this week I was driving to Nashville and was almost there when I fell behind a car in the left lane that was going probably 20 miles per hour below the speed limit.   This was a part of I-40 that was undergoing a lot of construction with concrete barriers leaving only a narrow pathway.  

When I finally was able to pull around him, passing him on the right (is that a confession?), I could see clearly that he was busy texting on his phone.  

Are these people crazy?   Let's forget for a moment that it is against the law.   In the case of the lady in the SUV, it was at least disrespectful (and they get mad at me for riding my bike on a country lane). On I-40 near Nashville, it was dangerous.

And don't get me started on teenagers.  Our youngest drivers not only think they're invincible but they think they are already great drivers.  Give me a blue-haired geriatrician behind the wheel of a lead sled any time instead of a teenager with a cell phone. 

A 2010 National Highway Traffic Safety Administration report stated that "driver distraction was the cause of 18 percent of all fatal crashes." A Virginia Tech Transportation Institute study found that "text messaging creates a crash risk 23 times worse than driving while not distracted."

Arguing against texting while driving is a lot like arguing about global warming.  Everybody that does it thinks it is safe just like too many people that don't live near a vanishing glacier imagine that our weather patterns are simply a normal weather cycle.

The laws of the state might be argued but the "Law of Common Sense" seems beyond argument.  Like Forrest said, "stupid is as stupid does."

 

 

Athletic Skin Problems

If you remember, last week I wrote about some of the more catastrophic sports injuries that we see.  Like broken bones and concussions.   Today I want to talk about skin problems.

It might seem like I’ve gone from one extreme to another but skin problems can be pretty serious on their own.

One of the most common sports that we see this is in wrestling.  A big part of that is due to a lot of skin-to-skin contact between wrestlers.   Wrestlers have a tendency to share those things.

And the wrestling mat can get infected too.   Some organisms can live for a long time on even a dry surface.  That’s why wrestling mats are cleaned on a regular basis.

The big fear among skin problems is MRSA, usually pronounced “mur-suh.”   MRSA is actually an acronym for Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus, a bacteria that through evolution has become resistant to many commonly used antibiotics.  In other words, a lot of antibiotics just don’t work against MRSA.

And MRSA can be one nasty bug.  Improperly treated, it can migrate to organs and cause really bad health problems.

A lot of the blame for the emergence of MRSA is placed on the over-prescription of antibiotics, especially when the source of the infection isn’t a bacteria at all. 

Put simply, a lot of childhood and adolescent problems are just not produced by bacteria.  The common cold?  It’s a virus.  Antibiotics won’t work.  Same for a lot of ear infections.   Anything that might be viral can’t be effectively treated with antibiotics. 

 
I remember well an argument that I had with my then-medical student daughter.   She was going to be a pediatrician and had declared that the only children that she would prescribe antibiotics for would be those that truly had a bacterial infection.

I told her then that parents that bring their children to her would almost always want to walk away with that magic pink medicine (an antibiotic). 

She’s now Dr. Whitney Dee, a pediatrician at Maryville Pediatric Clinic and it is a battle that she fights almost every day.   If parents only understood that if their child doesn’t have a bacterial infection an antibiotic just won’t help and, what’s worse, that they may ultimately be more susceptible to more serious infections like MRSA...well...her job would be easier.

Oh, and she wanted me to mention that just because snot is green, it doesn’t mean there is a sinus infection.  It just means, well, that the snot is green.

Another common skin problem among athletes is Impetigo.  Impetigo is quite common and very contagious.  The problem is that it can be transmitted through contact with clothing, towels, or other items.  

We see a fair amount of impetigo in football as well as wrestling.  As with a lot of bacteria, it tends to thrive in a moist, dark environment (dryness and sunlight can kill many bacteria) so we will often see it develop underneath shoulder pads.

Football players are not among the cleanest of athletes that we see either and shared toweling, clothes, and pads can help spread the infection.  Several of our schools spray their football locker rooms with an airborne disinfectant in an attempt to kill those same bacteria.

Since a lot of the bad odor in locker rooms (you might just have to trust me on this one) comes from bacteria, it is sometimes amazing how fresh those locker room smells after spraying.

A third problem that is far less troublesome is dermatitis.  Dermatitis is actually an inflammation of the skin so it responds to anti-inflammatory treatments such as hydrocortisone cream.  Since dry skin makes it easier to get dermatitis, keeping your skin moist with lotion is important, especially this time of the year when cold air leaves your skin quite dry.

Just always remember that effective treatment of any skin problem usually requires an accurate diagnosis, and for that you need to see your pediatrician or family practitioner.