Everyone saw the collision. Meltdown. CPR. ambulance. The shock on the players’ faces.
Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin went into cardiac arrest Monday night after tackling Bengals wide receiver Tee Higgins, and he received CPR for about 10 minutes before heading to an ambulance.
Details about what exactly happened are still not available. But experts say the trauma lingers for players, game attendees and spectators watching at home – and they must address it before it gets worse.
“It’s okay to not be well now,” he says Lindsey DiStefanoChair of the Department of Kinesiology at the University of Connecticut.
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Damer Hamlin’s incident is “extremely difficult” to watch
- The main takeaway: whatever you’re feeling is normal, and most of all, seek help. Even as society encourages radical stoicism, especially for men.
- “In football culture, we are often taught to hyper-masculine and detach emotions, and men in particular are socialized to only express things like anger. Not sadness, grief, distress, anxiety, fear,” Kevin Chapmana licensed psychologist and founder and director of the Kentucky Center for Anxiety and Related Disorders.
- Everyone from football players to staff to home viewers needs to process the trauma of what they witnessed.
- “Emotions need to be discussed openly,” says Chapman, a former college football player, “no need to compartmentalize anything or for this to get bigger, it’s true.”
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Watching someone close to you break down, in particular, can upset anyone. “I had to watch my father receive CPR,” he says. Dr. Laxmi MehtaMD, director of preventive cardiology and women’s cardiovascular health at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. “The mental impact of watching someone go into cardiac arrest is very challenging.”
Anyone watching the game, including those with a predisposition to anxiety disorders or those who have experienced similar traumas in the past. Over the next two weeks to the next month, Chapman says, consider whether this situation has left you in personal distress and is getting in the way of your daily functioning. It is normal but may require professional help.
Social media channels are flooded with comments from many, including athletes.
Sport, mental and physical health
Positions like Hamlin’s are rare, though football in particular comes with all sorts of risks like chronic traumatic encephalopathy. However, the sport is as well woven into the American social fabric as any other.
“Sports have an amazing opportunity to offer many benefits to everyone who plays,” DiStefano says. “It’s entertainment, of course, when it comes to the game of American football, but it’s a physical activity, which is very important for health. It’s fun, it’s fun, and the mental health benefits have been shown over and over again, with participation in sports. It’s character-building.”
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But the psychological stress and physical harm come at a price. Athletes like Simone Biles have helped shape discussions about mental health in sports. There is an opportunity to build on that now.
“The NFL needs to offer some mental health counseling, in a group or individual setting, not only to players on the field but also to other players if they feel they would like that help,” says Mehta.
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Experts hope that Higgins in particular will receive the care he needs; Worried about potential survivor guilt, Chapman wonders if he could have turned differently or taken a different route. “He needs to be surrounded by support right away,” says Chapman. “And he also needs to be allowed to process the events and discuss the evaluations or thoughts or cognitions that are all synonymous with the same concept, very frankly with the mental health professional.”
Parents of young children who have watched the game may find themselves struggling to support them. DiStefano recommends letting the kids lead the discussion and meeting them as they are.
What do we learn from the Dammar Hamelin collapse?
- Remember that trauma affects each person differently. “Some people may respond acutely now and need help, and it may not affect them for some time,” says Mehta. “They may not process it mentally until later. We need to recognize the differences in how we respond to these events and how we recover afterward.”
- Chapman suggests developing protocols for such future incidents, such as “going to the commercial immediately, as soon as we see something is happening, and not gossiping about the details of the event, as many commentators do. And of course, definitely don’t retweet the screenshots. These are all things that can It shocks people again, and gives them the impression that they are in real danger right now.”
- Perhaps we can better prepare ourselves for the inevitable next time. “Any event like this, unfortunately, tends to bring people together and realize how short life is,” says Chapman. “When we have a more preventive approach, as opposed to intervention, which is what we’re seeing now, we can prepare ourselves for things like that.”
Contributing: Adriana Rodriguez
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