Christina Brown Fisher, journalist and traumatic brain injury survivor, talks to brain health advocate and former NFL player Ben Utecht. By the time Utecht was 30-years-old he’d suffered at least five diagnosed concussions and was already experiencing memory loss. The former Super Bowl champion discusses his road to recovery, how the game has evolved and life after football, and TBI.
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What is Me, Myself & TBI: Facing Traumatic Brain Injury Head On ?
Me, Myself & TBI: Facing Traumatic Brain Injury Head On provides information and inspiration for people affected by brain injury. Each episode, journalist and TBI survivor Christina Brown Fisher speaks with people affected by brain injury. Listen to dive deep into their stories and lessons learned.
Christina Brown Fisher
Hello, everyone, welcome to the show Me, Myself and TBI. I'm your host, Christina Brown Fisher. My guest is Super Bowl champion and National Football League tight end Ben Utecht. His book, Counting the Days While My Mind Slips Away: A Love Letter to My Family, details Utecht's love of the game. From learning how to catch a football at the tender age of four with his dad, a Methodist pastor, to his meteoric rise in the NFL. As well as the career ending concussions that forced him to walk away.
Hi, Ben, thank you for joining me.
Ben Utecht
Thanks, Christina. Glad to be here.
Christina Brown Fisher
How are you doing now?
Ben Utecht
You know what? To be honest with you, I am probably stronger cognitively today than I, than I ever have been. And, and so it's really with a lot of joy that I can say that to you. So I'm actually doing very well.
Christina Brown Fisher
It's been a long journey, a long time to get to this place.
Ben Utecht
Yeah, it is. And, you know, every day is a journey, right? And I think one of the greatest lessons I've taken away from mine is the relevance that exists within every moment. Right? When when you're dealing with memory, you, you all of a sudden your perspective on life changes and every moment matters that much more. And so, you know, this journey, which has been soul refining, has, has actually given me a lot more clarity on who I am, and the role that I play in the lives of the people that I love the most.
Christina Brown Fisher
You mentioned memory. Was it memories that really showed you the extent of how bad, or how hard the brain injury had affected you?
Ben Utecht
Yeah, it was because it was really the consequence that if I'm being vulnerable, you know, that created the greatest fear and, and, you know, a concussion in football is, you know, is getting your bell rung, right? It's, it's seeing stars and, and for such a long time that was just a part of the game. And it was just something that you shook off and went out and did your job again. But once that started to have memory consequences in my life, it changed. And all of a sudden it became this injury that was going to have an effect on who I was, not just what I was, you know? So when you have an orthopedic injury, for example, and in football, you know that it's going to affect what you are, which is a football player. When you have a brain injury, that then begins to affect who you are.
Christina Brown Fisher
You were talking about memory, but more specifically what you were talking about, concussion, getting your belly rung, and how you look at it changes depending on how it's affecting you?
Ben Utecht
This injury, which was so unique because you really couldn't see or experience what would be a typical orthopedic consequence. You know, if you were to pull a muscle or if you were to tear a ligament in an orthopedic injury, you know that those consequences affect what you are, and that's an athlete. With a brain injury and as that began to affect my cognitive abilities, I realized that it was not only affecting what I was, but it was affecting who I was. And so that changed everything. Now, all of a sudden, a concussion through education was a traumatic brain injury and that there are long term consequences that can come with that injury, especially if it reoccurs. So it began to change the way that I looked at this injury in particular.
Christina Brown Fisher
When you tell the story in your book of being a young boy in Minnesota, playing ball with your dad and it becoming your first introduction to football. Can you tell me about those moments, what you remember about those moments and why they're still so important to you now?
Ben Utecht
Well, I think intrinsically they hold so much value because of the relationship that exists between a father and a son. And, you know, having played for Tony Dungy, who is, one of his greatest passions, is fatherhood, you just begin to understand over time, as you mature, all of the life lessons that exist within that relationship. And so my dad was, has always been a tremendous leader in our family. He, I've often said, that he brought his ministry home, and he did that, by loving my sister and myself through his actions. And so those carry tremendous weight. And I do remember those times as a very young boy going out into the backyard with my dad and, and him just sitting there on his knees, letting me tackle him with everything that I had, which to me was massive at the time. And to him probably was just, you know, full of gentle, you know, tickles really. And, and so that's really where it began, you know, and, and that created a foundation of joy that was connected to our game and that fostered, I think, my passion for athletics moving on in my life.
Christina Brown Fisher
When you were a little boy, maybe four or five years old, when you say you suffered your first head injury. What happened?
Ben Utecht
Yeah, it's one of those discovery moments, you know, over the course of writing the book. And I remember working with Mark Tabb, who was a multi New York Times best selling coauthor. And that was one of the questions he asked was, you know, as I shared this story of playing Superman with one of my friends and running around the living room, and we came into a collision moment where I ended up diving over him and going headfirst into the corner of a dresser and then being rushed to the emergency room. And he said, "wouldn't you say that that was your first TBI?" And I thought to myself, "gosh, I never really thought about it from that perspective," but I'm sure that was a part of the injury. And so, you know, the way you look at incidents over your life for me changed with my education and learning more about what exactly a concussion is and how it can affect you.
Christina Brown Fisher
Do you remember the first time you were diagnosed with the concussion and what that meant to you, or what did you know about concussions?
Ben Utecht
The first time I was diagnosed with the concussion was playing for the University of Minnesota, and I don't really remember much from the play. I do remember watching it afterwards, and I had gotten spun around headfirst into our enormous left tackle and was knocked unconscious and came to had a bloody nose, was brought off the field and diagnosed with the concussion by our training staff. And it really held no value, to be honest with you, it didn't...
Christina Brown Fisher
What do you mean?
Ben Utecht
Well, there was again, there was at the time, there's no real understanding of, you know, what a concussion is, let alone how can it negatively impact your life over time. And so I, that happened on a Saturday, and I was back practicing on Monday, and I didn't think twice about it, you know.
Christina Brown Fisher
No downtime?
Ben Utecht
No, no downside. And, you know, in that situation, you know, I don't know, I don't really remember what symptoms I was facing. But, you know, headaches and sensitivity to light and some of the things that are pretty common across all concussions and in football that, that didn't really measure up to anything meaningful, you know, because those happened all the time. You know, I mean, when you hit another human being with all you have, whether you were, you're wearing pads or not, you're going to ache. You're going to feel, you're going to feel things from the trauma of just, you know, a violent sport. And so that didn't really, yeah, I really wouldn't have been able to to think past just where I was in that moment.
Christina Brown Fisher
When I was reading your book and I was trying to keep track of all of the injuries because there were many besides the concussion. There was the broken pelvis, the broken ankle. I think there, were there torn abs as well?
Ben Utecht
Oh, yes. Yeah, that was a, that was a sports hernia, that turned into I think there are two individual, two inch tears, bilateral tears in my lower abdomen. And I think that was one of the things that was most surprising about the story is, is how many injuries I went through, both, you know, with concussions, but also with all of the orthopedic injuries that I faced. And just, you know, they're just they for me, unfortunately, I had one of these injury prone careers and, and that just created obstacle after obstacle to overcome. And, you know, it's a part of my story and so many other athletes.
Christina Brown Fisher
You mentioned the diagnosis of the concussion at the University of Minnesota. That was your second year on the team. Walk me through the other concussions that followed.
Ben Utecht
I'm trying to recall the others in Division I football, and again, if you go back and you try to remember moments where you can now recall facing some of those symptoms, and I know that there were some practice moments, there wasn't another diagnosis in an actual game. And it wasn't until I got to the NFL where I experienced some more diagnosis on the field.
Christina Brown Fisher
Do you remember which one it was, Ben? Where for you, it really stood out? Oh, yeah, I mean, certainly this is more than getting my my bell rung?
Ben Utecht
Yeah, that, that was while playing for the Indianapolis Colts and it was a a game against the Denver Broncos. And I, I can only repeat this from what I remember watching on film the day after the game, I was on the left side of our, of our offensive line, and I had released to block an individual and I ended up on the ground and there was a pursuing defender that was running behind me. And as he jumped over me, his cleat clipped the back of my helmet and on film you see it, you see my head kind of bob downward, and then my body goes completely limp. And to be honest with you, it didn't appear to be a strong hit. I mean, it almost appeared to be soft in nature. But, but the effect was, it was evident. What was interesting, though, is that I began to regain consciousness and I got up and was speaking to my teammates, high fiving my teammates, ran up to the sideline where I'm talking with coaches and physicians and, and I, just, I remember none of it. It was the first time that I had an actual medical diagnosis of amnesia that came as a result of, of a concussion. And so it's really hard to put into words what it's like to experience that. You know, you're walking into a meeting room a day later, and you're watching a play that doesn't exist, in your memory at all. It's as if somebody had just taken an eraser to the whiteboard and removed it. And so, that was the concussion that for the first time changed the way that I began to look at this injury.
Christina Brown Fisher
Were you scared at all?
Ben Utecht
That's a really good question. I don't remember feeling, I don't remember in that moment feeling scared. I do remember over the next three or four years of my career and recognizing some of these cognitive weaknesses present themselves. There were moments where my wife and I, you know, just sat there in quietness, just looking at each other, you know, saying, "wow, did that did that really just happen?" Or, or surprised that, that I couldn't remember something so significant in our lives? And those are the moments, I think, that, you know, began to, to create, I think, some authentic, fears for the future. And then, and then obviously that, that, that was all happening over the course of the concussion crisis. So all of this information now is coming out about, you know, potential long term effects and the dawn of the CTE diagnosis...
Christina Brown Fisher
The chronic traumatic encephalopathy.
Ben Utecht
Encephalopathy, right. And so now all of these, all of these, you know, medical scientific truths which are being distributed through multiple media outlets are now beginning to kind of shape how you, how you look at the, at the injury.
Christina Brown Fisher
Can you provide context in terms of what you knew and what players as a whole new versus how it was being addressed by management, by the organizations?
Ben Utecht
It'd be fair to say ten years ago, 10 to 12 years ago and, and before that, that there, there wasn't a lot of medical information provided to players. Even though outside of athletics there was quite a bit of information on, on traumatic brain injury and the effects both short and long term that, that can happen [to] an individual. And so as I was heading towards retirement after my last concussion and spending a lot more time with physicians, neuro specialists in the medical community and spending more time researching, I, I learned so much more about the injury than was ever really presented within any organization. At the same time, I would, I would say with sincerity that, that I, I had the greatest respect for for our medical staff and training staff and have never to this day, as you know from reading my book, believe that there was any kind of nefarious behavior that was happening intentionally. I think it had a lot to do with just the culture of of the sport.
Christina Brown Fisher
Yes, that is noticeable about your book. It seems as though you don't necessarily hold the NFL responsible or accountable.
Ben Utecht
I have just chosen to, I want to have a pro brain, pro game message. That, that's always what it's been about for me. I chose to...
Christina Brown Fisher
How do you do pro-game, and pro-brain?
Ben Utecht
Well, I think, I think you have to embrace the beauty of, of the sport. I think when you look at what kind of a platform it's provided for so many individuals, especially the underserved young male adult youth of our country, when you listen to the stories of what so many of those men who grew up without fathers but will tell you that the coaches that they had in high school and college and, and beyond, played a father figure role in their lives. And I just think that there's so much benefit to, to the sport. And so with where we've come since that time and the education that exists now, I think it gives us a great opportunity to find balance, right? We know that this is a tough sport. It's not just brain injury, it's all injury. And it's, it's a reality that I think the average career is three years, right? It's not, it's a, it's a, it's a dangerous, and, and rough sport. So, if we can create a platform where we're we're fully educating the athletes, we are fully protecting them and taking care of their medical needs, then I think as fans we can continue to enjoy watching.
Christina Brown Fisher
Using your example, do you feel as though the relationships that are formed between players and coaches, and players among a team, do you feel like that outweighs the risks involved in the game?
Ben Utecht
Um, well, I guess it depends on, and on how you approach, how you approach risks. I tend to think it changes over different age groups. When you're dealing with children, it's a whole 'nother approach to how to answer the question. When you're dealing with grown adults, it's a whole 'nother approach to that question. So, you know, as an adult, I think that there's, ah, today in more than there ever has been in the history of football, I think that there's a closer balance to, you know, to, to where we are in that situation now with children. I think that we have a long way to go, you know, because I think you have children that are entering contact football in first grade all across our country. And so, that, that to me is, is, is...
Christina Brown Fisher
That's too young?
Ben Utecht
Dangerous, I think. Well, yeah, I've I've always as you can imagine, I get asked that question more than anything else. If you had a son, which I don't, I have four daughters, but if you had a son would you have them play football? And my answer is again about finding the balance between a pro-game and a
pro-brain message. And I was told in my time working with the American Academy of Neurology by a pediatrician, a pediatric neurologist, that the most important developmental stages of a child's brain are ages 2 to 12. The brain's actually maturing in ways that it never does after age 12. So there critical time. So for me, as a father of a son who wanted to play, would want to play football, I would, I would be very conservative in my, in my decision making during those ages. And, and so that to me is what's really valuable, you know? And so, you know, do, do you need to start football in first grade in order to be an NFL football player? No, you don't. And, and so at the same time, sports are very valuable to our children and in our culture.
Christina Brown Fisher
As tight end with the Colts in 2007 you won the Super Bowl. Is it true that you don't remember much about that night's game?
Ben Utecht
No, I would say that there are things as I began to tell my story, there were, there were, there were blank spots that, that, that I couldn't I just couldn't describe. I think that the, I think the scariest time came after, uh, came after my career when, when we were, you know, sitting down with friends over dinner and talking about our weddings. And I couldn't, I couldn't, for the life of me, understand why I wasn't invited to their wedding. And I remember saying to her, to our friends, you know, why? "You know, I wasn't in any type of camp. You know, why wasn't I invited," and just got really quiet and they brought over their wedding photo album and there it was, page after page as a groomsman in the wedding, as a singer in in the wedding. And, and I just have no memory of that, you know? No, no matter how many times you see the picture, it's like, and then you close your eyes and you try to place it. It's just out there. And, and, and so the, those types of experiences, I think, were the, or the ones that began to create some concern and, and some very thoughtful pause.
Christina Brown Fisher
Did you find yourself Ben when situations like that arose, did you later find yourself maybe not wanting to engage as much?
Ben Utecht
I would. Yeah, I mean, if I were being completely frank about it, I, I would say that, it's, it's really, you know, did you, were you becoming depressed at all in your life, right? Because, you know, clearly multiple concussions can have, you know, behavioral health consequences. And, and so what happened for me and everybody's got their own, their own story and experiences, I think for me, my faith was an integral part of helping me find purpose through all of that. But I'd be lying to you if, if I didn't share that. When you're, when you're not functioning cognitively, when, when you're executive functioning, right? Your ability to process information in, in real time is slow and inadequate. You lose your patience and you get very down on yourself. You lose self-confidence and self-esteem. And if you don't have the communication or emotional, you know, intelligence to understand what's happening, all of a sudden you have days where you just don't want to get out of bed or you spiral out of control or you snap at people because, you know, you yourself are having a difficult time processing the information. All of those things, you know, I did experience on different levels.
Christina Brown Fisher
I know for myself after my TBI, there was a very long period of time in which I withdrew from friendships, from conversations, period. Part of it would be because of just quite honestly, overstimulation. I couldn't track and follow a conversation sometimes with one person. It was even worse if there were multiple people. And then other times I just was embarrassed by the fact that I may not have remembered something that they mentioned a couple of days ago or a couple of hours ago. And the safest place to be was by myself.
Ben Utecht
No, I totally can understand what you were going through. And again, it kind of goes back to just really being blessed to have a support system around me with my family, my, my wife, with other passions that were a part of my identity, that I was, that, that I was practicing at the time with music and with some of the things that I wanted to pursue. Those were all, those all played a role in helping me come back.
Christina Brown Fisher
After spending four seasons with the Indianapolis Colts and another two with the Cincinnati Bengals you left. Why was that the right time for you to go?
Ben Utecht
Oh, there's a lot of factors in that decision. I think probably most importantly is family. We just had our first daughter and that began to change the importance of the future. And so that, that played a role into that decision. Also, it began to become apparent that my concussion history was going to be a concern for any new team to, to take the risk. And, and, and so there were, there were hurdles within, within the you know, the scouting of, of NFL talent that, that made it very difficult to, to continue. And, you know, for me to continue would have meant, you know, basically agreeing to waivers that, that would, you know, release responsibility because of, you know, any future concussion in the future. And I just didn't want to play. I just didn't want to play those games with my, with my life. So, it just became the right time to do what was best.
Christina Brown Fisher
It's a little difficult for me to understand how athletes, how players didn't know or recognized the risk of head injury and football, given all that was already out there about traumatic brain injury. Plus, you're repeatedly slamming into one another. That cannot be good for the body, right? Can you explain to me why there was still this this lack of understanding of the impact of the head injuries among the players?
Ben Utecht
Well, I you know, I think that there's responsibility on both sides, right? This is now your profession, a little bit different in youth sports and in college. There is, there's, there's much more of a familial or parental environment that's created within, you know, the coach relationship with coaches and trainers and, and whatnot. You know, players aren't typically going into their, in any sport, they're not going into those scholarship years or those contractual agreement years studying medical history of all the injuries that they're going to, they're going to face. Right? You know, we're, we're not we're not all pre-med and trying to, you know, to really understand, you know, the anatomy of the body and what it can impact it, so, I think that part of that is just kind of this, this culture of, of negligence, right, on both sides. We as players, I was just, I was negligent to, you know, do any discovery on, on any injury that I had and, or faced. And, and so at the same time, you know, I think that we could have had more information provided, you know, through staff that, that maybe has more of that information available.
Christina Brown Fisher
Ben, you are now an advocate for brain injury, brain injury awareness for anyone affected by brain injury, not just athletes, but particularly as a former NFL player, and given your experience, has enough, is enough being done to protect players?
Ben Utecht
So, I, I genuinely believe that we have come a very long way. And, I think that you are seeing the positive impact that the focus on this injury has created across the country. It's, it's really quite amazing because you, you now have parents and coaches and teams at every level now that have to go through statewide legislation. Right? That has, that is designed to, to educate and to hold people in position accountable, you know, for the health and wellness of, of student athletes. And so I do think that we've come a very long way. I'd, I would say that the, the, the other side of that answer is that we have to continue to grow every single year. So, have we come a long way? Yes. Can more be done? Is it enough? No. And I don't know if I'll ever say that it is enough because we're constantly going to be learning more and more and more data will come in and we'll learn more. And, so, what are we going to do with the new information? And so I hope that we continue through advocacy, finding new ways to elevate player health and safety. And, you know, that's our job as advocates, as champions for the cause, to be able to continue to drive that momentum forward.
Christina Brown Fisher
In your book, you you write about being driven to the point where you felt you needed to document the symptoms that you were experiencing following your concussion. They included random headaches, according to your book: dizziness, sleeplessness, night sweating, loss of balance, fatigue, nausea, hard time, driving in a car, snapping at wife. How did you get past all of this?
Ben Utecht
Oh, man, it's interesting hearing you recite those, because I haven't, I haven't read that book in a, in a long time. And, you know, you know..
Christina Brown Fisher
You're not experiencing any of those things anymore?
Ben Utecht
No, but but, you know, when you say them out loud at, you, you know, I'm kind of reliving them now in the moment. You know, it, it, I, I needed to document. I needed to document, number one, because it was a therapeutic form of journaling. But also wanted to make sure that I was doing my best to be truthful in my experiences. You know, I knew I was going to be going through some transitions and some arbitrations. And this was an opportunity for me to make sure that because I was struggling cognitively, this was a, this was a chance to make sure that I could provide some more clarity. How did I get through it? Oh, man. Just, you know, by the grace of God and by, by, like I said, surrounding myself with a support system of people that loved and cared for my wellness, and music played a huge role in that. You know, as a professional entertainer and singer, it gave me an outlet and I wrote songs about it and made videos. And those were all a part of this kind of therapeutic process that brought me back. And then I was introduced to a company called Learning RX, which gave me the chance to train again, but in a different way.
Christina Brown Fisher
Yeah, tell me about Learning RX. Sounds like it was more grueling than training camp.
Ben Utecht
You know, this was just kind of one of those providential moments. I was co-hosting a television show here in Minnesota where I'm from, and we were highlighting the services of a company that has dedicated itself to cognitive brain training. And I guess, you know, the foundational goals are simple. We can improve your your cognitive abilities. And so I set out and I did this 100 hour intensive brain training program Monday through Thursday, an hour and a half each session, sitting across the table from a brain trainer who was taking me through many different exercises to strengthen a number of different cognitive abilities. My neuroscience valuation was shocking, to be honest with you. My, my, my, my pre score, especially in short and long term memory, showed me to be in the 12th and 17th percentile, which was shockingly low. But after the 100 hours, the 12th and 17th percent went to the 78th and 90th percentile and it was through those three months that I just began to regain and even become stronger cognitively than I, than I had been while I was playing.
Christina Brown Fisher
What were you doing?
Ben Utecht
Well, there was everything from mathematic, mathematical exercises, vocabulary exercises, memory exercises. Those were some of the most challenging for me. You know, I had, I had, you know, shared my concerns publicly, and this was the first time that they were validated by biomedical, scientific, scientifically credible data saying, "hey, you're not crazy, Ben. We're, we can show you that you are struggling in these areas." And that, ironically, gave me a lot of peace. Like you might think, wow, you know, to get those low test scores back, and wouldn't that make you feel even more scared? But the reality was, it actually made me feel like I wasn't crazy. Like I had, you know, all of these hidden consequences I can actually show I'm really dealing with this. So, we did one exercise that was for short and long term memory in it, and what they would do, is they would, they would give you word distribution. They'd give you, they'd give you, we started out with ten nouns and they would give you a new word every 6 seconds, and they would have a metronome on the table that was clicking back and forth. And every two clicks was a second rate of click. And every 6 seconds they give you a new word and you'd think to yourself, "this shouldn't be a problem." So they give you the first word tree, right? And then 6 seconds and they give you dog 6 seconds, and then they give you like 6 seconds. And I'll tell you, like you're, you're reciting each of these words over and over again, trying to memorize them as it's happening. But then you get to that fourth word and all of a sudden that first word is...
Christina Brown Fisher
You forgot it's "tree"?
Ben Utecht
And I remember just barely getting in, like, all of a sudden, like, I'm halfway through this list, and I thought I had the first three, and then, then the fourth one made the first one go away, and now I can't remember the fourth one. And then it just compounds and I'm sweating and, and I'm, I maybe, I maybe, you know, three of the words and they ask you, to, they ask you, to recite the words back in chronological order to the best of your ability, forwards and backwards.
Christina Brown Fisher
Oh, my goodness.
Ben Utecht
Right? And so...
Christina Brown Fisher
Oh, my goodness.
Ben Utecht
That was day one, right? By day 90, I was able to recite back 25 words. Not only nouns, but adjectives and verbs. Forwards and backwards. And they were distributed every 2 seconds. I mean, that's how amazing the transformation.
Christina Brown Fisher
Yeah, that's impressive. And you felt like what you were gaining in those sessions they transferred to the rest of your life outside of the therapeutic setting?
Ben Utecht
Yes.
Christina Brown Fisher
Oh, that's great.
Ben Utecht
100% and a part of that, too, is just what happens. See, what happens over the course of the three months is, is moments of of success. It's winning, right? You plateau. And then all of a sudden, one day you come in and you're better and you excel and you win at these exercises and then you plateau and then you win and you succeed. And you're doing it all along developing a personal relationship with another human being across the table. So you're having to have a relationship with that person. You have to communicate with that person. And so a number of things are happening over the course of this. It's not just the exercises, it's, it's relationship managing, it's confidence and self-esteem building. Right? All while helping you strengthen injured neural pathways and even the creation of new neural pathways. So the retraining of how you do certain things. Right? And so you begin to start applying all of those tactics. Even subconsciously, and you come out of it a more assured individual.
Christina Brown Fisher
So as you do better, you feel better, and then you continue to do better.
Ben Utecht
Exactly. And it's not, it's not just this, it's not subjective. I mean, I think that's one of the issues people have with concussions, is that it, the injury comes across as such a subjective injury because everybody's experience is different. So how do we really believe, you know, when we can't see? Well, this, it was tangible. This was objective, and it put a little bit more meat on the bone. And that, that, that, that goes a long way.
Christina Brown Fisher
When you talk about being fortunate in that you had an identity outside of football, your professional singing career. For so many people who have been sidelined by traumatic brain injury, what sometimes makes recovery worse is knowing that they won't be who they were before. Maybe they can't work again or they can't work in the same job, have the same role. How did you grapple with having the identity of an NFL player, a Super Bowl champion, stripped from you?
Ben Utecht
I think that it was growing up in a family that told me that my self-worth was greater than a game, that gave me opportunities to discover more layers to my identity, and that's priceless. And unfortunately, there are so many that don't grow up in those types of environments and aren't given those types of truths that create powerful purpose. And so when you remove the game, right, which they have made their entire identity, we experience tragically and unfortunately, we have experienced what that can do to an individual. But for me, it was finding that, I, my identity is much more than just as a, as an athlete. And that as humans we have such incredible potential within the purpose that we really exist for. And that gives people hope, right? And that's what we need in this type of a situation. When a career ends, when one door closes, another door will open. But you have to, you have to have hope in that. You have to believe in that and you've got to be willing to walk.
Christina Brown Fisher
Do you? Do you ever have regrets about your career?
Ben Utecht
No.
Christina Brown Fisher
No?
Ben Utecht
I, would go back, however, and change, changed the way I played the game. I played, I played very tall. I'm a tall player. Anyway, I'm six foot seven, but I played tall.
Christina Brown Fisher
And what does that mean?
Ben Utecht
It means that I did a poor job of protecting myself. You know, as a tight end. We run across the middle and open ourselves up to linebackers and safeties, the big hitters on the football field and so when you look at some of the great wide receivers, some of the great tight ends and we had, we had them on our football team. So they, they had such a, they had such a, you know, strong ability to protect themselves, to run out of bounds when instead of taking the big hit, or to to see the hit coming into it, and to dive down to get underneath it. And I, I just gave, was not good at that. I ran tall. I, I caught tall and I went down tall. Well, that just means I gave people a lot to hit and I took some massive hits. And so I would, you know, I would go back and change some of those things. And, and, you know, and again, I wish I went back and did a better job of understanding, you know, some you know, more about what the injuries are that I, that you do face in this game, and what do you do about it, when you when you do face that.
Christina Brown Fisher
In 2013, when Aaron Hernandez was arrested is it true that you approached the New England Patriots about needing a veteran tight end?
Ben Utecht
So that was an interesting time. You know, I was I was a couple of years out, I had really come back to a place where I, you know, as you call it, a new normal. Right? So, I had come back to a place of normalcy. I was in great shape. And there were a couple of teams that were really struggling at the tight end position. So those situations across the league motivated me to reach out to my sports agent and, and say it wasn't just the Patriots, there were a couple of other teams in there too. But just to say, you know, "would you, would you mind reaching out and seeing if there was any opportunity?" You know, and again, this was this was the identity struggle, right? This, so many years of your here, you know, vocational and emotional identity wrapped up in a sport, that it's really hard to let go. And so I presented this idea to my parents because there were, there were, there were a couple of teams that were I think were willing to, you know, to at least give me a try out and see.
Christina Brown Fisher
How old were you at that time?
Ben Utecht
Uh, let's see here. That might have been 29, 30, 31, right, right in that time frame. And, I remember sitting down with my my parents and my wife and telling them that I, that I reached out and had this conversation and that there was some response. And, and my dad just without really any hesitation said, you know, "if, if you decide to play again, I won't watch a single game."
Christina Brown Fisher
That's a powerful statement.
Ben Utecht
And that's the guy that I remember, you know, getting on his knees and letting me hit him as hard as I could. Right? And so you it just, it was the last nail in the coffin. It was kind of like, "gosh, okay, thank you, Dad. Because that, that really, you kind of brought me out of the clouds and back down to reality." And, and, and so, you know, is one of those situations in life that you have to go through, right, in order to in order to grow.
Christina Brown Fisher
Ben, you've described your book as a love letter to your wife and four daughters as a way to preserve memories even if they one day slide away from you. Do you still feel that way today that you might one day forget everyone.
Ben Utecht
I think that the fear or I should say, maybe no longer fear, the sadness, the sadness that, that reality exists is still there 100%. I mean, who would ever want to go through that? I mean, you know, being an advocate for brain health and, and just experiencing the caregivers that are going through dementia with their loved ones or Alzheimer's or Parkinson's or Lewy Body, I mean, you know, you just can't, you can't fathom what it's like to have to go through having some, your loved one there physically, but the essence of who they are slowly deteriorating before your eyes. Right? So, you know, I, I pray that the work that I put in cognitively will now give me the opportunity to store memories better moving forward. And that, and that chronic traumatic encephalopathy won't play a significant role in, in my future. But that, that's all uncertain. And so because of that uncertainty, I would be lying if I didn't say that there wasn't some sadness that I feel if I begin to think about what that, what that experience will be like for my family.
Christina Brown Fisher
Ben, for our listeners who don't have the superstar super athlete background that you have, but they are certainly struggling, they have endured a traumatic brain injury; what are the words of encouragement? What are the things that you would say to someone to press ahead, move forward?
Ben Utecht
That you matter? They matter. And I mean that with a deep level of love and compassion. You matter. You're significant. You were created for a purpose. Ok? And that there is no difference between me as a, as a very lucky Super Bowl champion and you. We are one in the same because we have a heart that beats and a mind that functions to do great things in this life. And so, don't let an injury define who you are, let the way you respond to the injury define who you are.
Christina Brown Fisher
Ben Utecht, the book is Counting the Days While My Mind Slips Away: A Love Letter to My Family. It's about faith. It's about football and it's about family. Thank you so much for joining me today, Ben.
Ben Utecht
Thank you for having me.
Christina Brown Fisher
Real pleasure. To order a copy of Ben Utecht's book, please visit the Me, Myselt and TBI website.