A doctor confirmed that a high school football player who died by suicide had advanced chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE.
Two years after Wyatt Bramwell died, Dr. Anne McKee, the director of the BU CTE Center, diagnosed Wyatt with stage 2 CTE, WSMV-TV reported last week. The diagnosis is alarming because it marks the first time that advanced CTE has been found in a high school football player as young as Wyatt. CTE is divided into four stages that are marked pathologically by a protein buildup in the brain that impairs neuropathways and can cause severe cognitive issues. McKee told the news station that it takes years for CTE to progress from stage 1 to stage 2, and in Wyatt’s case, several CTE lesions were discovered in the part of his brain that controls memory and emotion.
Wyatt's parents, Bill and Christie, said in the months before Wyatt's death, they had noticed a change in him.
"“He was impulsive, argumentative,” Christie Bramwell told WSMV-TV. “He was making some very abrupt decisions that we wouldn’t consider normal for him. He would yell, which just wasn’t like Wyatt, and he stepped away from the family.”
Wyatt’s father initially believed it may have been typical teenage behavior.
“As a parent, you’re thinking, OK, am I dealing with this 18-year-old kid that’s transitioning from high school to college?” he asked. “You know, what kind of hormones are at play here?”
The Bramwells said Wyatt became uncharacteristically reckless by blowing off responsibilities and giving up on goals — like playing college football.
The Bramwells said they witnessed Wyatt’s sudden temperamental behavior worsen over two months. That’s when tragedy struck, and Wyatt took his own life.
“I just remember feeling just very numb, like this can’t be happening,” Christie said. “It didn’t make sense. He wouldn’t do this.”
In the minutes before Wyatt died, he recorded a video on his cell phone, telling his family that he had been suffering in secret and that his head was damaged from hits taken while playing football. In the video, Wyatt explained that the voices and demons inside his head had taken over everything he wanted to do and that he hoped his family would understand his decision to find peace from the pain.
Wyatt also asked that his brain be donated to science because he said he believed he was suffering CTE. Caused by repeated hits to the head, CTE can only be diagnosed posthumously. The Bramwells honored Wyatt’s wish and donated his brain to researchers at Boston University.
In Wyatt’s case, several CTE lesions were discovered in the part of his brain that controls memory and emotion. Wyatt became part of a major study at BU, where researchers examined the brains of 152 contact sport athletes — mostly football, soccer and ice hockey — who died before they turned 30 years old. The university released results showing that 68 of the young athletes studied — nearly 40 percent — had CTE.
“We’ve recognized that there’s an issue with pro athletes, and part of that is just due to the length of time that they play,” said Dr. Michael Rippee, a neurologist at the University of Kansas Medical Center specializing in concussion management in athletes. “For parents at home, I think what this study is showing is that these issues may happen earlier and with potentially fewer hits than we think.”
Instead of taking his memory, the Bramwells believe the disease caused Wyatt’s behavioral and mood changes, something Dr. McKee has said is indicative of stage 2 CTE, WSMV-TV reported. While injuries from concussions in the sport of football have garnered a lot of attention over the past decade — and repeated concussions certainly increase the risk of developing CTE — Wyatt’s parents said he was only diagnosed with one concussion, suffered during his eight-grade season.
Because of this, the Bramwells believe Wyatt’s disease was the result of smaller hits to the head that piled up over his 10 years of playing tackle football.
Rippee said the BU study gives credence to the Bramwells’ belief about their son.
“At the end of the day, it doesn’t seem to be about the number of diagnosed concussions, although that’s certainly important,” Rippee said. “It seems to be more about how many times they’re just hitting their heads. It’s just that constant hitting the head all day in practice, in games over and over, play by play.”
