Photo by Sarah Finnegan.
Madison McGill poses wearing her lacrosse helmet. After suffering a concussion in 2016, Madison and her mother are working to change the equipment rules for the sport to require all players to wear protective head gear.
A digital camera’s shutter speed can be a great thing.
It can stop fast-moving moments in perfect clarity. It helps produce beautiful photos to cherish forever.
It can also be a detriment. It can show a mother the moment her daughter is hit on the head with a lacrosse stick. It can show her daughter’s reaction to that pain. It can show her fall to the turf.
That’s exactly what Alli McGill has seen. Her daughter, Madison McGill, is 13 years old and has played lacrosse for six years. Madison, a Pizitz Middle School eighth-grader, is a part of the Vestavia team in the Greater Birmingham Youth Lacrosse Association.
In the spring of 2016, Madison suffered a concussion not related to lacrosse. She was out of school for nearly two-and-a-half months recovering.
“It was a pretty severe concussion,” Alli McGill said.
Her daughter experienced blurred vision, headaches for months and an adverse effect on her memory. When the time came for Madison to pick up her lacrosse stick again, her mother was hesitant. Even though her concussion was not caused by lacrosse, her mom was concerned about potential lacrosse-related head injuries.
“She had fallen in love with the game of lacrosse, so it was really hard for me to say, ‘You can’t ever play again,’” Alli McGill said.
They researched and came to an agreement. Madison could play if she wore a helmet. Of course, she was willing to do so. They found a helmet called the Hummingbird, which looks much like a bicycle helmet.
Alli McGill said lacrosse is “very different” for boys and girls. A look at the Greater Birmingham Youth Lacrosse Association’s guidelines confirms that. For the boys, safety equipment requires a helmet, mouthpiece, shoulder pads, arm pads, gloves and an athletic cup. For the girls, safety equipment requires eye guards or goggles. Optional equipment includes gloves, and soft headgear. In some leagues, hard helmets are not allowed for field players.
“They don’t have the equipment to wear like the boys do,” Alli McGill said.
Alli McGill said the trend now, it seems, is that girls are beginning to wear helmets. It’s mandatory in Florida, and she’s now making that push in Alabama, where lacrosse is rapidly growing in popularity.
Alli McGill hands out brochures, spreads the word about helmets across the various boards she’s on and encourages parents and coaches to consider helmets for their girls.
“If you can prevent a concussion, it’s a good thing,” she said.
Helmets for girls can’t be found in local sporting goods stores, Alli McGill said. They have to be ordered online. The average parent of a lacrosse player may not know about the helmets.
“We think because there is no mandatory safety equipment for girls, some of (the injuries) could very well be eliminated,” Alli McGill said. “That’s just our opinion, but some of the injuries that we’ve been aware of, we feel that if helmets were involved, then it would have lessened the injury. That’s what these helmets are made for, to prevent concussions.”
She said she hopes U.S. Lacrosse, the national governing body of lacrosse, mandates helmets for girls.
“I don’t know if and when, but we’re sure doing our best to try to help that process along,” Alli McGill said.
She said her daughter’s first thought when she began wearing her Hummingbird helmet was she’d be the only one wearing one and be the girl who didn’t fit in.
“She really took it on and made it her own and started thinking, ‘You know what, I don’t want anyone else to go through what I went through with my concussion,’” Alli McGill said. “She has been a huge advocate of these helmets. She’s encouraged her teammates. We’ve reached out to other communities that have these leagues, trying to get these helmets across the state of Alabama.”
Alli McGill said she thinks back to last year, when her daughter experienced all the negatives of her concussion. She often stayed in bed and was unable to spend time with her friends. No teenager should experience that.
“She doesn’t want that to happen to anybody else,” Alli McGill said.
