Fredericks' rugby future in balance
Makos utility forward Vernon Fredericks relaxes at home in Blenheim as he recovers from brain surgery.
Very few sportsmen would view an on-field concussion as a lucky break.
But that is exactly what it was for Tasman Makos utility forward Vernon Fredericks.
On April 18, the 24 year-old suffered a serious head knock playing for his club side, Moutere, against Harlequins, leaving him dazed and confused. "I have no idea how it happened," he said. "I can't remember the first half. I was just wandering around, didn't even go into the team huddle at halftime … I thought I was playing hooker and I wasn't at all."
Having no major history of concussion, Fredericks though he would shake it off quickly after the mandatory stand-down period, but three and a half weeks later he was still suffering.
"I remember waking up at 4 o'clock in the morning with a thumping headache. I took some panadol and water but then I couldn't keep it down."
Two days later it happened again. "The headaches weren't going away. I thought I could sleep it off, but no. That's when I told my partner that I had to go to the hospital. I couldn't sleep or keep anything down … I was just spewing up everything."
He went to Wairau where the medical staff put him on a drip, then, as the CT scanner in Blenheim was broken, they sent him by ambulance to Nelson Hospital to be checked over.
The doctor's diagnosis was short, to the point and got his full attention. "He told me I had a two centimetre cyst in the middle of my brain and I would have to go to Wellington or Christchurch immediately to be operated on.
"I was calm, but my partner was a bit upset. It was just nerves, and a bit weird hearing you have to have brain surgery."
He opted to travel south for the operation, as his cousin was there, and was airlifted to Christchurch straight away.
After a two-day wait he had an MRI scan, which confirmed the initial diagnosis, then waited a week in the hospital for the operation. A highlight of his nervous wait for surgery was a bedside visit from Makos' team mates Billy Guyton, David Havili and Pete Samu, part of the Crusaders wider training squad.
The operation, which involved drilling two holes the size of a 10c coin in Fredericks' scull before popping the cyst with a camera, then drilling another hole to let the cerebral fluid drain, went perfectly according to his surgeon, despite it being in a tricky location.
After the op Fredericks stayed in hospital for three days, then returned to Blenheim where he is recuperating before, hopefully, returning to work with Scaffold Marlborough later this month.
Given the urgency of his treatment, many of his friends were concerned about the outcome. "When I came back people were going up to my partner saying, "Is Vernon alright, is he still the same? Everyone thinks I've gone a bit dopey, but I'm still the same," he says with a broad smile.
He knows he has rugby's new, more-stringent concussion rules to thank for his close shave. "If I hadn't had the concussion in the Harlequins game I wouldn't have known [about the cyst]. The doctor said the concussion aggravated it.
"Under the old rules I may have just had the automatic two-week stand down and got back into it."
Since the operation he has shaken off the worst of the headaches but still gets tired if he exercises too hard.
His rugby-playing prospects are up in the air, depending on another scan in three months to see if the cyst, which was identified as benign, is gone. "The doctor said that may dictate whether I can play again, ever. If it bleeds again it may block up the drainage hole.
"[The surgeon] was really positive about the outcome though, and didn't rule out me playing again this year, if everything is alright."
Although he was looking forward to his sixth Makos season, after finishing the 2015 NPC championship in some of the best form of his career, Fredericks is philosophical about the possibility he may miss all this campaign, or may even have played his last game.
"I couldn't wait to get back on [to the field] … but it's going to have to wait a wee bit.
"I have certainly got a positive attitude, but I will heed the doctor's advice. There are other things more than rugby in life."
