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Junior Seau's family announced last week that they would donate the deceased football star's brain to science to be studied, but now, they've told the press that they're going to reconsider the decision.
According to USA Today, the family released the following statement:
The Seau family is currently revisiting several important family decisions and placing them on hold in order to confer with their elders. All possibilities are being considered, but none will be acted upon until the Seaus arrive at an agreed upon direction.
The Seaus are Samoan, and KTLA notes that consulting with elders before making important decisions is in keeping with Samoan tradition.
Many believe that Seau, who was found dead in his home last week of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, shot himself in the chest rather than in the head so that researchers could examine his brain for trauma sustained over his 20-year NFL career. Science has found that repeated head injuries, like those experienced by football players, sometimes result in long-term damage known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), which causes sufferers to get depressed, angry and have lapses in memory.
If Seau did intend to leave his brain to science, he wouldn't be the first professional football player to do so -- former Chicago Bears safety Dave Duerson, who killed himself in 2011, also shot himself in the chest, leaving a suicide note asking that his brain be studied.
