Athletes and Mental Health: The Hidden Opponent | Victoria Garrick | TEDxUSC

You have to pass a team lift at 6:00 a.m. but you're accidentally a minute late because you fell asleep while the alarm was going off your heart is pounding from running to the gym but no one cares that it's because you were up until 2:00 a.m. Studying for an exam you don't yet feel prepared for you can feel the tension between you and your teammates who are now running sprints tomorrow at 6 a.m. because you're a minute late you start the lift and your mind just isn't in the right place but it doesn't matter you have to lift and as soon as it's over you devour your breakfast on the way to the 8:00 a.m. class. m. and you get there and your hair is still wet because you didn't have time to dry it, the teacher looks tells you where the homework is but you forgot it, how could you forget it?

You're supposed to be on top of everything so you sit there and worry about what else you might have forgotten and then at noon you have a 30 minute break, but it's not really a break because you use it to quickly catch up on a task. that you missed last week's game and soon it's 12:10 and to you forty minutes doesn't seem like enough time to get on the court and be ready, even though it really is. I see you approaching and a practice is starting and you have to forget everything that happened in your day because in practice you have to perform, you can't not perform, there is someone better than you, someone competing with you and someone in high school who just committed to be you, so forget the zero on your homework forget the test you're not prepared for forget the friends you haven't seen in weeks forget the argument you had with your parents play well do well act and when it's finally Al When you finish, you find yourself looking in the locker room mirror trying not to cry and you wonder: is this how I'm supposed to feel?

My name is Victoria Garrick and I play volleyball here at USC. I have played sports all my life, but never. pretty much like that now in high school I didn't understand

mental

illness and usually when people say

mental

illness, you know people get tense because talking about it is uncomfortable, you might think, oh, I've heard this before or This doesn't affect me. They are common thoughts I have. I know this because I used to think the same things. I thought you know depression means you have serious family problems or you know you're born with anxiety. I just didn't understand it because it's hard to understand something that you can understand.

I don't see or touch, so when I got to college and started my career as a Division 1 athlete, I never thought I would struggle with these issues. Now I can't be the only athlete here and we definitely probably have some soul cyclists and some neighborhood runners. so if you've ever had an injury, a tear, a sprained ligament, an ankle, I just want you to raise your hand, great, it's like most of the room, it's pretty common now. I want you to raise your hand, if you've ever done so. You had depression or anxiety. You can put your hands down.

Did you almost feel that tension or awkwardness that we just created together? Maybe you judged someone who raised their hand or were afraid to raise yours because of what people might think? four people suffer from a mental

health

problem, which is 25% of this room right now. What we just experienced together was a room full of people who stigmatize mental

health

. Jeffrey Jeffrey Lieberman defined stigma as dishonor or disgrace, he says it is like the scarlet A that Hester Prynne is forced to wear or the mark of Cain in the Bible, it is this label that marginalizes you from everyone else, we stigmatize health mental health in the same way and that is a social problem that needs to change and while anyone can experience a mental health problem today I am going to talk about mental health specifically in

athletes

because I have faced anxiety and depression through my experiences as athlete, so let me tell you a little bit. about me when I first got to the USC volleyball team I was very happy let me start by saying I wasn't a top recruit okay I didn't get called up a ton to Division one schools but USC was my dream scenario and I wanted it so bad and I knew I was good enough despite what everyone told me, so I emailed these coaches every day.

I called them every week. I went to do extra reps in high school. I sent them videos. I called again until they said, "Okay, you can move on." like stop contacting each other, so I finally got my spot, but still these USC coaches didn't think I would play a single point, but I had this fire, this enthusiasm for the competition and I didn't care that I didn't have the accolades that the other girls . I did it I kept working hard against all odds my first season I started and I played in every Pac-12 game and we won the championship that's me on the left right there and what happened was there was a girl who wasn't supposed to Do it Anyone who now has a role in what at the time was the number one team in the nation, mentally I started in this high place because I was living my dream, but suddenly I started to feel different, I became anxious, more anxious than I was. .

I had never before felt like I had five alarms to make sure I wasn't late, but I didn't even use the five alarms because I woke up at 7:15 anyway because of my anxiety about being late and I constantly worried about my athletic performance on days. of party. I was worried: What would happen if I didn't play well tonight? What would happen if the coaches benched me? What if my passes suck? What would happen if I didn't study Scout enough? There were moments when I felt a knot in my stomach and my skin began to crawl and my hands began to shake and I also had tears because I was very afraid to play and make a mistake because at an elite level mistakes are costly and on top of that I had school and exams and family in a social life and I couldn't.

I can't handle everything that's coming at me so fast and it just piles up at the same time. I want to take a second to show you how this happened to me because, to be ironic, it's easier to understand something when you can see it, so here we are. I'm going to look at a typical week in my life. I'm going to disclaimer. This wasn't meant to be funny, but while I was writing my talk I realized how funny my schedule is, so I had a little fun, so if you want. Don't take a tragic situation like mine lightly, you're going to enjoy this if not, bear with me.

I have 16 class units, 5 come out of our practice block, so I have needed tutoring, maybe time to eat because I am a human being. Who does that? Sometimes I also need office hours, probably with a professor who thinks his class is the only thing I have to do in my life. Then I have a test that I probably only know 20% of, so I'm going to set aside study time on a teacher really that 20% on top of all my other assignments and, wow, maybe I have 6 a. m. running because my teammates are going through the same thing as me and she was late one day, but don't forget the games on Friday and Sunday. from the state so now I'm missing these days of school because I'm secretly traveling I'm a little excited I'm missing class but the logical part of me is like what am I going to find the time to make up for that job because The warm-up The game starts not one, not two, not three, but four hours before the game, so if you thought I'd have time to make up for it, I actually don't and then everything restarts when I get off my plane early to do it all over again. and in the little time I have left I like to cry and feel miserable.

I wish I was joking, but if you look at the calendar in all seriousness, you can see how this could take over anyone, it could take over one of you. Suddenly I was thinking about what I have to do next, how I can't be late, how I can't get lost, what could go wrong, and it drove me crazy and, since I hadn't thought about it, I could do it. I have some of these diseases because I was an athlete. I struggled with depression for half a year without even knowing it. When I first felt really unhappy it was in August and I didn't know how to describe it every morning.

I woke. I immediately despised him. the day um I didn't have the energy I didn't want to go anywhere I didn't want to see anyone or do anything in practice I just went through the motions I woke up I went to the practice block for five hours and I went to sleep and I did it over and over again . I was completely exhausted and completely drained and do you know how much energy it takes day in and day out to not even succeed, but just get by as a student-athlete? It is exhausting. and I said to myself you can't feel like that Victoria you have nothing to be sad about you are just starting out you have a great family you have good friends and I was confused because I was always known for being the most energetic, the most cheerful and talkative and always happy so I told him to put on that face and pretend, but after a while he couldn't pretend.

I started seeing a psychologist once a weekend. It was weird, to be honest, you know, the first time I walked into the waiting room. I thought: "My God, now I'm one of those people who has a therapist, you know, you imagine there goes that voice that stigmatizes mental health as therapies for weirdos." I thought I would like to come in and it would be like this. a big yellow couch and I liked this tissue box and they were like, tell me your darkest secrets, but it's not like that, it was actually very helpful, so after a while of looking at it he suggested I try antidepressant medication and I immediately thought : It's like when you've been dating someone for a while and they say, I want you to meet my parents, and you say this is too serious now, so naturally I refused the medication, but of course my depression got worse.

I realized that it was so. It's not something that I could just eat a tub of ice cream while crying and be fine the next day, the neurochemicals in my brain are literally not producing like they used to and my serotonin levels were no longer high enough to keep my mood up. the one who was Once was what I used to be unable to describe. I could put it into words. I had this dark cloud over my head and it followed me everywhere. It was there when I woke up. It was there when I went to sleep.

I was there in practice. every day passing balls and you know how hard it is when you have to be good at your craft every day and all you want to do is lie down in a ball and just cry. I remember moments during water breaks that I ran into the bathroom and I only saw it because for five seconds I wanted my day to stop. Fortunately, I never got to the point of self-harm and I never put myself in any real danger, but I remember a few times I was on a bike and thought, you know, this car? accidentally hit me that would stop my week that would give me the rest I need so much I want to show you some photos that I posted during this time in my life what we thought of these just look at them Here I am with my friends At the party there we look nice and Christmassy at the Right, we're celebrating.

I look happy on the right because no one posts what they don't want you to see this photo on the left. I was at that party probably 20 minutes before I was so overwhelmed with all the people around me that I snuck out the back and went home alone. I know my friend in the photo texted me and said, “hey, where are you going?” I lied and met someone. The photo in the middle we took about 50 photos from that night to find one that I thought was pretty enough to post on my Instagram fully staged and the one on the right I spent that night crying.

I was trying so hard to portray this life that I so felt like I needed to have and this is a problem with so many people my age, not just because of depression, but because our culture has created this belief that we should achieve all the time. time to be happy. Look what internship he got, look what trip he went on. Keep scrolling constantly by people who look like they're doing so well that you sit back and say to yourself, well, what am I doing? What do I look like? Why don't I look like her? I need to make it to be happy and valued if I'm on the USC volleyball team I'll be valued if I get this job I'll be happy at this point you're probably thinking why don't you quit?

I don't have a scholarship. I could just leave it. Why don't I stop doing that? I don't quit because volleyball is what I am. It's not a hobby or something I do on the side. It's my life like most

athletes

and what that means is. I have to learn to manage my lifestyle because I have two more years left and I better want to win a championship. I have major depressive disorder, single episode with anxious features. Now I see my therapist. I take medication. I practice positive thinking. I try. being authentic on social media with people, but the biggest thing that stuck out for me was that I sat down and evaluated everything and thought about why it took me so long to recognize and accept my illness and realized the culture we live in.

These athletes don't make it easy for us to honor this ifYou think about it, the culture of athletics preaches where there's a will, there's a way, the best don't rest unless you vomit, pass out or die, continue, mental illness is associated with weakness to appear weak is the last thing a man wants athlete and we always hear about the grind, right, it's about the grind, even if you're not an athlete, I mean, for me you've heard about the grind, it means when you just feel like I can't do something, but You do it when your thighs are burning and you're sweating buckets, you run one more sprint when it's the fifth set and you feel like you can't do it anymore, but you're going to dig ten more balls like That's the routine, but being part of this culture makes it very difficult for athletes to differentiate between what is hard work and what is trying too hard.

What happens when this effort in your training becomes an effort through a conversation, an effort throughout a day and suddenly, a push in your life. I know what the routine is. I started on this team for two years competing with girls who were supposed to explode. They kicked me out of the gym and that's why it was so hard for me to honor what was going on. I was at practice thinking I don't want to be here today I just want to go home. and rest and I said Victoria the golden one is gone she is here she is working hard she must want more than you you don't deserve to be here if you are not going to work hard I told myself I was weak for wanting a break and this is so true in all athletes because the stigma makes it very difficult for us to come forward.

Did you know that Serena Williams and Terry Bradshaw have had depression? Serena Williams, she is a legend, okay, she was the number one tennis player in the world seven different times and even someone like her can struggle with these issues. but that's just something people don't realize, let's look at concussions, for example, in 1933, the n-c-double-a medical manual said that concussions should not be considered too lightly. In 1952, the New England Journal of Medicine said that players had suffered multiple concussions. You should stop playing football, it wasn't until 70 years later in 2009 that the NFL publicly acknowledged that concussions can have lasting effects on players, so we're seeing something here where 20 years ago no one cared about concussions. concussions, you think so, hitting your head. together it's probably not safe, there are no players, they tell us to suck it up if your head hurts, the way we treat mental illness today is very similar to the way we treat concussions 20 years ago, oh, these athletes who feel depressed, let them sleep, oh let the athletes who have an anxiety attack tell them to calm down we need to make a social change so that people care so much about mental health because I will tell you this right now a physical injury It is more serious than a psychological injury and that needs to change.

I could easily have the day off for a physical injury because I'm limping, you can see my swollen ankle, but have an athlete say I've been feeling depressed this week or I've had insomnia. Oh, insomnia because of my anxiety, you're just looking down on me and at this level no one wants to miss practice. I mean, that puts me behind the competition on my team, but when the coach can see that you're injured, they make you sit down because they can see that your physical health is at stake. but when no one can see your mental health, you decide and someone like me, who hates not being there, my team will tell you this.

I hate not being there when they run without me and I'm hurt, that kills. So walking up to them and telling them I'm completely unharmed and you can't see it but I'm not okay and I need to rest today is very hard to do and with everything I've been through. I have only done it once I am here today for a larger population, a silent population of athletes who think they will be seen as inferior, do not have the courage to put themselves forward or do not know that they can be a strong competitive elite athlete and have a mental health issue in 2015, the n-c-double-a conducted a survey and found that of 2,100 athletes, 30% reported that they were overwhelmed by depression and anxiety and said they had seen an overall increase this is two years old this should It will be recorded every season, if not every year, and they don't even give us numbers on depression and anxiety and this is the most recent survey the n-c-double-a has done.

It infuriates me that this is something so serious that it is being so clearly ignored that I did my own survey to show you that this is an epidemic. I surveyed 100 men and women from Division one schools like Stanford Oregon Washington UCLA, you name it and this is what I found when I asked them if they had ever experienced in terms of depression or anxiety 69 percent said yes, the statistic The one I gave them at the beginning was 25 when asked if they thought the amount of time they needed to dedicate to their sport was too much, more than half said yes, almost 90% and the next one, I was honestly devastated when they arrived. the results and kept me awake for a few days.

I asked them if they have ever felt like they have experienced anxiety, depression, or an eating disorder, but are too afraid to tell anyone. More than half means that those athletes of today are somewhere and no one knows it. who are struggling and about 80% agree with me that this issue is neglected throughout society. My university provides me with free medicine and therapy and for that I am very grateful, but many other athletes like me do not have that opportunity because The subject is underrated and they do not have the funds due to the extreme demands on time and pressure that we, athletes. , we feel like we should exercise, we just have to be very aware of how athletes across the country are feeling and constantly evaluate them. and athletes need to be aware of their mental health so they can learn to manage this lifestyle.

I love my team, they are special girls and I love the sport of volleyball, so I can't let it go, but as I continue with my next two years I hope to hear this conversation get stronger I hope mental health stops being stigmatized for all people and I hope that one day a person like me can get up on this stage to ask a question about mental health and no one will think twice before raising their hand thank you