Ordinarily Speaking.
Everything looked perfect on the outside, but it couldn't have been worse on the inside. My brain had told me I was living the worst life. Soon s.
Hello and welcome to Ordinarily Speaking, a podcast that celebrates resilience in sport. My guest this episode is cricketer Moses Henriquez. He's been somewhat of a pioneer in the mental health space. The way he has shared his personal battle has helped other cricketers put their hands up to ask for help. The manner in which he explains his depression and anxiety
is eye opening yet relatable. Born in Portugal, Moses moved to Australia at a very young age and has gone on to play four tests for Australia, eleven One Day Internationals and eleven T twenty Internationals, the pressure of potential following him every step of the way. We caught up at his house in Sydney pre coronavirus restrictions, where he is a new dad and more motivated than ever to
speak up. If this chat triggers things for you, please remember there is help out there, beyond Blue or Lifeline, just a couple of places you can go. I hope you enjoy the chat.
Well, Moses, thanks so much for spending some time with me.
Thanks Nerlie, thanks for having me excited about this.
I wanted to ask you first up, what made you you've been really open with your mental health.
What made you take a private battle public.
It's a really interesting question.
I think there was a morning when I woke up when I was probably fairly close to like like the darkest times that i'd sort of been through in terms of what was happening in my head. And I remember waking up one morning and thinking, I've actually got the
life I've always wanted. I was playing professional cricket, lived in my own house, I had a really supporting girlfriend, a beautiful dog, great family, both my brothers, my mum and dad or you know, they were also supportive, an employer who was supportive, you know, security, and I still couldn't find a way to be grateful or happy about everything that was going on around me. I just remembered thinking, like this is how I guess addicts were like a
created and homeless people. And you know, when you get to this state of a mindset and you don't have that support and you don't have people there around you, trying to help you like I had when I was going through some really tough times. I even thought, if I didn't have my partner, there christa to bounce off and to constantly reassure me that, you know, every day was a success, every day was a winner. And I was like, what would what would someone in that situation
do without that support. I just thought it was crazy that some people would have to fight those demons in their head and fight those thoughts and feelings on their own.
I remembered in that moment, I.
Was just like, if I ever get to the light at the end of this tunnel, firstly, I wanted to do some work in trying to bridge that gap of the amount of support that I had around and those that are in a fortunate position can access and resources that can that they can access and try and just at least raise some awareness and get some support out to the less fortunate. Yes, I think that would be
trying to battle those things on their own. I mean, it was so hard to battle it with all the resources I had, and I could just I could only imagine if you didn't have them, how hard it would have been. And as I said, I was just like this is exactly how people's lives just I think, take a huge u turn when they don't have that support around them and they've got those you know, demons.
How are you feeling?
I know, I know it's a battle every day and every day changes. How are you feeling today in this moment right here?
Oh it's a completely different a completely different person now to what I would have been two and a half years ago. I think, yeah, two years and maybe two months when I was probably at my worst, and that had been sort of off and on for the majority of my twenties. I'd say, so maybe five to seven years.
There'd be you know, six months where I felt really good, and then the next six months I'd be sort of finding ways to justify what I was doing to get through and saying this is completely normal, feeling.
Like this and whatever.
But to get to the breaking point of the you know, the the nadir, so to speak, that sort of low point where I was just like, you know what, I actually can't function anymore.
I can't keep going on like this.
That was probably about two years and two months ago, and it was crazy how quickly I turned that around, how quickly that changed compared to what I thought at the time. I thought it was going to be, you know, possibly something that stayed with me forever, and.
Is that That's the thing, isn't it is that when you're in it, it feels all consuming.
It does it? Does it? It felt like.
Because you just don't I didn't have that clarity of mind to rationalize with myself in a or in a positive way. When I was in that space, I just wasn't thinking logically, and I was just catastrophized everything, catastrophizing the future. I was stuck in the future completely. I was never in the present moment, and I just.
Remembered thinking, like.
My moods and the way that I was, I was going to end up just pushing people away and I'd end up being alone forever. I remember that was like one thought that you know, I was going to basically lose everything that I held dear, and that thought just completely took over. It was just like this, It started off as a little you know, like a little fire, and then it just turned into an inferno in the head, like through months and months of just not not being
comfortable with the thought. And I think that's sort of that feeling for me at that stage of trying to control my environment all the time, trying to make sure that I know exactly what's going on and that I don't fail, and that you know, success and all these types of things. I was always trying to control every
environment I was in. And once I learned that to let go of control and to be comfortable with the unknown and just to be just to be completely present in that sort of in that moment you're in now, that was a huge I mean, it took so much time to learn how to do that as well, but it was a huge turning point for me to sort of just try to let go of control a little bit, try to let go of what will happen in the future, because you just never know the future may never come.
But now, compared to them, I still look back and can't even fathom the thoughts I had going through my head at that stage and think like I just felt like a completely different person. And there are still times where like some of those thoughts might come back, like there are still some triggers or whatever. And I remember when we had our baby only eight weeks ago, the first couple of weeks definitely did trigger some like all of a sudden, this thing comes into the world that
you cherish and you hold so dear. But the first thing I thought about was like not celebrating the joy and like the happiness around it, but was like worried and paranoid and again trying to control his environment and mine and making sure that I gave him everything I could to you know that, like I started worrying about being a happy family and trying to create and control the future for him, to make sure that he was going to be happy, and sort of started sneaking into
some of those bad habits again. And it just took a little bit of adjusting even then. But with the stuff that I'd learned, and I could pick up those symptoms really early rather than just letting it again, like letting it roll on into something really dangerous.
So I think because I went through it.
Initially, it made managing that whole experience a lot easier as well.
At the depths of it, paint a picture for us of what that looks like, like can you physically could somebody physically tell that something was wrong with you or something.
Was up with you?
Well, it's strange.
A lot of my close friends didn't know and had no idea until possibly until I stood down from a game. My wife definitely knew, She one hundred percent knew, and she could see it. You can't like that's the thing. You can only keep the front on front up for so long. My brothers didn't know. So it depends how much time you spend with someone, I think, and at that stage I was happening both New South Wales and the Sixers, and I just felt it was so important
to be a strong leader, you know, it was. I couldn't let that front come down when I was at work or at cricket. I couldn't bring my problems, my emotional problems to the game or to the sport. Because of that, it actually just kept getting worse and it kept getting bigger. But my partner could definitely see what I was going through.
And so what did she see?
She saw at home.
She saw someone that barely smiled, if at all, didn't laugh, didn't enjoy times that I used to enjoy, Someone that didn't want to socialize, didn't like, avoided going out in public at all costs. Home became the safe space. But then you felt guilty. At the end of a day spent at home, you felt guilty because you're achieving nothing. So I it was just this vicious circle of I didn't want to didn't want to socialize because I was
so ashamed of who I was. I didn't want to and the conversations I had with people, as hard as I tried to engage, my head was just not there, like it was somewhere else. I was you know how you going, mate?
Yeah?
Good, thanks, you know, like, and I could hear what they were saying, but it was just going straight through. And even at home with my partner, like we'd have conversations where twenty minute conversations where ten minutes later I wouldn't have even been able to know what we spoke about. Like my memory, my engagement to the present moment was
just so far beyond. I was just constantly living in the future, and like living in a doom future because I was just like everything's everything's bad is going to happen soon, like you know, I just so I was never able to enjoy any like any current moment which she could see all the like all the time, I'd started playing video games and stuff more often to like escape.
I remember I played about seventeen seasons of seasons of FIFA in about a month, and I like, and I was like, I called it raising the youth, you know, getting these young kids and turning him into soccer superstars. But and I thought I was doing something great with my life. And I sort of look back now and
I'm thinking, like, this is that sort of obsession. And it was because it kept me inside, and it kept me away from having to socialize with people and kept me away from you know, living life essentially and building relationships. And I became comfortable with sort of this little world I had with you know, playing playing PlayStation. And the first thing I did when I wanted to change and made those changes is I just cut out anything that
would keep me in the house. So I threw my PlayStation out, I deleted all the games off my phone. Not that that relationship or that would be the same for everyone that plays video games or but I knew for me, I used that as something to stop me from going out and to stop me from socializing and anything that encouraged me to stay at home other than like the relationship with my partner I tried to eradicate.
Really, did she try and say you need help?
Did you realize you needed help or did it all just feel like it's just a phase, or how did it feel at that.
Point in time before you got help.
I'd been getting help for like two years, I reckon before that like the toughest point, and that help was mainly because I thought I was like, I was telling myself that I didn't enjoy cricket anymore, and I was like, you know what, I don't. I don't enjoy the game anymore. I don't I don't love it like I used to. Should I retire?
Should I? You know?
So that's about four years ago now, that.
Would have been.
Yeah, I think those thoughts kind of started when I was like twenty seven, twenty eight, And ironically it's sort of lined up with when I actually started performing well. I'd been injured and inconsistent and you know, all this chat about your potential in my early twenties and late teens and how.
Much does that impact a person?
You know what?
At the time, I thought I handled it well and I thought I knew exactly like I was like, no, it's fine, I'll just you know, chill out, and you know, it's all good. And I sort of took it all in my stride at the time, but I think listening to that external expectation ended up becoming internal expectation of what I felt like I needed to achieve because everyone had told me I should.
Or should have by now.
Yeah, And I thought that was okay, you know, I thought I was handled pretty well. But then once I actually started almost playing to what people had expected for so long, I was like this, I've been like looking for this moment for so long, and I'm not enjoying it now, and like why why? And I started questioning and all this sort of stuff. And I didn't realize at the time what had manifested and why I wasn't
enjoying it and why all these things had happened. But I'd actually gotten to the age where I could no longer get a contract next year on potential, So that sort of twenty six twenty seven, And I only realized this when I started the whole you know, really being honest with myself and really saying like, why don't you like cricket anymore?
Like why did you love it when you were.
Seventeen eighteen, like absolutely lived, breathe, absolute cricket stuff, and now why don't like why don't you like it? Anymore. The game hasn't changed. It was my perception to the game, and once I really got into it, I think what massively changed was at twenty six, twenty seven, twenty eight. Subconsciously I realized, like when I looked back through my therapy and I started you know, reading a lot more about you know, the fear of failure and stuff like that,
and what these sort of behaviors look like. It was just a huge fear of failure. Once I actually got to the age where I was like, you know, what if I don't perform? And I never actually thought this in my head, but like subconsciously I knew if I don't perform at this age, I can't keep getting a contract. So it was like this huge fear of failure and the fact that like i'd go out and play and do well, I would sort of keep my head above water of.
Like, okay, instead of enjoying enjoying m.
Just enjoying the moment and enjoying like being playing cricket with my friends, I was like, okay, well I've got another two games. I remember I had like the most successful year I'd had, and I was like, what was all that for? I never felt satisfaction or fulfillment, so to speak. I just felt relief, like it was like, oh, I've finally done what people like. I never felt satisfied, I know, I never felt like fulfilled with what I
was achieving on the cricket field. And the only thing I ever felt was like a relief, like, Oh, thank god, I finally did well. Thank god, I've finally lived up to what people wanted me to do. And I think I started like playing cricket how other people like, almost worried about what other people's expectations were and you know, what is it? What does a successful life look like? And all this sort of stuff. And I never actually like, at that age, I didn't actually just enjoy my life
and enjoy the game. And I was always just like, am I doing enough? Am I doing enough? I've got to do more. I've got to do more. You've got to do this perfect. This has to be done. This has to be done. And when I look back at some of the ways that I used to train and stuff like that, I was just nuts, Like some times I go in without I wouldn't even have a purpose other than training more.
It's like hit more balls, bowl more.
Balls, and now I'm like the complete opposite, not that I don't train as much, but like before I train, I sit down and I think, like I actually visualize or picture what I want to get out of the training session and what do I want to achieve in this training session or today when even if it's not cricket, if it's life, it's like I wake up in the morning, I'm like, what am I going to like what are
the things I'm going to achieve today? And it just stops so much that procrastination that I used to do in my life. It was like giving myself a purpose every day of you know, the things I wanted to do.
Whether that's like you know, some days, if I'm having a day off, I'll wake up and go and say to myself, today I'm just going to completely engage with every conversation I have with anyone like a stranger, whoever serves me coffee at the cafe, whoever it is, and I walk away from some of those conversations like with smile from ear to ear, like to see other people smiling and to see other people enjoying their day. And I've started like loving to hear about other people's journeys.
Connection connection, Yeah, one hundred percent.
When you were at the worst of it, how bad was it for you?
I remember waking up and having a game to play, and I was like, just give me something that will take this away, Like this, I wanted to try, not only prescription like forget prescription drugs. I wanted to try like the heaviest stuff that would just give my brain a break. I was like, I wanted to just give my mind a rest, and I knew that it wasn't
healthy at the time. When I was at my at the worst, I didn't have a drop of alcohol for like three months because I just thought, like my dad had a bit of an alcohol issue growing up, and I saw him drink a lot of alcohol in my teens, and he also had depression and probably still does or he definitely still does. But I was so concerned about having that dependency on it. So at the worst, at my most bottom, I was so fearful of like if I had one drink of alcohol, I would turn into
an alcoholic. Like up until that point, I'd always been fairly responsible with how I drank alcohol, like as much as I would never behave too poorly on the drink. I mean, I've done some stupid things. We all have, especially when I was younger, but you're always aware of Yeah, I've never woken up the next morning and not known what I'd done the night before, other than a couple of midnight snacks.
But we all forget YEA calories after two am.
Don't count exactly.
But it was just this, like I had this fear of becoming completely dependent on alcohol, so I steered away from that. But at the same time, when I got to my worst, I was like, I do need something. I knew alcohol wasn't the answer, but I was like, what else is there that I can take to fix this? Because I can't do it anymore? And I was just like,
there's no way. And in terms of the physical, like what started to happen to me physically, like I was shaking for a lot of the day, just feeling like I couldn't sit still or stand still, felt like I
had like a squash ball in my chest. It felt like my heart rate, my resting heart rate would have been like one forty, but then I'd like, I'd check, I'd actually check my resting heart rate and it was still fairly normal, maybe a couple of beats more than what it normally would be, but like it felt like it was through the roof, completely lost appetite, not sleeping. Basically, if you looked up the depression symptoms on Google, I was ticking off almost every single one of them, and
like quite severely. There was probably two or three months where I was in a really bad place and trying to function on you know, one or two hours sleep, and then the sleep I got was like at really unhealthy times as well. I lost I remember, I still remember I'd lost about ten kilos in maybe four weeks, So I went from being like ninety eight kilos to
eighty eight kilos in the space of four weeks. And I remember going like I was living with Mike Michael lum was living at my place at the time when he was out playing for the Sixers, and I remember going down to the beach. He'd like forced me because he knew he was doing everything he could to get me out of the house. And I remember going down to the beach and sort of taking my shirt off and going into the water. He's like, jeez, you've been
going to the gym, mate, Like you're looking ripped. As I was like, no, I haven't been in the gym in a month. It's called depression, Like I've just lost so much weight. He's like, you're looking like healthy, and I was like, nah, I like literally, my everything's just been shredded off my body, like and it was not healthy at all. And jokingly he's like, geez, I've got to get me some of that depression and I was like, no, no,
trust me. I was like, you don't wish it. You don't wish it on your like on your worst enemy. The amazing thing was like once I started feeling better and I got my appetite back, it all came on so quickly. Like I remember at the end of that next Shield season, I was one hundred and three, so I put on fifteen kilos in like eighteen months. But I couldn't have been happier and I couldn't have been
in a better place. No one ever said anything, or no one charged or anything like that, which was it probably helps when you're six foot three you can sort of fluctuate in your weight a little bit more and people don't realize. But I remember looking back now and thinking at eighty eight kilos, people thought I was like physically looking so healthy, but inside I was an absolute mess,
and then fifteen kilos heavy, it was the exact opposite. Inside, I couldn't have been more content and couldn't have been happier and more comfortable with where I was. I didn't look too different. Oh well, I didn't think I did, but maybe I had my happy pills on him when
I was looking at myself in the mirror. But I think the biggest thing was actually the squash ball like in my chest, because at times when something didn't go my way, I just remember that squash ball turning into like a tennis ball and actually feeling like I couldn't breathe, and that feeling like I was having like almost like cardiac arrests.
So was it like a pang like a physical.
Oh yeah, yeah, one moment in particular I remember, and it was so trivial. And I look back now as I was having just like my direct family and Chris's direct family of Christmas Eve was supposed to be a good, like a fun afternoon, and I knew that we should have been, like it was going to be helpful for me and CHRISTA was really like, let's get everyone over and you can you know, it'll be nice for you to see everyone and talk to everyone. I was like, yeah,
I should, I should. I didn't want to, Like I just wanted to be on my own and with Christa. I remember, but like we're trying to get prepared and everything, and I went to like turn the gas on the barbecue and there was no gas left in the barbecue and I was like it would have been two pm or something on Christmas Eve, and I just remember thinking, oh, well, life's over.
And Chris is like what. I'm like, well, well, we're stuff here, Like I can't. I can't.
I can't do the barbecue. There's going to be no food like where stuff. Like I knew we shouldn't have had people over. Let's ring them or tell them to go, like and she's like there's seven to eleven, like walk up the road to seven eleven and like and she's like, I'll do it. You stay here, I'll go up and get the gas from the service station and bring it back.
And I was like, no, it's just too hard, like we're not gonna and like I was just creating this absolute because I was already at like my wits end before that had even happened, and then every little setback it just wasn't rational, like how I reacted to every little That was probably the worst anic attack I had.
Like I remember like pacing around the house and like ending up on all four on all fours, like trying to breathe, trying to find like somewhere, and it was all because there was no gas in the in the like for the barbecue. And remember about half an hour, once I'd settled down and Chris had got me to focus on my breathing and stuff like that, and I was able to get back into sort of Okay, I'll
just go up and do it. I was still in the car, like driving to the service station which is like a minute away, and I was still like shaking, and then coming back and trying to connect it all.
It was.
It was just this huge task at the time that I had put on this absolute pedestal, like it was the most important thing ever. And I remember looking back a couple of months later, once I was feeling a lot healthier and thinking, wow, was that the same person that managed that, Like it's just bizarre to think how I reacted to some to some you know, stimuli that I hadn't prepared for. And again it was just as I mentioned earlier, is that something happening that I hadn't controlled,
that I couldn't control. And whenever something kept popping up, especially when I was at my worst that I hadn't planned for, I couldn't cope. It's a constant reminder of how like to be okay with not knowing? Like, because you do want to plan and you want to organize and have you know, make sure that you're doing everything you can in this moment to make sure like you're
going to be able to keep enjoying life. But if you don't actually live in this moment, then you know, like what's the point at all?
To be fair, Christmas does bring out the worst.
Yeah, yeah, that's right.
You're listening to ordinarily speaking with special guest Moses Henriquez. How do you feel about your wife and everything that she's been there for you, supporting you through it, because it sounds like she's been the rock through this.
Yeah, she definitely has.
I definitely had like fears as well and anxieties over the burden on her. I mean she even stopped going to work for two weeks just to stay at home and to look after me, to make sure everything was okay. And I was like, this isn't sustainable, like you need to live your life just and I was almost telling her to leave me, like just go live your life. Oh you know, this isn't like there's no way you can live your life like this, and she was like yes, Like yes I can, of course I can. Like what
are you talking about? This is ridiculous. Where it will sort it out, It's all fine. Like I just remember feeling like I was just creating this huge burden for her, but she never once made me feel like like that. When I look back now, what felt like just sort of that unconditional sort of care, unconditional love and respect
I guess that she had. I just feel like, if you if you don't have that around to remind you of the clarity and the reason, I just can't imagine what I would aspire it into because I kind of felt like at times life couldn't have got any worse, like what And I know for a fact life could have could have got a lot worse my actual life, but my perception on life couldn't have got any worse.
And did you know in the moment that it was irrational. Did you know my life's great ro rah? Or were you in the moment thinking, no, it is as bad as it feels.
At all times, I knew that I was so lucky that I had physically I had, like I had a life that I shouldn't be worried about. But I think if anything, that even made me feel even possibly more guilty that I was like, how can you not feel? How are you not happy? How are you not feeling content? How like you've got stuff? Oither like there are people who are struggling to make meal, struggling to pay bills, et cetera, And they don't have a job that they like.
Their kids are like struggling, or they've lost a loved one, or they've lost a child, or they've lost a father, all these things, and I hadn't I hadn't had any particular moment that had set this off. Or maybe a combination of a fair few things, and like a combination of I guess, my own sort of belief systems and from growing up and what I sort of what I told myself success was, I guess maybe, but nothing like it was crazy and that made me feel worse. You've got no reason to feel like.
This, so angered anger and joined self.
Guilt just came straight in like it was. It was a whole heap of self loathing and the guilt that I felt for being like that, which was while I was trying to I was like, you'll end up pushing everyone away. And because I was telling telling myself that narrative, that's what I was trying to do as well, I was like, you know.
Because at least then you've got the control back exactly.
I was like, and in it, I was trying to push everyone in a while, I was like, nah, like you don't want to spend time like you don't want to be here, It's not good for you. I had an understanding of that stage that all the negative thoughts had like just built and rolled on in my head, and I was like, there's no way that these negative thoughts can be good for other people to be around. So I was just trying to push them away, and
thankfully they did it. Like, I had so many people who wanted to help.
When I speak to sports people about going through this, a really common thing that comes up is crying in their cars ahead of training, ahead of a game. It's this pretending that, you know, getting everything out and then walking out and pretending everything is okay.
Have you been through that?
Yeah? I remember.
Crying the night before Shield games, like the night before day one of a Shield game was quite common for me, Like, and when it got worse, it was like the two or three nights leading into a Shield game, I was like so upset and in I was like, I've got four days of this shit, you know, I've got four days of this eight hour, nine hours a day chasing leather.
I got it.
Probably I'm probably going to miss out and watch watch the other boys bat for five hours, and I'm going to have to bowl and probably go whacked around. And I just catastrophizing what was going to happen in each game, and sure as anything, like the game would go like, the game would go forward, and you know, I may perform, I may not perform, like you know, And at the end of the game, the only thing I ever felt, whether I did really well or I did poorly, was relief.
I was like, that game's over. I've got four days until the next one. Like. But I do remember specifically, and this was probably a year before I got to my worst, But I remember I won the toss at Banks Down Oval in a shield game against Tasmania, and we elected to bowl on what I thought was going to be a green seema And at the end of the day they were like two for two hundred and ninety. Come day two they get four hundred and twenty or
four p fifty or something like that declared. Where five for ninety going into like at the end of day two, I got out for like twenty odd And I remember sitting in the car.
I remember driving down the M five back home.
And I remember thinking to myself in the car, like I'm doing one hundred and like one hundred and ten on the highway, thinking if I just turned this car into here, like what like into the into the pillar or somewhere, I didn't want to create a crash. I remember thinking like if I just got ranch straight into this pole or do here, what would happen, like like what would.
What would be the coolinter like the.
I guess the consequence of what would happen there, you know, And I was like, I can't do that. It's not fair on my brothers, it's not fair on Christa, and it's not fair on all these people out of there for me. I can't leave. I can't leave my team with ten men for the next two days.
And I just.
I never, like I just remembered that moment, and I just I remember crying. I ended up having to pull over because I was crying so heavily in the car that I was shaking and stuff.
I had to pull over.
Just took five minutes, ten minutes until like I stopped crying, and I was like, and that wasn't even at my worst, Like that was actually you know, that was just like a fleeting moment that in that five or ten minutes became like it just built up into something like really unhealthy. But even at that stage, I didn't even think I had Like I didn't think I had a really bad problem.
I was like, I'm just managing it, you know, Like it's it's like, this is this is what happens when you have a high pressure job, Like this is what you've got to put up with. And I'm like, if anyone was to tell me, like now that there felt something similar to that and it's because it's a high pressure job, it was like, no, it's not because it's a high like pressure and stress is something we can't weigh like it's something we create for ourselves, you know,
it's what we what we perceive in every situation. And like it wasn't a high pressure job for me, Like it's just what other like what I may have considered high pressure or someone else may have considered, but the actual job wasn't. Like I was going out and playing cricket like I'm playing a game, like I'm having I'm
supposed to be having fun. And I justified to myself how I was feeling, and it's like, well, you've got to because you've got to be able to you know, you've got these expectations, so that comes with feeling like this when you fail or when things don't go your way, these are the things that are going to happen. I really believe now you can manage that. You can manage high performance and well being in much better ways than what maybe I learned how to do.
For sure, did you have to separate yourself from the cricketer because I found that so obviously with what I've gone through the last few months, losing my job, so that I had to start separating people weren't actually friends with me because of what I did for a living.
They were friends with me because of who I am, and so it was a part of that for you that you suddenly started to realize when you gave up the captaincy, when you stepped away, that people actually that's how you knew them was through cricket, but that's not why they were friends with you.
Was that part of it?
It was huge, It was a really big part of of As strange as it sound, I never thought I had an ego. I never thought that I identified myself as a cricketer. I always thought I was quite humble in that sense, but I definitely to a degree. You know, although I might have been humble with the language I used what I saw as success and what I had picture in my head as being doing the right thing by external expectations and my own expectations, there was a
huge ego attached to that. Like for me to achieve the things I wanted to achieve, it was because I wanted to be seen as something might not have always been like, you know, I had, like I wanted to succeed and be the best cricketer that ever lived. But I still remember from a very young age that like one of my life goals was to be the best dad possible. When I ended up growing up, I was like, I just want to be a great dad. I want to be there, and a great dad and a great husband.
I want to be there. I was like more than anything else. And I've always sort of kept that in the back of my head. But like even that has a bit of an ego attachment to it, because that's I'm trying to attach my identity to what I perceive as success and and how I thought I was going to become a really good dad. Was like, okay, like you know, how am I going to do that?
Okay?
Security, you know, money, success, a happy household, all these things, and what are what are the things that are going to make me have those things?
Okay? Well, how am I going to make money? Okay? I'm going to play heap, Like, play really good cricket.
If I do well at cricket, it brings everything else, like it makes its more pressure. Actually, it's going to give me a better chance of being a successful dad and you know, a happy dad and a successful father and husband if I've got you know, all those other
things sorted out as well, and playing cricket. And once I was able to realize through a lot of reading and a lot of therapy and a lot of you know, research, that whole I guess relationship that I have now with the present moment and connections and talking to people and learning about other people has just completely changed how I sort of view who I want to be. It's like, no, I don't. I can only be a good father if
I'm present. I can't be a good father on the back of just being a good cricketer like that, that means absolutely nothing. I can't be a good father just because you've made money or because you've put a shelter over someone's you know, over shelve one's head. It helps, but it doesn't. It doesn't mean you're a good father. I had to actually completely change my values, change my beliefs as to what I thought success was and what I wanted to prioritize, and you know, my beliefs and
so on. I just I did a complete shift. I did a lot of reading about different cultures and even all sorts of different religions. And I've never been like a religious person. I read the Koran, I read the Bible like I literally just went and read as much and learned about as many different cultures and religions and stuff as possible, and what I learned in all of them, there's this common theme of basically just being kind to your fellow person in all of them, and how important
relationships are in life. Self help books and psychology books that I read, it was the same ongoing theme. I was like, you know what, I actually do feel my best. I feel so much better when I'm helping other people or when I'm engaging with other people and learning about other people. So that became a huge focus. Being a cricketer is not that important. It's very lucky. I'm very privileged to do that.
But if I.
Stopped playing cricket tomorrow, someone else will take that spot and the game will keep rolling forward.
You speak about being a dad, and you spoke about your own dad earlier. Have you spoken to your dad about sharing that commonality in mental health?
Yeah? I remember when the first time I spoke to him and told him what I'd been diagnosed with, and.
He was I chatted on the phone.
I was in Hobart and he was asking why I hadn't played the last couple of games, and I told him and I couldn't even bear to tell him until I'd already started to feel a bit better. Because I remember I was in Hobart because it was the first tour. I was like, I want to see what I'm like now when I go. I wasn't there to play, but I was there to just sort of integrate back in around the team. So I was starting to feel like I was getting some moments of clarity each day, whether
it be half an hour or ten minutes. Through the twenty four hours, I was feeling, you know, I was capable of positive thought against I was like, Okay, let's see if I can sort of integrate back into That was when I rank Dad and told him sort of the extent of everything. I remember him breaking down, crying and just saying like, this is all my fault.
This is you feel like this because.
Of you know, and I was like, no, it's not like if anything, me experiencing what I've gone through shows me the strength that you had to keep trying to stay alive to like father me through you know, all the battles that you had, and it gives me really good perspective as to the depression you battled. You know, like for a long time i'd be lying if I didn't say I was resentful towards him for maybe not
giving me the best upbringing I could have had. But like, since I went through that depression myself, I was able to empathize with the challenges he would have had, you know, a single or divorce from my from divorce from my mum, from looking after me by himself, not having like barely spoke English, didn't left all of his family in another country out here battling depression on his own without much help, trying to raise a pain in the ass little kid
who thought he knew everything, you know, Like for a long time, I was like, this isn't how raising a son supposed to look Like he's supposed to be there
for me. I supposed to be drinking here and then like it just gave me this perspective that the strength he just kept waking up every day knowing that his responsibility was to make sure I was, you know, because I know he didn't want to be like he wanted to leave this world and what go to a better place, And he stayed alive and kept fighting through so that he could give me every opportunity to do, you know, to live And now he's got a hand son, so's
he's he's in a very he's a much better place now. But I just remember that conversation and he like straight away thinking it was his fault because of you know, and I was like, no, it's not, it's not your Like, it's actually made me realize the strength that you had every day.
To keep going.
And it didn't it was an orthodox like it was, you know, an unorthodox way of parenting. But like at the same time, it gave me such a huge perspective of like, he didn't have the support I had. He didn't know, like he also didn't have the education I had. He left school in year eight, so he didn't like he didn't know if he worked at his mental health that he would actually get better. He just thought it was like, oh, I'm stuffed forever, you know, like there's nothing I can do about it.
This is just me. This is the way my brain is.
Like he had no education or no insight to believe that if he worked at it, like things could improve.
He just didn't know that that was a available.
How do you feel now when you think back on that conversation.
I think it was a really important conversation for both of us, like especially for me, because it's probably the first time I'd actually said thank you to him that sort of perspective of sort of going through somewhat what he would have gone through, I guess, but not to the same extent, because I, you know, he'd actually gone through my parents divorced, my two younger brothers when lived with my mum and I stayed with my dad, and.
He'd actually gone through sort of that whole.
Family being taken away and everything he felt, almost everything he had in his life had just been taken away from him. And it got to a stage when I was you know, I felt like I did over nothing. I was like, imagine if that happened to me, Like, imagine if when I got to his age and I didn't have that support network around him, and I put myself in his shoes. I was like, there would have
been no way I would have coped. Like I even look back now, I just wonder how both my mum and dad even ever decided to move from.
Portugal to come out here.
You know, in the day of like you don't have they don't have duo Lingo to teach them how to learn how to speak a different language, they don't have the internet, all these apps and all these things that can help you integrate into society and stuff like that. They came out with a two year old kid, no idea on what this culture was going to be like. And they did it all for, you know, the hope of giving me and then eventually my two younger brothers
a better opportunity. And I just had no idea like the strength and courage you would have taken them to do that, to leave their whole support network back home in Madeira, in Portugal. And I was always so quick to judge at how you could be doing things better.
It's like, why don't you just do this better way?
And to do like black and white and like it's just so you feel this because of that. And I've just learned that life is lived in the gray. Like there it is not black and white. Nothing's ever black and white, Like there is always gray, and there's always a reason for why someone may have acted in a way or behaved in a way, and to you know, to try and at least empathize with and be kind to that person.
Setbacks breed empathy.
Yeah, yeah, you said you thought about self medicating, did you ever self medicate?
I did.
I did eventually with prescription medicine, so with any to presence.
But that's not self medicating, that's getting help.
Yeah, well no, I didn't ever self medicate. I remember lying in bed wanting too for a long time, and you know, considering all the different types of drugs that will be possible, I didn't even at the stage I was.
Like, who would I call? Like who am I? Who am I calling? To get?
Like like, I didn't. I wasn't even thinking about recreational party drugs. I was like, you know, where do I get these opioids? And you know, these things that are just going to numb, numb my brain to a point of where I'm not thinking.
You know where I can't. I'm not capable of thought.
Luckily through just through education and like my own sort of sense that I knew that that wasn't the right way, and I'd been I knew through therapy and I knew through reading that there was light, like deep down it it was just I had to work hard enough to get there. But there were so many times where I was like, no, it's too hard, Like it's going to take way too much work that would be a lot easier.
I'll just do that.
And I was like, no, you're actually you're educated enough to know you know that there is light. If you want it, you just have to work for every day was like if I got through the day, that was a win, like the sun's up tomorrow, and try to tick little goals, tried to you know, started really small. Okay, I didn't improve today, but things didn't get worse, Like that's that's that's good. I got through the day and sort of much much smaller goalpost. So I remember the
strain psychologist Michael Lloyd. He said to me, you know the story about the twenty cent piece in a phone booth, sort of like when someone goes and checks, goes to make a phone call in the phone booth and then realizes there's two twenty cent pieces in the bottom of the phone booth.
They're like, oh look, I got a free.
Phone call, and they just chuck it in, you know, check the twenty cent and you felt joy in that moment over something so small. If I found two twenty cent pieces at that time of my life, I would have created a negative emotion out of that reaction. But like trying to actually realize that it was my mind that was telling me that, and every situation that happened day to day. I was trying to have that sort of twenty cent piece reaction to sort of each situation
in the day. Oh that's a nice surprise. The mushrooms taste quite good this morning. Actually, you know, I just just really random stuff that I hadn't even considered being a positive experience ever before. One of the things I started doing was and I had to fake it at the start, was I started keeping like a gratitude journal, and for the first month I had to fake it, Like I was like writing stuff at the end of the day that I knew I should have been grateful
for at the time, but I actually wasn't. I was like, I should have been grateful for this person doing this, but I didn't even notice at the time that this happened. Just through like days and days and days and weeks of doing this and committing to it, they like I actually started to pick up on those moments in the day that I should have been grateful for, Oh, thank you very much for doing that, Like I'd really appreciate it.
And then maybe i'd send a text or i'd send a letter to say thank you and to actually express how I felt in a much healthier way than just.
Going, oh, thanks mate.
Those kinds of things started to feel like second nature all of a sudden, like I was actually noticing the good things that happened every day to me. And I actually started to feel like I was, you know, like, oh, I'm having a good day, like these look at all these great But what I realized was my days hadn't changed. It was just like my perception on the days had changed.
The lenses on my sunglasses had changed. It was like I was wearing these really dark black lenses and now I'm just wearing these light lenses and I'm seeing the best in every situation. My gratitude journal got to a stage where I started off that old saying fake it.
Till you make it.
But I was spending twenty minutes trying to find one or two things to be grateful for. And I still remember the sentences I'd write were like I'm grateful because my dog Morton came and met me at the door. At the door, and I'm grateful because Christa made dinner, and like these absolute like I wasn't even engaging with like what I was writing down. I realized, like, after six months of doing it, I had to actually stop keeping a journal because everything I wrote that same moment
of like when Christa made me dinner. I started like writing a paragraph about that moment. You know, I was like this and the efforts she went to and it made me feel like this, and I just respect like these qualities about her and my dog and he did this, and like my mate, he came picked me up, and I would write the whole moment because I'd experienced that whole moment and I remembered everything about how that moment
made me feel. By the end, I was like spending an hour and a half in bed writing down fifteen twenty things I was grateful for. I was doing like two pages worth of gratitude like I couldn't and I was like, Okay, this is getting to a point where maybe it's becoming a bit of an obsession and I'm
writing way too much. But it had helped me experience the moment, to experience those nice twenty cent piece moments of like that nice feeling of when something good happens to you, or when a situation happens to you and you take it and accept it in a positive way, flipping my perspective on that sort of hole, maybe even a little bit of a victim mentality of like oh it's so hard, like nothing good happens, and just through time and doing it day like day and day and
sort of becoming more and more present because oh, what am I going to write in my gratitude diary later tonight? And you're like, oh, you're looking for things. And then I started to do things like the things I looked forward to in the next day, so I would tell myself that things were going to be good moments. And again I was faking it till I made it, because I was like I remembered writing things like I look forward to the opportunity to go out to bat tomorrow,
and I was lying to myself. I was like, I did not look forward to that. I'm absolutely hearing that, but like I knew I should have been looking forward to it, and it was a way for me to go, okay, like this is a step towards.
And like now when I go out to bat.
I went out to bat in the AUSSI a game against England a and I remember thinking like if that had happened to me four years ago. I would have been so worried and had this fear of failure. But I remember, like we were two for not many or three for not many when I went out to be an absolute like it was green and it was seeming around everybody's like, what a challenge.
How good is this going to be? It's going to be so much fun.
It's underlie its pink ball, Like if I can get through this, it's like, what a great opportunity. And I actually believed what I was telling myself.
You know, so you sent out a social media post a couple of weeks ago. You know that you still have your moments and it is tough, and you mentioned earlier you're a new dad. How hard has it been? And you know, and what have you learned about yourself in that.
When I put out that post, I wasn't in a bad space myself. I did get a lot of people contacting me worried about how I was. I probably should have put a disclaimer on my post that I was doing okay, and I apologized to anyone who was worried. It definitely wasn't a cry out for help, but it was more so a post because I just read I just finished reading a book that sort of spoke a lot about the expectations that social media and stuff can
put on people. And you know, that constant comparison, that life comparison, of the journey you're going through in the
journey other people going through. And I remember going through my own posts and thinking, other than a couple of posts like back when I actually went through my depression and stuff, and my whole social feed was like good times, you know, photos on holidays, photos playing golf, photos of you know, me at the cafe, photos of the dog, of for my son, of my wife and and my friends, and we're all smiling and having a good time.
No whenever post photos of when they got a duck.
Exactly like it's just highlights. It's just an absolute highlight reel. And I thought, I thought, jeez, I'd never even considered that my social media could be providing like a false narrative of what my life looks like to someone who might be comparing themselves and going, well, he's doing all these things, this is what my life needs to look like. Especially because I'd had a son and I was a
new father. I was so proud of being a new father, and I was so happy to see like whenever he pipped out a little smile, or if I'd changed his nappy successfully or got got him to sleep successfully, I was like, oh, yeah, I've done my job.
How goodxist, you know.
But there were so many moments in between of just feeling completely out of depth as a father and feeling like completely like I had no idea what's going on. But all my social posts were the opposite of like just times like this is me changing the baby, he's just done a pooh, and like, yeah, this is like I'm really happy about it, but no, it's a real inconvenience at times, you know, and it's not It wasn't
bloody easy. And I just thought to myself, like, I actually, I think I owe it to other people to show them this life projection and the life comparison that social media can do. That I definitely appreciate that I am very lucky. I have a great life, and I am very lucky, but there's no way that my social media is a great reflection on what my actual life is, you know, like I'm only posting the highlights on.
Here, especially when you're somebody that's come out so publicly and said this is what I've been through as well, So you have almost feel like there's more pressure on.
You to well, that's yeah, I think that's exactly right too. Like I didn't want to feel like that may be my profile or my social media sort of page or whatever it might have been. And I wasn't too self indulgent to think that, like people were doing that, but I just thought, I don't want to be part of the problem. Sure as hell, someone not everyone would have all the symptoms of anxiety or depression, and not everyone
maybe some people don't have any. But if there's one symptom or two or three or however many symptoms, if you can relate to it and understand it, Yeah, I felt that. Yeah, I've done that as well. It's okay to feel that, the feeling of that you're not unique in your problem, or that you're not not alone.
You're not alone.
I've really enjoyed talking to you because I think you have a really unique ability to put it into words and explain it in a way that it's almost like it becomes a self help manual. The things that you've learned and what's helpful to people, and I think that's the key to this podcast is at celebrating resilience, so it's not just focusing on what you've been through, but also coming out the other end, hopefully. I wanted to finish by asking you, how do you feel about cricket now?
Yeah?
I still feel like right now, I accept I'm a lot closer to the end of my career than the start, and i'd hope so. I've been playing for fifteen years now professionally, so it's I mean, if I was more than fifteen years away from the end, I'd be real worry. But I think I've like, I enjoy the game a lot more now than what I did three or four years ago. There's absolutely no doubt about that. I'm probably not as aspirational as I was ten years ago, five, ten,
fifteen years ago. I don't care as much about wanting to play for Australia and wanting to wear the Baggy Green and wanting to do these things because everyone told me I should. What I care about is trying my absolute best in every moment to be the best person I can be. So whether that's as a cricketer as which is my occupation at the moment, or whether that's as a friend or as a captain, or as a
husband or as a father. Like so yeah, I do I do want to be I still want to be the very best cricketer I can be, and to do that, I still feel like I have to challenge myself against the best. So I still do want to play for Australia. I still do want to have success in the Australian cricket team. But it isn't like that isn't what keeps
me going. It's like what keeps me going now is sort of just being the best person I can be, being the best cricketer I can be, and having as like as positive influence on the team that I play in with whether it's people in the actual playing leven or the squad and using my own experiences I guess of and there's no doubt, and especially in cricket, but and even hearing other people's store other you know, whether it's AFL or rugby league, rugby union, any sports, all
the individual sports as well, hearing the stories of self doubt depression and how common it.
Is in elite sport.
I do feel like I've through what I've been through I can communicate that, and I feel like I can observe and see some of those symptoms that I had never do I say, you're going through this, you're doing that? Of course not, but like I observe similar things that he's putting a lot of pressure on himself like I used to. I still love competing, even though I accept competition isn't always the healthiest thing for well being. But I still love that contest of playing sport of trying to.
I don't love to see other people fail. I don't love winning because I like seeing other people losing. I love competing because I want to do better than I did yesterday. I want to be a better better than I was last week. I want to be a better bowler than I was last week, or than I was, you know, five years ago. That's why I love competing. I want to make more birdies than I did, or make less bogies, I should say, than I did a couple of years ago. So for competition, for me, it's
not so much about wanting to dominate someone else. It's actually just for me keep trying to improve and keep
trying to get better. And also, if I don't like now learning that sort of compassion of it's okay, like you tried your best, because it's so easy to forget, and I think that's really important thing for me to remember continuously, because I still forget whether I do well at cricket or whether I don't, whether I do have a positive impact on someone else or I don't, as long as I know deep down that I tried my best in that moment, like that's you know, I guess
at the end of the day, that's all I can do.
The courage to be kinder to yourself.
Yeah, it's harder than it sounds. It is.
It is. Thank you for chatting to me. I could chat to you all day.
I really do appreciate it, and I think what you're doing is pretty powerful.
It's already helped a lot.
Of people with what you've done, and I hope this kind of podcast is going to help a lot more.
So, thank you, Thanks Nay, thanks for having me on. I've enjoyed it so time.
If you enjoyed this episode of ordinarily speaking, I want to go back and check out the episode with Glenn Maxwell, who detailed his break from the game for mental health reasons. Remember if this chat has triggered something for you, Please ask for help. If you enjoy this podcast, follow Ordinarily Underscore Speaking on Instagram and make sure you hit subscribe
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