Mental health and sports: emotional fitness is a game of two halves
Liam Brady: "Just because you are doing really well in school or you're an athlete or playing for Cavan or Dublin or Galway does not make you immune to mental health challenges."
For an inter-county goalkeeper who — among other things — has landed a 45 against Dublin in the All-Ireland Championship, Liam Brady knows a thing or two about pressure. But as he says: "There's pressure, and there's pressure."
Brady, 27, is one of the facilitators for the Movember Ahead of the Game programme, which aims to raise awareness of mental health — the positive and the negative — among young players in their early teens around the country. Now in its second year here after years in development and use in Australia, Britain and elsewhere, it sees stars such as Brady speaking directly to young people about their own issues, both on and off the field.
"I fell into the trap of being a perfectionist," he says of his younger self. "When you looked at me from the outside or talked to my parents everything seemed to be going really well, playing for Cavan at minor level, then under 21 and senior. People assumed 'he must be in a great space, his grades are really good.'"
But it wasn't always like that. Brady has a psychology degree and has also been coaching children for a decade, so he can see the stresses that can take hold from various angles. Even as he seemed to be serenely making his way through his studies and football career, the pressure was bearing down — "That constant pressure of having to perform or feeling that I had to perform and I just got really anxious.
"When I was that age [early teens], I would have loved to have had something like this programme because it would have equipped me better to deal with the challenges I was facing. Not eradicate it completely, but give me the tools to deal with it in a better way."
Ahead of the Game is designed for young athletes, coaches, and parents, aiming to enhance mental fitness and resilience. It is being delivered in Ireland through the GAA and the Gaelic Players Association (GPA), with workshops and participant training.
According to Brian Curtin, manager of Young Men's Health Implementation — Europe, for Movember, 30 facilitators around the country, with the likes of legendary Galway hurler Iggy Clarke and current Cork camogie champion Saoirse McCarthy, are on board. So far, it has reached over 175 clubs across all 32 counties of Ireland, engaging nearly 5,000 participants.
And what are the facilitators hearing from these under-14 players? According to Curtin: "One that is quite positive is young people's concept of mental health is probably much greater than we had even anticipated, so their general broad understanding is good. In terms of challenges we are seeing social media and the pressure it presents is definitely up there, and the everyday demands of juggling sport, school and social life can be difficult."
Saoirse McCarthy spoke with young people and parents at her club, Courcey Rovers in Ballinspittle in County Cork. Clodagh Walsh attended the parent's session, where Saoirse was accompanied by accompanied by former Kerry hurler Martin Stackpoole. Walsh's daughter, Aoife, also a club member, was among the young people tuning in at the parallel session for young people. According to Walsh: "We would have gone to Croke Park in August just gone to see her [Saoirse winning with Cork] in the All Ireland so just to have her standing there and her to say she can have a bad day, with her peers, it’s a very powerful message."
Walsh says Aoife went to the workshop "with an open mind", and afterwards said it was funny, enjoyable and relatable. "I asked what [she] got out of it, and she said that everybody can have a bad day and to look out for their friends. The fact that we as parents can talk to our children day and night [about this] but to hear it among their peers from somebody that they look up to, it's a really powerful message to get when you’re 13. As adults, we can reach late into our teens and our twenties before we realise you can have a bad day."
Walsh also noted that while the parent and young people sessions are separate, they both come home with the same message. One aspect of this is that parents can continue asking their children how they are feeling, but subtly and in different ways. According to Brady, it can be the tenth time asking that a child might open up, even a little, to their parents. It chimes with Curtin's point that those seeking to help — parents, the facilitators, mental health advocates — must be the "loudest voice" in what can seem like a sea of negativity, not least online.
"There is a lot of that on social media in particular, and that pressure of 'being a man' and not talking about these kind of things," Brady says. He has often used the analogy of a physical injury, where something small at first, if ignored, becomes a bigger problem, eventually with the potential to end up with surgery. When he poses the same question regarding mental health — 'what would you do?' — it can be about talking to parents, or friends, having a kick about, going to the chipper. Ultimately, reaching out and sharing.
"The message we get across early is that mental health does not have a jersey," Brady says. "Just because you are doing really well in school or you're an athlete or playing for Cavan or Dublin or Galway does not make you immune to mental health challenges."
Of course, the GAA can itself be a crucible of pressure, particularly at the highest level. Brady says it is "one of the biggest challenges the GAA has at the moment" but he adds that Ahead of the Game can help, giving young people the tools and knowledge to learn that these pressures will arrive in their lives at some point, whether on the field or off it. By way of further example, groups discuss how global stars, such as Serena Williams and Tyson Fury, have opened up about their own mental health challenges.
For Clodagh Walsh, It is about children gaining that resilience as well but also noticing if their friend is struggling. I think what I took from the talk is when your child comes home, it may not be a big deal to you that they lost a match but it is a big deal to them.
"One thing Saoirse and Martin said is that you need to champion your own children, you have to be the one in their corner because if you’re not in their corner, who is? It's not saying they’re right when they're wrong, but you must have their back. Everybody, no matter how old you are, needs that person who has their back."
It is about building mental agility and mental fitness, according to Curtin. "What we are trying to do, whether through Ahead of the Game or Movember, is to be the louder voice, the voice of reason and give opportunities for better and healthier examples of role models and of how to manage mental health and be more cognisant of it, rather than relegating it to those old norms of pull your socks up and get on with it," he says.
Curtin says work is underway to grow the programme further and to look at other opportunities where Ahead of the Game can play a role. Brady says he has learned plenty from his work with the programme. "A lot of the facilitators, we don't see it as a job, it is just so enjoyable and in that GAA setting, we are in a unique setting where we can empathise with the kids and they can empathise with us," he says. "Giving them the confidence that these feelings are normal."
He is a big believer in perspective in all things, not just from young people but from parents who didn't have to worry about smartphones and social media when they were growing up.
"We know as adults that an Ulster final is a bigger game than a division five county club under-12 final, but they don't know that; they see what is in their heads and see that from their perspective," he says. "The key thing is that a lot of the symptoms are the same [regarding different types of pressure]. You could be anxious before a big game, it could be Cavan in an Ulster Final versus Tyrone or Derry but in a kid's head their under-14 final is just as big as as Ulster Final.
"It's very personal — my mental health is my mental health and your mental health is your mental health."
And, as Brady says more than once, they one thing they do have in common is that they don't wear a jersey.
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
Celebrating 25 years of health and wellbeing
