Some sad news coming out of the world of sport this week in Germany:
On Tuesday, Hannover 96 and German international goaltender Robert Enke died at the age of 32. Enke was a highly regarded sportsman and consumate gentleman, both on the pitch and off. Always viewed as a positive influence on his teammates and the game as a whole, Enke was seen as possible first-choice keeper for Germany’s World Cup campaign next summer in South Africa.
Enke’s story is noteworthy because his death, although certainly one of great tragedy, is an example of the blurred lines of the public and private worlds of sport and society. Enke had battled depression for the last three years of his life, most notably following the death of his infant daughter in the year 2006. Fearing what a discovery of his condition would mean for his privacy and his career, the former East German kept his diagnosis a secret, and ultimately took his own life.
Anna Motz has a great piece in today’s Guardian column on Enke’s story and the ongoing stigma of mental illness.
Last night was one of the last rounds of qualification ahead of the World Cup Finals. The German national team postponed their friendly battle with Chile, and the remainder of international matches featured a moment of silence in the keeper’s honor. A memorial service was held today at Hannover’s AWD Arena, with more than 49,000 mourners in attendance.
Sport is a fundamental part of society here in Europe, and by all measure, football (soccer) is king. That said, no matter what the sport, no game is more important than the health of its players. Hopefully, if any good can come of this tragedy it is in the fact that perhaps more awareness has been raised about the myriad of mental illnesses present in all corners of our society.
From someone who’s lived through multiple bouts of depression including visions of suicide, I think our society has taken a serious illness and made it into the equivalent of a headache. People throw around “I’m depressed today” as if it were no big deal. If you go to your PCP and tell them that you’re feeling blue because your goldfish died, they’ll put you on an antidepressant. I feel like this is robbing society of the understanding that it is a serious illness that requires expert treatment and the compassion and support that loved ones should provide. I think that in some cases the stigma is gone, but in others its been replaced with a new stigma, one that comes about because everybody and their brother is on Klonopin and Prozac. I find that if I tell friends that I’m worried that I’m entering another bout of depression, those that have true depression will take the time to ask me how I’m doing and check in more regularly, those that don’t simply say ‘oh me too, I need a vacation or I got in a fight with my boyfriend or I’m sick of studying for this test,” even though all of them are on antidepressants. I am not on antidepressants, though I have been in the past, I am in individual therapy and group therapy and am mostly able to keep myself above water through that. I see the same thing happening with Bi-Polar disorder. I’ve known people with this disease, and watched them through the manic and depressed phases and its intense and worrisome. I know many other people with the diagnosis who have had nothing more than a few blue periods. Bi-Polar disorder and Depression are serious illnesses that ruin lives and I wish that our society took them more seriously.
“Your death for us is still omnipresent. It has made us all speechless, stunned, helpless … We were not able to put our grief into words … We could not simply go about business as usual. We have long sat together and thought of you. We have been silent together, cried together and searched for answers together, but in fact found only more questions – agonising questions of ‘Why could not we help you? Why did you not want to talk to us about your problems? Why is it that, in our competitive society, it is not possible to express fears over such illnesses?’ It is for all of us a painful thought that you felt so alone and in need, even if you were with us. For you there was so much more at stake than for any other of us. Your death is so bleak. But we will do everything we can to carry on in your memory, play good football to be successful. And we will do our best to ensure that stigma and prejudice have no place in football” – an open letter from the German national team to Robert Enke.
Good follow up by the Guardian and BBC1 on the issue of depression in sport:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/nov/25/marcus-trescothick-neil-lennon-depression
Does anyone remember what happened with Frank Bruno?(British heavy weight boxing champ)
For something that effects/affects everybody on the planet at sometime in their lives… I cannot understand any of this.
Except to say, I hate it when people talk s-l-o-w-e-r to me when I tell them, or they are told I suffer with a mental illness?
…I just get sad, and really nervous sometimes. (sad mostly).
Everybody has cracks they can walk through?
This truly represents a sad state of our world-wide society. Many students at the high school where I teach would benefit from the help of counseling or, as a possible last ditch effort, medication to calm the frustrations and sadness they feel. But their parents, or the students themselves, do not want to live with the stigma attached.
Although I am an opponent of (atleast America’s) seemingly quick-to-prescribe/diagnose state of medication and self-emotional-immobilization to satisfy the doctor-centered largess of the Drug Companies, in dire needs such as this it is necessary.
This is truly a sad story, one that happens all too often.