I’VE HAD SUICIDAL THOUGHTS ... NOW I JUST WANT TO HELP OTHERS
Ex-Liverpool keeper Chris Kirkland learnt to cope with mental health issues — now he wants to support fellow sufferers via a ‘mood app’
FOOTBALL is a sociable profession and as such many former players like to stay in touch. But Chris Kirkland’s phone tends to ring more than most.
Having spoken openly about the mental health problems that dogged the final years of his career, the former Liverpool and England goalkeeper is becoming a first port of call for players suffering with anxiety, depression and stress.
‘As soon as I hear their voice on the phone I can tell,’ Kirkland tells
Sportsmail. ‘When people are ready, they talk differently. The key is getting them to a safe place in their heads where they feel it’s OK to open up. Many are too scared, unsure what their managers will think.
‘But there were 680 players who asked the PFA for help with mental health last year. I bet there are 10 times that who need help but are too frightened to ask.’
Kirkland’s own troubles surfaced at the back end of his career while playing for Sheffield Wednesday and Bury. At his lowest point, thoughts of suicide flicked through his mind.
‘Yeah, I did have those thoughts but I would never have done it,’ says Kirkland. ‘I have a wife and daughter I love too much.’
An interview he did for talkSPORT’s On the Sporting
Couch earlier this year was in turn harrowing and inspiring. He said he was confident that he was on a clear road to recovery.
There was even talk of playing again. But it turned out that road was not as easy to navigate as hoped. In July, Kirkland checked into a rehabilitation centre after recognising familiar signs while on a golf trip to Portugal.
‘I felt myself slipping back and withdrawing,’ he says. ‘I didn’t want to do stuff or socialise or exercise. I didn’t want to go to Portugal but I went because it was my best mate. I was out there and realised I had to get home and go somewhere for treatment before it was too late. I didn’t want to get back to where I had been before with this problem. I googled and found a place called Parkland Place in north Wales. They got me in straight away. It was the best thing I ever did.’
If Kirkland, 38, has learned anything about mental health over the last few years, it is that the issues never really go away.
‘Once you have suffered, you will always be prone to it,’ he says. ‘The key is learning to cope with it. I have the tools now. There are many more good days than bad. It lifted me being around the people at Parkland Place.
‘The first couple of sessions were tough because I was listening to people tell some incredibly harrowing stories. I couldn’t relate to some of that stuff. There was some bad stuff. I wasn’t sure I could stay. But after a couple of days I loved the group sessions. You go to bed and collapse. You are zonked, but your mind is no longer racing at night, it’s clear.’
Signed by Liverpool from Coventry in 2001 and recognised as the best English goalkeeper of his generation, serious injuries to his hand and knee restricted Kirkland to 25 Premier League appearances for Liverpool and one game for England. It was at Wigan that he perhaps played his best football.
Kirkland’s mental health issues began to surface while at Sheffield Wednesday, who he joined in 2012, and revolved specifically around time spent away from his wife Leeona and daughter Lucy.
‘I never wanted to stay over, so I was up at 5.30am to get to Sheffield,’ he says. ‘They were an incredible club. I walked out after two weeks but they gave me time. I went back and was Player of the Year for the first year. I could block out all the bad feelings and anxiety for 90 minutes.
‘But halfway through the second year it started to affect my game. I couldn’t focus and couldn’t wait to get off the pitch: in the dressing room, showered, in the car and gone within 15 minutes.
‘The Woodhead Pass and Snake Pass from Sheffield to Manchester are dangerous roads but I would drive at ridiculous speeds just because I couldn’t wait to get home. But you don’t think like that. It was draining.
‘You think you are knackered but then you go to sleep, wake up after an hour and then you can’t get back to sleep.
‘I was relieved when Keiren Westwood came in the next year because I didn’t have the pressure of having to play any more. I was going to sign again, as I loved the club and the fans. I was in my training kit, the contract was in front of me and I just couldn’t do it. I just had to get home.’
Kirkland wishes he had recognised he needed help sooner. Instead, he ploughed on, only succumbing to the crippling problems in his head when he found himself on a rooftop in Portugal during a pre- season trip with Bury in 2016.
Talking of his suicidal thoughts, Kirkland says: ‘You do think about it, but as soon as you do, you think about Lucy and Leeona and you realise it’s your mind playing tricks. I am confident I won’t be back in that place again.’
As we talk at a hotel near his home in the North West, Kirkland is relaxed and well. He is clear about the moment he realised the scale of the problem. With the assistance of the PFA, he found a counsellor in Manchester.
‘Someone asked me in an interview if I was embarrassed,’ he says. ‘Of course I am not. What have I got to be embarrassed about? At the start I was maybe more scared and confused. When your mind doesn’t seem your own, you are not in control. You feel like you are watching your life from within a steel box. You are trying to bust out and give yourself a shake but you can’t, you can’t get through. You can’t do it.’
ONE of the triggers for people susceptible to mental health problems can be social media. Images of friends and family enjoying their lives can be painful for those suffering. Twitter and Facebook can also be used as vehicles for abuse.
This is why Kirkland has cofounded an application called Yapa. Backed by Liverpool and endorsed by former Aston Villa midfielder Stiliyan Petrov, the app encourages users to send out text- based posts that are mood-dependent.
These range from ‘Depressed’ to ‘Happy’ via different colour codes, giving members the chance to connect with other users. If a user posts multiple times in the ‘Depressed’ colour range, then they will be messaged privately and recommended help. There
‘If football wants me, I’m here. I want to use my profile to do good’ ‘My dad suffered for 40 years and his dad committed suicide due to depression in the 1980s’
are no photographs on the platform, no ‘ likes’ and zero tolerance of abuse.
‘The founder contacted me in 2016 after reading about my story,’ Kirkland says. ‘He told me it would be free to everyone and that attracted me to it immediately. It is just a communication tool to tell others how you are feeling and to help each other. It’s not Facebook videos and fun and laughter. This is about real everyday stuff.
‘We’ve spoken to people like the cricket authorities about it and the app is used in 174 countries now.
‘Some of the abuse on social media generally is terrible. My daughter Lucy is on Instagram but we are careful with it. I use Twitter to promote stuff, but that’s about it.’
Kirkland’s life is full these days. There will be no playing comeback — ‘My body is no longer up to it’ — and his work with Liverpool’s women’s team has come to an end after he could no longer commit the necessary time. But he works for Liverpool’s TV channel and says the club have been ‘absolutely brilliant’. He also has his own academy twice a week, does some coaching at Tranmere and is keen to help other people — not just footballers — suffering as he did. He is not convinced football is as enlightened on mental health as some make out.
‘Many players won’t talk to someone inside the club, so there has to be someone outside as well,’ he says. ‘In my day, nobody talked about mental health, not even two years ago. I didn’t know what it was. Until you are ready, you just bottle it up. I know for a fact that so many players struggle. There is nott enoughhddone. ThThe number b talking to the PFA was 140 a few years ago and now it’s almost 700. What does that tell you?’
The articulate Kirkland would appear ripe for a role at the PFA or FA. Players are more likely to talk to one of their own about their troubles, after all.
‘There was talk about that but it’s gone quiet,’ he says. ‘I would do it, of course I would. I was down at Parkland Place yesterday for an aftercare session and I hope to be an ambassador for them. Just sharing my experiences.
‘If football wants me then of course I am here.’
One disquieting discovery was that Kirkland’s father has also suffered from depression. He learned that his grandfather committed suicide. ‘Dad suffered for 40 years and his dad committed suicide because of depression back in the 1980s.
‘I only found this out about a year ago. It was a big moment. It was upsettingtti bbutt thithings clicked li k d and made sense and I realised that I could see things and understand things that had happened.
‘Dad is good at the moment, he is managing it. He has got bits of help. He is a bit stubborn. It’s an old-fashioned thing, isn’t it?’
Kirkland doesn’t want to be stubborn or old-fashioned. He wants to be modern. He wants understanding and awareness and he wants to help.
‘Depression cost me a few years of my career but I am OK knowing that I tried,’ he says. ‘Now I do things that I think will be beneficial. I only want to do stuff that will benefit a lot of people.
‘Players call me. “What is your advice? Where did you go?” I say they have to talk. That is the starting point. I am trying to use my profile for the greater good. That’s the least I can do.’