Eddie Hall Says He Struggled With Thoughts of Suicide as a Teenager
Eddie Hall has opened up about the struggles with depression he experienced as a teenager, and how discovering the gym was a pivotal change which has since helped him manage his mental health—while also becoming one of the world's most celebrated strongmen.
During a recent conversation with his fellow World's Strongest Man winner Brian Shaw on the Shaw Strength podcast, Hall recalled how he was a competitive swimmer as an adolescent, but how his grandmother's cancer diagnosis led to him becoming a "class clown" and getting involved with drugs and alcohol, leading to him being expelled from school at the age of 13.
"I went through a stage of really bad depression and anxiety," he said. "As a 13-year-old kid, being prescribed Prozac, which is an antidepressant, and you're seeing a psychiatrist, so whilst all my mates were at school learning and having fun, I'm sat in front of a psychiatrist trying to get my life back together. It's hard to talk about. It was a really dark time in my life."
"I guess it was a wake-up call, you know?" He continued. "Because those two years were so miserable, locked in my room on my own, literally having the thought 'I want to kill myself' on a daily basis. And then fast-forward to about 15 years of age, and it was my mum who sat me down one day, and you could see from the outside, all eyes on the outside could see I was imploding. And my mum sat me down and was like: 'What the fuck are you going to do? You cannot continue the way you are, you can't stay in your room all day, you can't not go to school, you can't not get a job. You've got to get up and get on with your life.' And from whatever conclusion we came to, we decided I was going to join the gym. So instead of being home all day, wanking and playing PlayStation and whatever else, join the gym."
Looking back, Hall sees this as the moment that set him on the path to where he is now, and credits the people he met through his training with helping him find his confidence.
"I was hanging around with guys who took me under their wing very quickly, guys in their 50s, 60s, 70s, old guys who'd been powerlifting and bodybuilding for 40, 50 years," he said. "And that was where my life got back on track."
Hall shared this story in the hope that it would help others who are living with depression to understand that they're not alone, and that it is better to talk about these difficult subjects than keep it all bottled up inside, especially considering the sobering statistics relating to suicide among young men.
"I want to tell you, here and now, as the World's Strongest Man, it's not weak to talk about mental health," Hall said in an Instagram video earlier this year. "It's not weak to admit you have a problem. If you've got cancer, you would go to the doctor. If you had a cold, you'd take things to make you feel better. This is exactly the same. It's an illness, and you need to get it treated... Don't be ashamed to reach out."
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