Is it okay to talk to athletes about mental health in sports?

Many coaches have wondered whether it is okay to talk about mental health with their athletes. Is this a topic that should be out in the open, or avoided completely? Will conversations about mental health put athletes at greater risk for having mental health issues?

At the USC-MHS, we encourage coaches to talk about mental health with their athletes. It’s a positive part of athlete development to teach them how to check in on themselves.

Mental Wellness Check-Ins Should Happen Just As Often as Physical Wellness Check-Ins

We often ask athletes how they are feeling physically. “How is that shoulder doing today?”, “Are you feeling rested?”, “Do your muscles feel good – are you ready to play?” We encourage them regularly to check in with how their body feels – and when they aren’t 100%, we ask them to take steps to get back to their full capacity. 

Let’s also start encouraging athletes to check in with how their mind feels. Creating a safe space for acknowledging mental health and practicing checking in regularly will improve their ability to recognize any mental health concerns early; hopefully early enough that small steps toward healing are enough to get them back on track – before the problem endangers their wellbeing or safety.

Avoiding the Topic of Mental Health Adds to the Stigma

When we shy away from talking about mental health, we also may give athletes the impression that their feelings are abnormal. There tends to be a stereotype in sports that athletes are tough; nothing ever bothers them. As a result, when athletes feel emotions like anxiety about a big game, stress about the number of hours of training, sad about losing a game, or any number of others, they may feel like something is seriously wrong with them. In addition to those initial feelings, they may be left wondering why they can’t be tough like the other athletes and not let these things bother them – only exacerbating the problem.

Athletes need to know that experiencing different emotions is perfectly normal. We should also let them know that mental health, like physical health, falls along a continuum. Some days are better than others. There are great days, terrible days, and anything in between – all of which are completely normal. However, based on recommendations from MentalHeath.net, it is time to get professional help if:

  • Sadness, feelings of depression or anxiety, or any other signs or symptoms of mental health issues persist for more than two weeks
  • If the mental health concern is interfering with the athlete’s ability to function at sporting events, in school, with family, or in their social life
  • If there is contemplation of self-harm or suicide

Start the Conversation!

So, should coaches talk about mental health to their athletes – absolutely! It educates athletes, helps them develop skills they need to self-evaluate, and even if they are experiencing mental health issues, talking about mental health can aid the healing process.

If you are worried about feeling awkward talking about mental health with your athletes, Banyan Mental Health recommends practicing what you will say in front of a mirror first so you can become more comfortable with the topic.

Keep checking back to the USC-MHS Learning Center and Resources pages for more information about how to lead mental health conversations with your athletes.

Speaking of Mental Health: Put in the Person-First, Take out the Stigma

Mental health concerns can be a challenging topic to talk about. There is so much stigma around mental health that bringing up the topic can make a room go silent, can lead to whispers between people well after the conversation took place, and unfortunately, it is all too often assumed that experiencing mental health challenges is equivalent to being “crazy.”

There are a lot of coaches, parents, athletes, and others in the sports world who sincerely want to help support those who may be experiencing mental health issues. But because of the stigma around mental health concerns and due to limited knowledge about how to help, many times, we are afraid to step up out of fear that we might be doing or saying something wrong.

Strategies

Here are some simple strategies that can be utilized that might help the conversation go more smoothly when you reach out to help someone.

1 Use Person-First Language: This is first on the list because it is such an easy way to make a difference in showing respect and compassion for another person. It is a matter of changing your word choices, and yet can communicate a much more supportive message. Too often we label people as their mental health issue. Calling someone “depressed”, “psychotic”, “schizophrenic”, “anxious” or any other label turns that person into the challenge they are experiencing. But mental health issues are experiences, they do not define the person. It is far better to use a personal pronoun first and then follow with what that person is experiencing. Check out the “Say This, Not That” table below with some suggestions.

PERSON-FIRST LANGUAGE: SAY THIS, NOT THAT

SAY THIS

You may be experiencing depression.
Are you feeling anxious?
Are you experiencing psychosis?

NOT THAT

You are depressed.
Are you anxious?
Are you psychotic?

One note about person-first language – even though changing the words you use might seem “simple,” it can actually take a great deal of effort to change our speech patterns. But the more you try, the better you will get at it. If you make a mistake and use a label, you can correct yourself or try again in future conversations to use wording that shows how much you care.

*For more examples of person-first language, visit https://odr.dc.gov/page/people-first-language

2 Understand that Mental Health Issues are an Experience: Using person-first language communicates that the person is not defined by the mental health issue they are experiencing. Now, you need to remind yourself of that knowledge, as well. Experiencing a mental health issue does not ever mean a person is crazy and it is important to remember that recovery from any mental health issue is possible. When we recognize within ourselves that the person is separate from the illness or disorder, we are more likely to show that through both our words and actions. After all, we should conceptualize mental illness in similar ways to how we conceptualize physical ailments. We would never tell someone who has a broken arm, “You are broken,” as though the injury is now their permanent defining trait. If we know that recovery from mental health issues is possible, we are more likely to bring hope to others experiencing them.

3 Break the Silence: A third tip regarding those conversations about mental health concerns is to START THEM! We know it can be awkward at first since there is stigma around mental health. However, the more we talk about it, the more those conversations become part of the norm. If our youth athletes hear parents talking about it, it will not make them depressed too, it will allow them to see that conversations about depression are ok to have as an example. We will save lives if we make it okay to talk about mental health concerns before they become so severe that they lead to suicidal thought or harmful behaviors. After all, if we saw someone with a broken arm who needed a doctor, we most likely wouln’t have any problem asking them some questions about their injury to make sure we got them connected with the professional medical help they needed. Let’s make it the same for mental health issues – START the CONVERSATION! You can do this – if you help just one person, you’ve made a huge difference!