With her head delicately resting on the back of her hand, Naomi Osaka struggles to finish her sentences. His gaze wanders. Her eyes let out a few tears. Despite the suffering, the Japanese tennis player is trying to put on a good face in the face of journalists who are waiting for her first words after her elimination at the US Open in New York in early September. "It's really hard to articulate. I feel like I'm at a stage where I'm trying to figure out what I want to do. Honestly, I don't know when I'm going to play my next game. I think I'm going to stop for a while", slips the champion, in complete disarray. Neymar, he doubts the continuation of his career in the national team after the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. The Brazilian star of PSG does not know if he is "mentally strong enough to continue to manage my life as a footballer afterwards", he admits in a documentary broadcast on the DAZN platform.
Whether you're one of the greatest players in the world or a former world number 1 in tennis, why hide your flaws? Now, some high-level athletes no longer wait for retirement to reveal their discomfort. In their discourse, the word "depression" is no longer taboo. In addition to Naomi Osaka, gymnast Simone Biles or basketball player DeMar DeRozan, on Twitter, recently dared to publicly discuss their mental health.
The image of the superhero
These confessions sometimes surprise the general public. "In the imagination, the champions are invulnerable, we imagine that they are only athletes, but they had a life, a childhood, sometimes traumas, like Simone Biles who was the victim of sexual assault", reports Meriem Salmi, psychotherapist psychologist, responsible for the psychological follow-up of athletes at Insep from 2000 to 2013.
Meriem Salmi has been fighting for more than thirty years to impose the subject of mental pathologies in athletes on society. Things are moving forward, she says, because "the number of athletes talking about it is increasing." That takes time. Mental preparation has gradually entered the mores, but psychological support in the broad sense "was seen until now as a problem". "It was not necessary, the athletes could hear: 'If you are not strong enough, you have no place here'", she assures.
Nathalie Crépin, sports psychologist at the Resource Center for Performance Optimization and Sports Psychology (Crops) in Lille, confirms: "Before, if an athlete admitted that he was consulting a psychologist, he could hear that he was crazy or weak, it was difficult to manage. His management could tell him that he had no business there if he could not take the sacrifices and the load of stress and work ".
This is exactly what prompted Théo Nonnez, 21, to put his bike away for good one evening in February 2021. This former cyclist from the Groupama-FDJ Continental team, French junior champion in 2016, " completely cracked”, he tells franceinfo. "I was talking about it to very close friends, but it's tricky to open up internally, concedes the ex-runner. When you want to make a career, talking about this problem is like shooting yourself in the foot. . It's getting exposed. I wanted to get out of it on my own, I didn't want to show that I was weak", analyzes the one who has reoriented himself towards a BTS communication.
Suffering in silence, Cédric Anselin also experienced it. Now a teacher in a training center in Norwich (United Kingdom), this 44-year-old former footballer rubbed shoulders with Zinédine Zidane in Bordeaux, attended the French youth teams, played in a UEFA Cup final (1996) and ended up sinking into depression. "My career stopped because a coach no longer wanted me, he explains to franceinfo. I was pushed out when I thought I had made no mistake". Discarded in his Norwich club, he is won over by loneliness. "I didn't want to be in a locker room anymore, he says. There's no point in doing the best job in the world if you're not happy."
Depression, a wound of a different kind
Depression can arise at any time. A banishment, an injury, a personal problem... The body may well be trained, if the head does not follow, the momentum is broken. When the evil is physical, no athlete is reluctant to talk about it. "We are in the body-object, agrees Nathalie Crépin. Suffering is acquired from an early age, it is normal, sometimes necessary and it is even seen as a factor of efficiency and performance." But pouring out your discomfort is more complicated, even "if women have more facilities to express things", notes Meriem Salmi. "In society, we know that they consult more than men, but for high-level sport, the figures do not yet exist", adds the psychologist. "You can complain about a knee, it does not engage the intimate, she illustrates. With mental problems, we are in another dimension of which we should not be ashamed".
This shame is sometimes accompanied by the guilt of disappointing those around you who have sacrificed a lot to see your dreams come true and sometimes lives them vicariously. "I told myself that I was the problem, I couldn't not be happy, I was paid to exercise my passion, I benefited from great equipment", testifies Théo Nonnez. Despite these ideal conditions for performance, his taste for pedaling slowly disappeared. Until the crisis, when he bursts into tears, one day, on his bike.
"There is nothing wrong with saying that we are not well, it is even very courageous to admit it, abounds Cédric Anselin. We must talk about it as soon as possible, otherwise depression will 'worsen." What former American tennis player Mardy Fish confirms in the Netflix documentary dedicated to him: "If I hadn't consulted, I might not be here today."
"The earlier we treat depression, the faster we can treat it", insists Meriem Salmi, who followed certain "very, very damaged" athletes before the Tokyo Olympics and had the pleasure of seeing them fly away for Japan. Bound by professional secrecy, she does not say more, but "if we have serious care, she repeats, we get out of it". Hugely awaited in Tokyo, Simone Biles quickly abandoned the team event, victim of "loss of figure". She finally reappeared a few days later to win bronze on beam. But at what cost: "I should have given up long before Tokyo," she told New York Magazine.
Talk to heal. Talking so as not to reach the point of no return, like the German goalkeeper from Hanover Robert Enke, who committed suicide on November 10, 2009. "For a long time, he believed that he would find the spring necessary to bounce back, writes the novelist Bernard Chambaz in his essay, Plonger (Gallimard, 2011), where he looks at the tragic fate of Enke. He hoped he would find it when he hit rock bottom. But today, he is convinced that "There is no bottom. And although he knows that it is contrary to his nature and to customs, he has the feeling that the only freedom he has left is suicide."
Other athletes have tried to end their lives, such as the former rugby player and captain of the XV of France, Pascal Papé. After a back injury during the Six Nations Tournament in 2013 which forced him to put his career on hold, the former second line of Stade Français went through a depression, attempted suicide, before being admitted to a psychiatric hospital. . "There is at that moment a mixture of fatigue, sadness, self-loathing. I am only well when I sleep, but I can't do it. So, I wanted to sleep forever “, he says in 2016 to L’Equipe Magazine (for subscribers).
Breaking down barriers
To avoid this, nothing beats prevention and support. Thus, Nathalie Crépin carries out 200 psychological assessments per year, all sports combined. They are mandatory for all high-level athletes, minors and adults, who must submit to them once a year, according to the decree of June 16, 2006 wanted by Jean-François Lamour, then Minister of Youth, Sports and of community life.
With the Covid-19 crisis and confinements, consulting a psychologist has become "normalized" in civil society, notes Nathalie Crépin. A trivialization that infuses the sporting world. And there is no reason for it to be otherwise since "there are no fewer pathologies in high-level sport than in society. It's the beginning of the end of a taboo, she rejoices. Athletes come more easily to consult without giving the reason for their visit".
"The liberation of speech came with time", fits Meriem Salmi, who has accompanied Teddy Riner for more than sixteen years. Even if he never reported depression during his career, the heavyweight broke down certain doors and advanced the practice, notes his psychologist. Very quickly, he assumed his psychological support.
"That's why it's important for the spearheads to be able to express themselves. This will help the lesser-known to do so too," says Nathalie Crépin. By entrusting his ill-being, Théo Nonnez had many returns and sometimes from "fairly well-known" personalities. But he does not claim victory right away. According to him, this process of accepting depression in the top athlete will still take time. And he, like others, is always ready to accompany those who suffer. "I grew up with that, why not use my experience to help people around me, concludes Cédric Anselin. It makes me feel good, it's even more incredible than playing against AC Milan at San Siro ." Théo Nonnez and Cédric Anselin got away with it. Naomi Osaka, too, is on the right track since she is finally thinking of a return: “I have this desire again, she proclaimed on September 27 in the program “The Shop” on HBO. It wouldn't really matter if you win or lose, I just want to have the pleasure of being back on the court." To let tears of joy flow down her cheeks?
