Tyrone defender Ronan McNamee knows that if he hadn't taken a chance to open up about his mental health struggles his life would have taken a very different path.
There certainly wouldn’t have been the All-Ireland title with the Red Hands in 2021 and the All-Star from a few years previous. Chances are he wouldn’t be in Ireland right now, instead travelling as far away from his problems as possible just to learn the cruel lesson that distance wouldn't soften them. In truth, he doesn’t know just how far things would have spiralled.
As a teak-tough defender and a male who kept his thoughts to himself, the idea of speaking out had to fight against his strong internal instinct to contain. To bottle up. To tell nobody.
But it was a battle that he won, and through counselling, public discussion and the weighty helping hand of former manager Mickey Harte, McNamee faced up to his issues.
And as an ambassador for this year’s Darkness Into Light campaign, the annual fundraising event organised by Pieta and supported by Electric Ireland, McNamee has urged others to fight against those bottling instincts and speak out.
"The reason I didn't speak about it was because I thought it would be a pity party in a way, hence you don't bother. It was the complete opposite.
"The amount of positivity that I got from it and the amount of people that reached out saying that they had their own problems and could relate to mine was rewarding in a way.
"Personally for me still, it's not something that I would talk about often enough. Or enough in a way that when I do speak about it still I would be uncomfortable speaking about it.
"The amount of positivity that I got from it and the amount of people that reached out saying that they had their own problems and could relate to mine was rewarding in a way.
"But, with time, when you do speak about it more you get more comfortable. You tend to park it a lot of the time and then whenever you speak about it, it reignites a lot of the troubles you did have. And whenever you sit back and look at where you were and how close things were to folding on you, then it annoys you that way.
"So there was a lot of positivity that came from it and I feel that it probably did help a lot of people. If it helped one person it would have been worth it, but I feel like from the messages I received, it helped a lot of people."
McNamee said that the positive reaction extended to many opposition players. Initially fearing it may open him up to on-field abuse, he was caught by surprise by the number of times he heard "fair play to you" from those he was battling with on the pitch.
That was massively reassuring for him, as was the fact that his problems just didn’t seem as severe when he vocalised them.
"Probably the fact that what I deemed to be massive issues weren't," was his response when asked about the benefits of seeking help.
"Whenever you address them and looked at them, they weren't problems. They were massive problems in my head, but in a life, on a day to day when you would look at them and see where other people might be and not have any real grievances at all, then you have to look at it from a different point of view.
"The likes of the counselling, I was seeing a counsellor in Omagh at the time and I remember I was sitting down with Mickey Harte often, like once a week, and you'd be chatting and maybe have a coffee.
"I remember him saying to me one time that it's none of my business what other people think of me. I was just fixated on what other people, were they judging you? You were always worried about the opinions of other people. That was probably the worst part of it.
"I remember he said that and you sort of stripped it back and thought about it, it made a lot of sense. You were just taking too much on in regards to worrying and trying to keep other people happy instead of looking after number one."
Harte’s influence on McNamee is clear. He moulded him into one of Ulster’s best defenders in recent times, but it was outside the dressing room where he had the biggest impact on the Aghyaran man.
"I don't think it's something you could explain. Only for him, I wouldn't be playing with Tyrone. I likely wouldn't be here, to be brutally honest.
"I wanted to leave, and [was] planning on getting out of Ireland, maybe going to America or go out to my brother in Australia. My plan was just to leave everything at home as regards to any issues that you were having, that you could just take off and leave them.
"I remember him saying to me that regardless of where you go, you're going to be taking them with you. It's probably something that I never, ever thought.
"Obviously, when you think about it now, of course you're going to be taking them with you. It's baggage that you don't necessarily bag up but you're going to be taking it. I wasn't thinking along them lines. I was just thinking about getting out of dodge and being away.
"He set me up with the counselling and would have been meeting me every other week just for a coffee and a chat. It wasn't even a chat about me. It was just football talk or anything. In an around them stages, at the start of 2016, I hadn't won anything with Tyrone worthwhile - I had a couple of McKenna Cups but that team hadn't broke through.
"My plan was to head away. Tyrone went on to win Ulster in 2016 and 2017, and were beaten in an All-Ireland final in 2018. If you'd left, and all those things happened while you were away, it would have been harder to deal with. Only for him, and his son Michael - who I was friendly with, he was the physio - I'll be forever indebted to them to be brutally honest."
Tyrone have added one more Ulster title since that 2017 success – two years ago en route to All-Ireland glory – but there’ll be no Anglo Celt celebrations this season after their provincial quarter-final loss to Monaghan.
For now it’s about learning the opposition in Tuesday’s All-Ireland round-robin draw and preparing for a reaction.
"Anybody that’s sitting with time on their hands now is going to be looking at it at as a time to get work done.
"Ideally, you’d rather be out this Sunday but you’re not and we just have to deal with it that way."
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