Former AFL football player Dylan Buckley used to feel sick with anxiety on game day.
“Vomiting, intrusive thoughts, I hoped that I would be injured and not have to play for six weeks,” says Buckley, who in 2014 was nominated for the NAB AFL Rising Star award when playing for Carlton.
“I always used to think if I had six weeks off I would get over it and get myself right, and it would be different, but unfortunately it never was.”
Dylan Buckley during his days playing for Carlton.Credit: Luis Ascui
Buckley was too scared to tell the psychologist. “I thought that they would just tell the coach and I wouldn’t get a game or they would think that I was weak.”
It wasn’t until Buckley left football, after being delisted by Greater Western Sydney at the end of 2019, that he was diagnosed with anxiety.
“It didn’t really leave me, it just picked up in other parts of my life and that’s when I knew it probably wasn’t the footy, it was more just me and how I was dealing with things. I just wish that I knew back then that there’s things that you can do and things I’ve put in place since then to help.”
These days Buckley co-hosts the popular podcast List Cloggers with former Carlton teammate Daniel Gorringe, another AFL player whose footy dreams didn’t quite go to plan.
The two men are also ambassadors for Tackle Your Feelings, a free mental health training program for community AFL coaches and club leaders that was formed by the AFL Coaches Association, the AFL Players’ Association and Zurich Insurance.
Tackle Your Feelings ambassadors and podcast co-hosts Daniel Gorringe, left, and Dylan Buckley.Credit: Wayne Taylor
The program helps coaches and club leaders understand, recognise and respond to the mental health needs of their players. It was established in 2018 following the death of Adelaide coach Phil Walsh, who was killed by his son who had schizophrenia that at the time was undiagnosed and untreated.
More than 7000 people have participated in Tackle Your Feelings at 850 community clubs across Australia. The program is delivered by local psychologists and high-profile player and coach ambassadors who share their stories.
“Football is one of the key anchors for any community and it’s one of the unifying things in Australia,” says Australian Psychological Society CEO Dr Zena Burgess.
An independent evaluation by Monash University found participants reported being more confident to make a referral, more aware of resources to support mental health and less likely to distance themselves from someone with a mental illness.
The study – published in the peer-reviewed Mental Health and Prevention journal last month – said consideration should be given to making the program available to all club members. It will be expanded to include players from next year.
Gorringe quit football three times during his seven-year career with Gold Coast and Carlton. “To be honest, every day is a battle, and during the career my mental health was probably at its worst, and heightened a lot just being in that environment,” he says.
Going up. Daniel Gorringe flies for a spectacular mark.Credit: Paul Rovere
One of the times he quit, Gorringe told his father he was not going well and things were tough. “My dad, in my eyes growing up, was like the most manly man ever. I never ever saw him cry. I never saw him struggle. And he turned around and said, ‘Look, I’m actually struggling as well’. And we shared our stories and I’d never seen that side of my dad. It was a pretty special moment. It just goes to show there’s a lot of men out there who are hiding how they’re feeling and for no good reason at all.”
Life after AFL football can be a tough transition for players, Gorringe says. “When your football identity gets ripped off you and you are mid-20s it’s a bit like ‘Who am I?’
He worked as a real estate agent and a tradie and appeared on Big Brother before finding his feet as a podcast host, marketing manager, co-founder of Sippy Lager, a beer company which donates money from its “extra blue” batch to mental health charities and a Tackle Your Feelings ambassador.
Gorringe is open about his bad days. “I’m feeling super anxious today and it’s been sky-high all day and I can’t explain it,” he says on the latest episode of List Cloggers. “You get short of breath and there’s a wave that comes over you and I haven’t felt good all day and to be honest, I really, really didn’t want to come in here and speak because that’s the last thing I feel like doing. But then I know that when I come in here, I feel better.”
Jim and Dylan Buckley.Credit: Wayne Taylor
He tells The Age social anxiety is something he deals with every day. “It’s just knowing the factors that really cause it to creep up on me and what tools I have that I can combat that.”
Tackle Your Feelings program manager Adam Baldwin says having ambassadors such as Gorringe, Buckley and Melbourne defender Steven May share their stories helps raise awareness and reduce stigma.
“Sometimes you get these burly old school coaches, but then when they hear from these people they see on TV on the weekend, or they know about through their playing career, it really strips away some of the preconceived ideas they might have.”
Buckley would think of his father Jim Buckley, a three-time premiership player for Carlton, when he saw the stoic older men at the back of the room during the Tackle Your Feelings sessions. They didn’t say anything, but Buckley knew they were listening.
“It gives me goosebumps thinking about it now because I would always picture my old man and what I would say to him.”
In February 2021 Buckley talked to his dad about the alcohol addiction and depression Jim had battled much of his life.
“It took me 28 years to have that conversation with him,” Buckley says. “The last few years he’s been sober. Without this program, I honestly don’t think I would have had the skills to have those conversations with him to get that actually kick-started.”
Support is available from Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636.
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