November 2, 2022 • 22 mins
On today's episode, Philadelphia Eagles right tackle Lane Johnson sits down with Jay Glazer on the one-year anniversary of their original "FOX NFL Sunday" chat where he detailed all the challenges he faced in his battle with depression and anxiety.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is Unbreakable with Jay Glazer, a mental health podcast
helping you out of the gray and into the blue.
Now here's Jay Glazer. Welcome back to Unbreakable, a mental
health podcast with Jay Glazer. I am Jay Glazer, and look,
it was about a year ago where a friend of
(00:25):
mine who I have trained with, who lived with me
and my son for a while, came out on national
television and told the world he was struggling. That friend
just happens to be the best tackle the National Football
League and Lane Johnson, and it was at that moment
also he gave me almost permission to come on television
and tell the world that I was struggling with what
I call the gray depression anxiety. So I said a
(00:48):
year later, Hey, let's run a back, big boy. Lane Johnson,
Welcome to Unbreakable. How are you, brother man? A year
ago we did that interview and you said to me,
I've been stuck in hell. Since we've done that, in
this past year, do you still feel like you're stuck
in that hell of depression anxiety or as alleviate? Have
you been able to see a little heaven? No, I'm
(01:09):
gonna I'm in a much better headspace compared to last year. UM,
I mean I was dealing with a number of things,
primarily UM the surgery had on my ankle put me
in a bad spot. I wasn't able to work out
feel the same, uh you know, doing day to day
stuff for my profession without feeling pains. It was always
on my mind and amplified. And then I think we
(01:32):
just some of the medication I was on maybe it
wasn't agreeing with me in my system. You know, whenever
your body feels uh extremes like that to where you
have like convulsions like the shades ramers in your hands,
it's really scary and it's uh, and it's something that
it seems like it's always over unique and can it
can really can take control of your life. Um. And
(01:54):
it's hard to really open up and express what it
really feels like the people who maybe ignorant of the feeling,
but once you get it, it's uh. The fear that
you have in your in your system is like overload
to where it's hard to describe. But I feel like
all my a lot of my anxieties all have always
(02:14):
come from just like internal pressures, I think, um, you know,
coming from a small town. My goal was always to
be UM an NFL player, and so you know the
odds of doing that is high. But I just feel
like I was always hard wired. If I always had,
you know, my mind set on something, I would always
you know, pretty much stay to it. You put too
much pressure on yourself, like you you were yeah, yeah,
(02:35):
goals that really aren't attainable, you know yeah, and even
when you do attain them, it's like, well you're expecting
to get them anyway. So it's like, you know, you
had yourself and shackles almost And so that was, I know,
when type of situation. I feel like since last year after,
I feel liberated, you know, having come you know forward
about it. When I realized, you know, there was people
(02:57):
from the coach organization UM that reached out. I just
I could touch a lot of people in the NFL
because a lot of athletes are going through this. People
I go against there going through the same exact struggles.
And it's UM. You know, our job is to go
win win football games, and there's a lot at stake,
you know, people's you know, it's a it's a high
price game, you know, uh, season in season out for
(03:17):
people who didn't see the feature that you and I
did last year. Just and I said to you, look
my depression and anxiety when it kicks in, I feel
it on the left side of my gut, philip, behind
my rib cage, and I feel in my joints like
I just went through a fifty round fight in the rain. Right.
So for people who didn't see our feature, described to
(03:39):
people what your depression anxiety did to you, what it
cost you. Uh, Mine was where every time I woke up,
it was like I was in full anxiety attack mode.
So I lost a lot of weight, probably fifteen twenty
pounds doing day to day activities. Was it was hard
to function, and then trying to play football on top
of it, I couldn't do it no more. I was
at a I was at a place where, um, you know,
(04:02):
I feel like my body had was had all that
they could take and all that it can muster. And
so I really needed help and to stop putting this
stuff in the corner um and letting it consume me,
you know a little bit of a time and UH
really come to grips with it, and I feel like
further undunderstand yourself. I feel like whenever you're putting these
positions that will it opens yourself up well to you,
(04:24):
and so you have to maybe confront different sides of
yourself that you know you don't really understand. You also
said you were you were thrown up in front of blood, right, Yeah,
well I've thrown up so much something like when I'm saying,
when I get these anxiety attacks, so the first thing
I feel is in your stomach because it's like the
fight or flight response, and all that blood rushes away
from your stomach and you can get uh, yeah, very nauseous.
(04:47):
This happens every game day for me. By the way,
this has happened ever since, uh really high school. But
whenever this was going on, I thought it was due
to my medication that I was on. A lot of
it was due to bad side effects. So when you
have an that ss A r I uh side effects,
they can range some like cold the flu like symptoms.
You can have tremors in your hand, like convulsions, and
(05:09):
they stay with you. They don't they don't really go
away because this stuff is messing with your serotonin um
you know, neurotransmitters in your brain and so chemically, when
that stuff isn't but you were so like want, yeah,
I want people to say that you're on medication. Yeah,
I was on the extended extended release. Um, and what
(05:31):
I was doing was usually I had regular prescriptions to
where you could split them, and so with this extended release,
there's a there's a reason why it's made the way
it is is to not be split. And so basically
I went from a pretty decent dose to nothing and
so and these are the type of you went through
pretty much. Yeah, because you're supposed to taper down. There's
(05:52):
a tapering system of these, and so the withdrawals and
news syndoms from these were terrible. And so the medication
I was almost Paxil, and so that is known to
have the worst side effects of any of This is
our hours. Do you are you still on medication? On
different medication now? Yeah, yeah, I'm on a different medication.
And you know, even with the whole medication, they always
(06:12):
saw it as like a crutch, and um, you know,
if you had something bad with your need, you know
you're gonna take something for that or you know something.
This is no different. This should be taking even more seriously.
But I feel like just us, we we've become very
good at what we practice. So if like we're very good,
you know, the anxiety builds up and you're constantly distracting yourself.
For I feel like we're attracted to drama. You know,
(06:34):
social media has drama on it. Yeah, your brain almost
gets addicted to it. And whenever you don't have that,
you know, that stimulation from that it manifests and anxiety.
You know. But but the reason why I'm asking about
your your meds, I want people to hear this, Like,
I've been on over thirty and I haven't found any
of that work for me yet. I use I haven't
(06:54):
said this publicly yet. I used kinamine intrusions UM and
that is the only but that's an IV. I haven't
had a pill. Had one pill that worked for about
four days, but I just metabolized things. But I'll never stop. Like,
if we can find medication that's gonna work for me,
I'm gonna take it. So I want people to understand
that I'm not against men's. Lane is not against men's
(07:14):
That's why I wanted him to say that he's using them.
Anything that we could do is not a crutch and
it's not a weakness If it works for you, God
bless you. Yeah, I just think it's it's another part
of the plan of attack. I feel like this along
with I thought just training your mind, um, really learning
to quiet your mind and practice it because we don't
practice it. Like I said, a lot of our world
(07:35):
now is full of distractions. So like even like you
were talking about for the podcast, you know, breath work,
that's something's been around for a long time. It's just
you know, starting to come around here in the US,
some people practicing it. And then you know, for what
we do, it's all about stress control and trying to
be your best self every day and and not have
like like your thoughts running away with you. I feel
(07:55):
like that's the problem, your thoughts. You gotta learn to
really quiet your mind, and it's hard to do if
you don't practice it. One thing I learned from you,
which you didn't even tend to teach, is you know,
you and I were talking to you were talking about journaling,
and this didn't make the peace. And so I've had
an anxiety tech every time I've ever been on TV
from two thousand five till now and up until I
(08:17):
should say when I wrote the book. Once you said
your journal I had already written the book when you
and I sat down and talk last year, and then
I realized, So I'm a bit I haven't been having
these anxiety texts panic attacks when I've been going on
TVs Office. I'm like, Man, I wonder because I've been journaling,
which in the book for me, basically writing a book
(08:37):
is journaling. So that was huge. So you still like,
what's your practice now? You do you journal? Now? To
you your meditation, breathwork, I know you work out like
a motherfucker. What else is part of your your journey
to get you through this? Uh? Well, there's a well.
So during the off season I went to Dr Aiman,
Oh yeah, who has the aim and clinics, and so
(08:59):
basically did a spake scan of my brain and so
he's kind of able to diagnose like which areas of
the brain is kind of more overactive, and can describe
me kind of why you're filming in certain ways. But um,
obviously he's big on meditation. Um. I think it's called
cart crea. I think it's the name of it. Um,
he's big on that. It's almost like a like a
mantra to quiet your minddental meditation. Yeah, yeah, what he said,
(09:24):
uh from the mantra though like some of the studies
I know one of the studies is from the University
University of uh think, Pennsylvania. But I think he did
an eight weeks study of just people that practice this
every day. They showed a lot a lot better blood
flow in the frontal prefrontal cortex of the brain, and
so they are a lot more sharp focused, able to
deal with stress, a lot better anxiety. Um. But basically
(09:46):
what he said, it's like, it's a workout for your
for your mind. Um, practicing this, you do that, now
you do Yeah. I got to do a lot of
that before before games or the night before, UM, to
really just try to calm the system that down. It
really quiet, the quiet the mind down. So when I'm
on the field, I'm just uh, you got the roommates
(10:07):
in your head to stop talking? Yeah, yeah, exact to play,
to play nicely, to with each other. I should say yeah,
well yeah really just I'm just I'm trying not to
think nothing. I'm gonna go on the field and not
i'l like the main problem with with things is over thinking.
So I just want to just I'm just living in
the present. The most president I can be. So I want,
I want to get back to you. And I did
the feature and I know if you're nervous at one
(10:30):
point going in, tell me more about the reaction after
you did the piece. Now that made you feel? I
just I just knew that a lot of you know,
I feel like I represented uh, just a lot of
guys in the NFL that felt the same way that, uh,
you know, deal with these things and maybe don't even
you know, talk to anybody really about it. These are
things kept hidden to them, to themselves, and you know,
(10:52):
and I learned this stuff from like whenever my teammate
Brandon Books went to a similar or deal and yeah,
we just realized that we have a lot more in common.
And I think the main thing to break the fold
is to talk obviously communication and then really have a
plan of attacks to really okay your mental health? What
does that look like? How are we hitting all the
(11:13):
boxes um to protect our minds and really just our
peace of mind? But how to make you feel like
these players reaching out? Did you were you able to
feel was it able to lift you? Yeah? Yeah, I
mean I felt I just felt liberated, just felt just
telling my story and then the reactions, Like I knew
I was gonna have different reactions, most mostly all positive. Yeah,
(11:34):
I just you know a lot of these conversations that
I had as the players after the games, like hey man,
I got through similar stuff. You know. That was Yeah,
that was That was the biggest touching home moment, was
just seeing all the guys after the games and having
these conversations with the guys and uh, you know that
meant the world to me. He's ready story you can
tell where somebody in particular came over you after game
(11:55):
and just touched you and something he said to you. You
You don't have to use his name if you don't
want to. Yes, one the right as guys are pretty
pretty notable players had some struggles came with to me
and uh, you know he said that amen, praying for you.
You know I've gone through similar stuff, and uh yeah,
I mean, just like just what I said, It's it's
all too very common that we all have these similar issues.
(12:16):
But it's also very common that nobody knows it because
we don't talk about it a lot. You know, it's
crazy too. So again, I trained lane for a couple
of years and mixed martial arts and then he lived
with my son and I um, and his big thing was,
obviously I'm short. My son at the time was I
don't know what was saving me back to the ten
or whatever. So he was short. And Lane used to say, Man,
(12:37):
I feel like sucking Gandalf in this place where you
two hobbits. So, but is it amazing that we're our
lives have gone? Because when I trained you mixed martial arts.
My entire thing to you, don't show it, don't show
your hurt. Right, what was my thing? Neutral face, neutral face,
don't fucking show it. If you're hurt, if you're tired,
you will never fucking know. Right, Lane, up your ship, right,
(13:00):
if you put your hands on your heads, right, don't
fucking show it. And here I am now preaching to
the world, and you now also preaching the world the
complete opposite in life, show it all, tell it all,
say it all, show your pain, show your vulnerability. I'm
still trying to process me living the two worlds. Yeah, well,
(13:21):
I think what she said really does apply to really
like your sports, so yours was mixed martial arts, mind
and football. And yeah, whenever you are in that cage,
you you you do need to have that you don't
show any negative body language. You're a warrior in there.
But like you said, it's very hard to separate that
personality that lifestyle. Okay, now we're heading at home, we're
(13:42):
going to somewhere else, and it's hard to flip the
switch to turn it off. And I think that's the
main thing, is that it's hard for us to flip
the switch to turn it off because this is something
so ingrained with you, or something you've been so passionate
about your whole life, and it really takes, really takes
a hold of you as your identity. Where there you
like it or not, there's something you put a lot
of your thoughts and time and energy on the start
(14:05):
thinking about. So it's hard to go to something else.
Have you been able to take because I think a
lot of our issues go from come from social media.
You know we immediately Yeah, man, we're comparing ourselves. Everybody
else's filtered fraction of a second on fucking Facebook and Instagram,
but also Twitter. Man, we're just seeing so much ship
talked about us, yet we're addicted to us. Have you
(14:27):
been able to quit that addiction? Yeah? Well I have.
I have helped with my social media stuff, so my Instagram,
my Twitter, so I really try to look at that
during the uh really just you know, as I've gotten older,
just celess I want to listen to the radio. The
more I like to listen to podcasts or listen to
you know, staying my own stuff because I feel like
with everything you turn on, I mean, eighty percent of
(14:50):
it is negatives. Just a negative, just constant. You know.
That's what the world's turned into, unfortunately, turned into drama. Um,
Like you said, the the Internet, I don't know. I
feel like there's no accountability on there. I feel like, hey,
if you gotta profile, how you need to need some
identity with some identification with it too. You can't just
you gotta be you get You must be held accountable
(15:10):
for what you say. Wouldn't that be a great world?
But it's incredible too because the ship people say to us,
imagine you walking into somebody's job and us walking up
to some mu's boss and go, hey, hey, hey, Johnny
over there in the office two or four he stuck it. Taxes,
(15:31):
terrible taxes, right, fucking fire hip. That's what people do
to us. Come on, yeah, you're not gonna state of paranoia,
but like it comes with the territory. Like what I
realized is that it's all at the end of the day,
it's all about the consumer enjoying the game or enjoying
the fights, the spectator, the fans, um. So it's part
(15:51):
of the game. Like, yeah, but we have feelings, motherfucker.
Yeah existed in seventies and eighties. It was just it
was I feel like it's more face to face and
it hadn't to go go type all their anger out
and vent, you know, give me the give me the point.
I guess the hardest time for you, for the lowest
point you have that you got through. Yeah, I mean
it's probably been the past three years because, like, like
(16:14):
I said, a lot of this step for right, Yeah,
a lot of this step for my injury, you know,
and having to play professional sport and not feel the same.
We're in constant pain. Yeah, I mean, somebody just gave me. Hell,
I just thought I thought I was gonna retire early,
to be honest with you, and that that was what
I was fighting. Yeah, I mean, because if it was
(16:35):
gonna affect me this bad, even though I can still
make money and still be good at what I do,
not knowing that I can, you know, drove me nuts,
you know, when I can't push off my left foot
the way I am my right foot. Yeah, so its
just something I had to adapt to. But now it's
I mean, I thought whenever, uh, you know, I left
(16:55):
and whenever, whenever we did that interview, you know, I
was talking to Dom, I was like, hey, I don't
really know how much longer I can go with this,
just because my moody was hurting so bad. You can
see even last year on my film like run Blocked
and like coming Out, I was I was very high.
I was in pain. I was just a lot of pain.
But you know, NFL people, it's it's the name of
the game. You know, you gotta get healthy or somebody
(17:18):
else's coming in. So you know, a lot of it
was was you know that, and then the internal pressure
to play at a certain level despite whatever excuse she
may have. You know what I'd like you to do,
and I meant to say this when I went around.
I'd love for you to be able to tell your
trainer right when guys are hurt, to ask guys how
they're doing, not just physically, because like you said, when
(17:39):
you're hurt. It's a warrior being forced to put his
shield down when he's not signed up to put his
shield down. So talk to him, talk to him and
say hey, from now on, when you got a guy
in here, make sure just talk to him that they're okay.
Between the years, Yeah, and I think it the you know,
the most vulnerable times is like whenever a coach or
at least like talks that you remember is like when
the pulls you aside privately, you know, not among the
(18:03):
guys and like tells you like, hey, how are you
doing that type of stuff, And that's like that that's
that's where guys will open up more instead of being
you know, in the locker room among the guys, if
you do it in a more personal setting, guys will
really tell you what's on their mind. But like like
I said, you're going to the gym asking guys how
they doing. They're always can say I'm good, you know, yeah,
(18:24):
but really pulling You're saying, really pulling somebody aside, saying hey,
really pulling somebody aside, exactly really pulling them. So when
when this went down to last year, I did I
jumped your ship for not reaching out to your teammates,
me being one of them, tell us it got this bad?
Do you aid, do you now realize that, Okay, I
(18:46):
can never get into place where I don't reach out
to anybody. Do you get that? Yeah? Yeah, I mean
the self isolation. I feel like it's not it's like
a natural like side effect of it. I feel like
when you first get these you know, a philiates stuffies,
when there isolated, not you know, I guess spread it
anymore for people to find out. You want this to
be just your problem that you can hopefully overcome. But yeah,
(19:07):
I mean I only knew that it was just gonna
kept building the monster. And I knew that even though
it was making things worse, as like, I wasn't going
to turn back, you know. And I feel like a
lot of people do this. I don't. I don't know why,
because I guess they're scared to confront them, to confront it. Well,
there's a certain amount of shame we feel. Yeah, you're like, well,
(19:28):
we used to it like it's weakness. Now I don't. Yeah, Well,
these conversations didn't exist back in you know, in different times.
It wasn't sucking up mentality. Hey, that's why do you
have a lot of trauma filled people as growing up.
Since somef doesn't go away, you know what I'm saying,
It just it goes with you. I was especially proud
when I saw you not too long ago doing a
mental health speech at a synagogue. I mean, what may
(19:53):
we'll talk about coming such full circle for you, Lane
and just making a one eight are you? Were you
proud of yourself? You are gonna be proud of yourself
now for being able to lead some many of us
out of this. Yeah, well that was really you know,
another time that really hit home on me because you know,
that's the first time I've ever besides you know, going
one on one with you, you know, speaking to a
group about this. And yeah, just the amount of people
(20:17):
I saw that we're in the audience, we're there because
in fact, they were filming some type of a degree
of pain or they have a love on that's going
through a certain situation. Man, it's a quiet killer. You
don't realize how many people have lost lives, they've lost
loved ones to suicide or just uh, you know, stuff
that's you know that can be at least started with
(20:37):
a conversation. And like I'm saying, Yeah, seeing those parents
and some of the kids there, that was special. Yeah,
that was a that was a good moment in my life.
Before I let you go, our last question, I always
ask somebody, give me a moment in your life, your
unbreakable moment, something that could have broken. This doesn't have
to be mental health wise, just anything, something you're like,
your career, whatever. It is. Something that like for me
is when I almost died with my lungs and then
(20:59):
freaking came a way back and open unbreakable with an
oxygen attack. My learn breakable moment was, you know, eleven
years after starting my career, get my first full time
job and not not Quinn, after eleven years of rejection,
making nine thousand step four in fifty bucks a year
living in New York City. What is your unbreakable moment?
Give me that moment for you that something should have
(21:19):
broken you didn't. You came through the other side of
that time a little stronger because of it, I mean,
overcoming just uh really this past year with the injuries,
the anxiety, you know, even the coming forth and and
now you know telling people, you know, kind of my
journey and then uh really it's just uh be wary
of the people you're around every day at work. Try
(21:41):
to lighten people up and uh, like I said, a
compliment I can go a long way for people. A
good conversation can go a long way for people. And
I feel like the initiation of that might be the
hardest part, but once you break that door down and
it opens it up for a much better life. Man,
I appreciate you so much to it and I'm proud
of you again. Off La Johnson, thank you brother. Always
(22:04):
proud of you. Proud to walk this walk together. Man.
Thanks Phil both love you, Love you.
This is Unbreakable with Jay Glazer, a mental health podcast
helping you out of the gray and into the blue.
Now here's Jay Glazer. Welcome back to Unbreakable, a mental
health podcast with Jay Glazer. I am Jay Glazer, and look,
it was about a year ago where a friend of
(00:25):
mine who I have trained with, who lived with me
and my son for a while, came out on national
television and told the world he was struggling. That friend
just happens to be the best tackle the National Football
League and Lane Johnson, and it was at that moment
also he gave me almost permission to come on television
and tell the world that I was struggling with what
I call the gray depression anxiety. So I said a
(00:48):
year later, Hey, let's run a back, big boy. Lane Johnson,
Welcome to Unbreakable. How are you, brother man? A year
ago we did that interview and you said to me,
I've been stuck in hell. Since we've done that, in
this past year, do you still feel like you're stuck
in that hell of depression anxiety or as alleviate? Have
you been able to see a little heaven? No, I'm
(01:09):
gonna I'm in a much better headspace compared to last year. UM,
I mean I was dealing with a number of things,
primarily UM the surgery had on my ankle put me
in a bad spot. I wasn't able to work out
feel the same, uh you know, doing day to day
stuff for my profession without feeling pains. It was always
on my mind and amplified. And then I think we
(01:32):
just some of the medication I was on maybe it
wasn't agreeing with me in my system. You know, whenever
your body feels uh extremes like that to where you
have like convulsions like the shades ramers in your hands,
it's really scary and it's uh, and it's something that
it seems like it's always over unique and can it
can really can take control of your life. Um. And
(01:54):
it's hard to really open up and express what it
really feels like the people who maybe ignorant of the feeling,
but once you get it, it's uh. The fear that
you have in your in your system is like overload
to where it's hard to describe. But I feel like
all my a lot of my anxieties all have always
(02:14):
come from just like internal pressures, I think, um, you know,
coming from a small town. My goal was always to
be UM an NFL player, and so you know the
odds of doing that is high. But I just feel
like I was always hard wired. If I always had,
you know, my mind set on something, I would always
you know, pretty much stay to it. You put too
much pressure on yourself, like you you were yeah, yeah,
(02:35):
goals that really aren't attainable, you know yeah, and even
when you do attain them, it's like, well you're expecting
to get them anyway. So it's like, you know, you
had yourself and shackles almost And so that was, I know,
when type of situation. I feel like since last year after,
I feel liberated, you know, having come you know forward
about it. When I realized, you know, there was people
(02:57):
from the coach organization UM that reached out. I just
I could touch a lot of people in the NFL
because a lot of athletes are going through this. People
I go against there going through the same exact struggles.
And it's UM. You know, our job is to go
win win football games, and there's a lot at stake,
you know, people's you know, it's a it's a high
price game, you know, uh, season in season out for
(03:17):
people who didn't see the feature that you and I
did last year. Just and I said to you, look
my depression and anxiety when it kicks in, I feel
it on the left side of my gut, philip, behind
my rib cage, and I feel in my joints like
I just went through a fifty round fight in the rain. Right.
So for people who didn't see our feature, described to
(03:39):
people what your depression anxiety did to you, what it
cost you. Uh, Mine was where every time I woke up,
it was like I was in full anxiety attack mode.
So I lost a lot of weight, probably fifteen twenty
pounds doing day to day activities. Was it was hard
to function, and then trying to play football on top
of it, I couldn't do it no more. I was
at a I was at a place where, um, you know,
(04:02):
I feel like my body had was had all that
they could take and all that it can muster. And
so I really needed help and to stop putting this
stuff in the corner um and letting it consume me,
you know a little bit of a time and UH
really come to grips with it, and I feel like
further undunderstand yourself. I feel like whenever you're putting these
positions that will it opens yourself up well to you,
(04:24):
and so you have to maybe confront different sides of
yourself that you know you don't really understand. You also
said you were you were thrown up in front of blood, right, Yeah,
well I've thrown up so much something like when I'm saying,
when I get these anxiety attacks, so the first thing
I feel is in your stomach because it's like the
fight or flight response, and all that blood rushes away
from your stomach and you can get uh, yeah, very nauseous.
(04:47):
This happens every game day for me. By the way,
this has happened ever since, uh really high school. But
whenever this was going on, I thought it was due
to my medication that I was on. A lot of
it was due to bad side effects. So when you
have an that ss A r I uh side effects,
they can range some like cold the flu like symptoms.
You can have tremors in your hand, like convulsions, and
(05:09):
they stay with you. They don't they don't really go
away because this stuff is messing with your serotonin um
you know, neurotransmitters in your brain and so chemically, when
that stuff isn't but you were so like want, yeah,
I want people to say that you're on medication. Yeah,
I was on the extended extended release. Um, and what
(05:31):
I was doing was usually I had regular prescriptions to
where you could split them, and so with this extended release,
there's a there's a reason why it's made the way
it is is to not be split. And so basically
I went from a pretty decent dose to nothing and
so and these are the type of you went through
pretty much. Yeah, because you're supposed to taper down. There's
(05:52):
a tapering system of these, and so the withdrawals and
news syndoms from these were terrible. And so the medication
I was almost Paxil, and so that is known to
have the worst side effects of any of This is
our hours. Do you are you still on medication? On
different medication now? Yeah, yeah, I'm on a different medication.
And you know, even with the whole medication, they always
(06:12):
saw it as like a crutch, and um, you know,
if you had something bad with your need, you know
you're gonna take something for that or you know something.
This is no different. This should be taking even more seriously.
But I feel like just us, we we've become very
good at what we practice. So if like we're very good,
you know, the anxiety builds up and you're constantly distracting yourself.
For I feel like we're attracted to drama. You know,
(06:34):
social media has drama on it. Yeah, your brain almost
gets addicted to it. And whenever you don't have that,
you know, that stimulation from that it manifests and anxiety.
You know. But but the reason why I'm asking about
your your meds, I want people to hear this, Like,
I've been on over thirty and I haven't found any
of that work for me yet. I use I haven't
(06:54):
said this publicly yet. I used kinamine intrusions UM and
that is the only but that's an IV. I haven't
had a pill. Had one pill that worked for about
four days, but I just metabolized things. But I'll never stop. Like,
if we can find medication that's gonna work for me,
I'm gonna take it. So I want people to understand
that I'm not against men's. Lane is not against men's
(07:14):
That's why I wanted him to say that he's using them.
Anything that we could do is not a crutch and
it's not a weakness If it works for you, God
bless you. Yeah, I just think it's it's another part
of the plan of attack. I feel like this along
with I thought just training your mind, um, really learning
to quiet your mind and practice it because we don't
practice it. Like I said, a lot of our world
(07:35):
now is full of distractions. So like even like you
were talking about for the podcast, you know, breath work,
that's something's been around for a long time. It's just
you know, starting to come around here in the US,
some people practicing it. And then you know, for what
we do, it's all about stress control and trying to
be your best self every day and and not have
like like your thoughts running away with you. I feel
(07:55):
like that's the problem, your thoughts. You gotta learn to
really quiet your mind, and it's hard to do if
you don't practice it. One thing I learned from you,
which you didn't even tend to teach, is you know,
you and I were talking to you were talking about journaling,
and this didn't make the peace. And so I've had
an anxiety tech every time I've ever been on TV
from two thousand five till now and up until I
(08:17):
should say when I wrote the book. Once you said
your journal I had already written the book when you
and I sat down and talk last year, and then
I realized, So I'm a bit I haven't been having
these anxiety texts panic attacks when I've been going on
TVs Office. I'm like, Man, I wonder because I've been journaling,
which in the book for me, basically writing a book
(08:37):
is journaling. So that was huge. So you still like,
what's your practice now? You do you journal? Now? To
you your meditation, breathwork, I know you work out like
a motherfucker. What else is part of your your journey
to get you through this? Uh? Well, there's a well.
So during the off season I went to Dr Aiman,
Oh yeah, who has the aim and clinics, and so
(08:59):
basically did a spake scan of my brain and so
he's kind of able to diagnose like which areas of
the brain is kind of more overactive, and can describe
me kind of why you're filming in certain ways. But um,
obviously he's big on meditation. Um. I think it's called
cart crea. I think it's the name of it. Um,
he's big on that. It's almost like a like a
mantra to quiet your minddental meditation. Yeah, yeah, what he said,
(09:24):
uh from the mantra though like some of the studies
I know one of the studies is from the University
University of uh think, Pennsylvania. But I think he did
an eight weeks study of just people that practice this
every day. They showed a lot a lot better blood
flow in the frontal prefrontal cortex of the brain, and
so they are a lot more sharp focused, able to
deal with stress, a lot better anxiety. Um. But basically
(09:46):
what he said, it's like, it's a workout for your
for your mind. Um, practicing this, you do that, now
you do Yeah. I got to do a lot of
that before before games or the night before, UM, to
really just try to calm the system that down. It
really quiet, the quiet the mind down. So when I'm
on the field, I'm just uh, you got the roommates
(10:07):
in your head to stop talking? Yeah, yeah, exact to play,
to play nicely, to with each other. I should say yeah,
well yeah really just I'm just I'm trying not to
think nothing. I'm gonna go on the field and not
i'l like the main problem with with things is over thinking.
So I just want to just I'm just living in
the present. The most president I can be. So I want,
I want to get back to you. And I did
the feature and I know if you're nervous at one
(10:30):
point going in, tell me more about the reaction after
you did the piece. Now that made you feel? I
just I just knew that a lot of you know,
I feel like I represented uh, just a lot of
guys in the NFL that felt the same way that, uh,
you know, deal with these things and maybe don't even
you know, talk to anybody really about it. These are
things kept hidden to them, to themselves, and you know,
(10:52):
and I learned this stuff from like whenever my teammate
Brandon Books went to a similar or deal and yeah,
we just realized that we have a lot more in common.
And I think the main thing to break the fold
is to talk obviously communication and then really have a
plan of attacks to really okay your mental health? What
does that look like? How are we hitting all the
(11:13):
boxes um to protect our minds and really just our
peace of mind? But how to make you feel like
these players reaching out? Did you were you able to
feel was it able to lift you? Yeah? Yeah, I
mean I felt I just felt liberated, just felt just
telling my story and then the reactions, Like I knew
I was gonna have different reactions, most mostly all positive. Yeah,
(11:34):
I just you know a lot of these conversations that
I had as the players after the games, like hey man,
I got through similar stuff. You know. That was Yeah,
that was That was the biggest touching home moment, was
just seeing all the guys after the games and having
these conversations with the guys and uh, you know that
meant the world to me. He's ready story you can
tell where somebody in particular came over you after game
(11:55):
and just touched you and something he said to you. You
You don't have to use his name if you don't
want to. Yes, one the right as guys are pretty
pretty notable players had some struggles came with to me
and uh, you know he said that amen, praying for you.
You know I've gone through similar stuff, and uh yeah,
I mean, just like just what I said, It's it's
all too very common that we all have these similar issues.
(12:16):
But it's also very common that nobody knows it because
we don't talk about it a lot. You know, it's
crazy too. So again, I trained lane for a couple
of years and mixed martial arts and then he lived
with my son and I um, and his big thing was,
obviously I'm short. My son at the time was I
don't know what was saving me back to the ten
or whatever. So he was short. And Lane used to say, Man,
(12:37):
I feel like sucking Gandalf in this place where you
two hobbits. So, but is it amazing that we're our
lives have gone? Because when I trained you mixed martial arts.
My entire thing to you, don't show it, don't show
your hurt. Right, what was my thing? Neutral face, neutral face,
don't fucking show it. If you're hurt, if you're tired,
you will never fucking know. Right, Lane, up your ship, right,
(13:00):
if you put your hands on your heads, right, don't
fucking show it. And here I am now preaching to
the world, and you now also preaching the world the
complete opposite in life, show it all, tell it all,
say it all, show your pain, show your vulnerability. I'm
still trying to process me living the two worlds. Yeah, well,
(13:21):
I think what she said really does apply to really
like your sports, so yours was mixed martial arts, mind
and football. And yeah, whenever you are in that cage,
you you you do need to have that you don't
show any negative body language. You're a warrior in there.
But like you said, it's very hard to separate that
personality that lifestyle. Okay, now we're heading at home, we're
(13:42):
going to somewhere else, and it's hard to flip the
switch to turn it off. And I think that's the
main thing, is that it's hard for us to flip
the switch to turn it off because this is something
so ingrained with you, or something you've been so passionate
about your whole life, and it really takes, really takes
a hold of you as your identity. Where there you
like it or not, there's something you put a lot
of your thoughts and time and energy on the start
(14:05):
thinking about. So it's hard to go to something else.
Have you been able to take because I think a
lot of our issues go from come from social media.
You know we immediately Yeah, man, we're comparing ourselves. Everybody
else's filtered fraction of a second on fucking Facebook and Instagram,
but also Twitter. Man, we're just seeing so much ship
talked about us, yet we're addicted to us. Have you
(14:27):
been able to quit that addiction? Yeah? Well I have.
I have helped with my social media stuff, so my Instagram,
my Twitter, so I really try to look at that
during the uh really just you know, as I've gotten older,
just celess I want to listen to the radio. The
more I like to listen to podcasts or listen to
you know, staying my own stuff because I feel like
with everything you turn on, I mean, eighty percent of
(14:50):
it is negatives. Just a negative, just constant. You know.
That's what the world's turned into, unfortunately, turned into drama. Um,
Like you said, the the Internet, I don't know. I
feel like there's no accountability on there. I feel like, hey,
if you gotta profile, how you need to need some
identity with some identification with it too. You can't just
you gotta be you get You must be held accountable
(15:10):
for what you say. Wouldn't that be a great world?
But it's incredible too because the ship people say to us,
imagine you walking into somebody's job and us walking up
to some mu's boss and go, hey, hey, hey, Johnny
over there in the office two or four he stuck it. Taxes,
(15:31):
terrible taxes, right, fucking fire hip. That's what people do
to us. Come on, yeah, you're not gonna state of paranoia,
but like it comes with the territory. Like what I
realized is that it's all at the end of the day,
it's all about the consumer enjoying the game or enjoying
the fights, the spectator, the fans, um. So it's part
(15:51):
of the game. Like, yeah, but we have feelings, motherfucker.
Yeah existed in seventies and eighties. It was just it
was I feel like it's more face to face and
it hadn't to go go type all their anger out
and vent, you know, give me the give me the point.
I guess the hardest time for you, for the lowest
point you have that you got through. Yeah, I mean
it's probably been the past three years because, like, like
(16:14):
I said, a lot of this step for right, Yeah,
a lot of this step for my injury, you know,
and having to play professional sport and not feel the same.
We're in constant pain. Yeah, I mean, somebody just gave me. Hell,
I just thought I thought I was gonna retire early,
to be honest with you, and that that was what
I was fighting. Yeah, I mean, because if it was
(16:35):
gonna affect me this bad, even though I can still
make money and still be good at what I do,
not knowing that I can, you know, drove me nuts,
you know, when I can't push off my left foot
the way I am my right foot. Yeah, so its
just something I had to adapt to. But now it's
I mean, I thought whenever, uh, you know, I left
(16:55):
and whenever, whenever we did that interview, you know, I
was talking to Dom, I was like, hey, I don't
really know how much longer I can go with this,
just because my moody was hurting so bad. You can
see even last year on my film like run Blocked
and like coming Out, I was I was very high.
I was in pain. I was just a lot of pain.
But you know, NFL people, it's it's the name of
the game. You know, you gotta get healthy or somebody
(17:18):
else's coming in. So you know, a lot of it
was was you know that, and then the internal pressure
to play at a certain level despite whatever excuse she
may have. You know what I'd like you to do,
and I meant to say this when I went around.
I'd love for you to be able to tell your
trainer right when guys are hurt, to ask guys how
they're doing, not just physically, because like you said, when
(17:39):
you're hurt. It's a warrior being forced to put his
shield down when he's not signed up to put his
shield down. So talk to him, talk to him and
say hey, from now on, when you got a guy
in here, make sure just talk to him that they're okay.
Between the years, Yeah, and I think it the you know,
the most vulnerable times is like whenever a coach or
at least like talks that you remember is like when
the pulls you aside privately, you know, not among the
(18:03):
guys and like tells you like, hey, how are you
doing that type of stuff, And that's like that that's
that's where guys will open up more instead of being
you know, in the locker room among the guys, if
you do it in a more personal setting, guys will
really tell you what's on their mind. But like like
I said, you're going to the gym asking guys how
they doing. They're always can say I'm good, you know, yeah,
(18:24):
but really pulling You're saying, really pulling somebody aside, saying hey,
really pulling somebody aside, exactly really pulling them. So when
when this went down to last year, I did I
jumped your ship for not reaching out to your teammates,
me being one of them, tell us it got this bad?
Do you aid, do you now realize that, Okay, I
(18:46):
can never get into place where I don't reach out
to anybody. Do you get that? Yeah? Yeah, I mean
the self isolation. I feel like it's not it's like
a natural like side effect of it. I feel like
when you first get these you know, a philiates stuffies,
when there isolated, not you know, I guess spread it
anymore for people to find out. You want this to
be just your problem that you can hopefully overcome. But yeah,
(19:07):
I mean I only knew that it was just gonna
kept building the monster. And I knew that even though
it was making things worse, as like, I wasn't going
to turn back, you know. And I feel like a
lot of people do this. I don't. I don't know why,
because I guess they're scared to confront them, to confront it. Well,
there's a certain amount of shame we feel. Yeah, you're like, well,
(19:28):
we used to it like it's weakness. Now I don't. Yeah, Well,
these conversations didn't exist back in you know, in different times.
It wasn't sucking up mentality. Hey, that's why do you
have a lot of trauma filled people as growing up.
Since somef doesn't go away, you know what I'm saying,
It just it goes with you. I was especially proud
when I saw you not too long ago doing a
mental health speech at a synagogue. I mean, what may
(19:53):
we'll talk about coming such full circle for you, Lane
and just making a one eight are you? Were you
proud of yourself? You are gonna be proud of yourself
now for being able to lead some many of us
out of this. Yeah, well that was really you know,
another time that really hit home on me because you know,
that's the first time I've ever besides you know, going
one on one with you, you know, speaking to a
group about this. And yeah, just the amount of people
(20:17):
I saw that we're in the audience, we're there because
in fact, they were filming some type of a degree
of pain or they have a love on that's going
through a certain situation. Man, it's a quiet killer. You
don't realize how many people have lost lives, they've lost
loved ones to suicide or just uh, you know, stuff
that's you know that can be at least started with
(20:37):
a conversation. And like I'm saying, Yeah, seeing those parents
and some of the kids there, that was special. Yeah,
that was a that was a good moment in my life.
Before I let you go, our last question, I always
ask somebody, give me a moment in your life, your
unbreakable moment, something that could have broken. This doesn't have
to be mental health wise, just anything, something you're like,
your career, whatever. It is. Something that like for me
is when I almost died with my lungs and then
(20:59):
freaking came a way back and open unbreakable with an
oxygen attack. My learn breakable moment was, you know, eleven
years after starting my career, get my first full time
job and not not Quinn, after eleven years of rejection,
making nine thousand step four in fifty bucks a year
living in New York City. What is your unbreakable moment?
Give me that moment for you that something should have
(21:19):
broken you didn't. You came through the other side of
that time a little stronger because of it, I mean,
overcoming just uh really this past year with the injuries,
the anxiety, you know, even the coming forth and and
now you know telling people, you know, kind of my
journey and then uh really it's just uh be wary
of the people you're around every day at work. Try
(21:41):
to lighten people up and uh, like I said, a
compliment I can go a long way for people. A
good conversation can go a long way for people. And
I feel like the initiation of that might be the
hardest part, but once you break that door down and
it opens it up for a much better life. Man,
I appreciate you so much to it and I'm proud
of you again. Off La Johnson, thank you brother. Always
(22:04):
proud of you. Proud to walk this walk together. Man.
Thanks Phil both love you, Love you.
Fox Sports Radio News
Host
Jonas Knox
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