June 15, 2022 • 40 mins
From Simone Biles’ brush with the twisties to Rick Ankiel’s experience of the yips, the constellation of phenomena known as the yips–and the stories of the athletes who experience it–are some of the strangest in the world of sports. Far more common, but perhaps equally opaque, are mood disorders like depression and anxiety, and on this episode of Losing Control, host Justin Su’a talks with Karen Swartz, a clinical psychiatrist who specializes in mood disorders and community education. Mood disorders destabilize confidence, shift the relationship with the things we care about the most, and impact how we see ourselves–just like the yips–and in the second half of the episode, retired Major Leaguer Rick Ankiel reflects on the yips, mental health, and how his experiences in baseball have shaped his relationship to sports, and to life.
- Rick Ankiel, a retired professional pitcher, outfielder, and author of “The Phenomenon: Pressure, the Yips, and the Pitch that Changed My Life”
- Karen Swartz, the director of clinical and educational programs at the Johns Hopkins Mood Disorders Center and a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to Losing Control, a podcast from Sports Illustrated
Studios and I Heart Radio. Can you talk about the
technical part of that vault? You tried, um what happened
and what were you attempting and what happened? So I
was trying it's you and a half and I ended
up doing the one and a half to thot a
little bit lost in the air. That's the voice of
(00:21):
Simone Biles, one of, if not the greatest gymnast of
all time. At a press conference back in July, Simone
is describing the twisties or the gymnastics yips, which led
her to withdraw from the Tokyo Olympics. When the best
gymnasts in the history of the world has to pull
(00:42):
out of the Olympics, everyone reads about twisties and things
like that. When I read about that, I thought, this
is a bizarre way that the body is sending signals
that do not make sense. And I've seen that with
people going through depression anxiety. It's just that they're not
trying him to do these incredible athletic feats. They're trying
(01:04):
to get through their work day. Karen Schwartz is a
professor of psychiatry and a clinical psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins.
And to be clear, neither myself nor Dr Schwartz have
worked with Simone Biles. Although we did reach out, we
weren't able to speak with Simone for this podcast. But
Dr Schwartz is pointing to what maybe the elephant in
(01:24):
the room. Mood disorders like depression and anxiety are everywhere,
and they're an important part of the Yip story, and
that's what we're talking about today. In the first half
of the episode, Dr Schwartz and I will dig into
depression and anxiety, what they look like, what they feel like,
and how you can support the people in your life
who might be experiencing these illnesses. And later on I'll
(01:47):
check back in with Rick Ankiel, who you heard in
the first episode of Losing Control. Rick Ankiel is a
retired major league baseball player who got the yips, fell
out of the major leagues, and then worked his back
into the game, where he had a successful career as
an outfielder until he retired in two thousand and fourteen.
It's mental health and the Yips today on Losing Control.
(02:14):
I'm justin Suah and this is Losing Control, a podcast
about one of the strangest phenomenon sports, the yips, or
when an athlete or elite performer suddenly finds themselves unable
to do the thing that they do better than almost
everyone else on the planet. If you're listening for the
first time, welcome, But if you want the full experience,
(02:34):
head back to episode one. Losing Control is a podcast
told through conversations with athletes, coaches, neuroscientists, and more, and
it's in order. Each episode features a first hand perspective
that contributes a piece to the puzzle that is the yips.
Along the way, you'll learn about some of the challenges
that high performers face and the mental work that enables
(02:55):
them to do what they do. Not only that, you'll
hear how you can accord break these tools, strategies, and
mindsets into your own life. Because it's not just about
losing control, it's about getting it back. So let's get started.
I'm Karen Swartz. I'm a psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins. My
clinical focus is on mood disorders and my passion is
(03:16):
community education about mood disorders. So, in addition to taking
care of patients at Johns Hopkins who have depression, and
bipolar disorder. I also lead a program called a DAP
where we go into high schools to teach students and
parents and teachers about depression. As a psychiatrist, how do
you think about the relationship between the mind and the body.
(03:37):
I think people have this idea of the mind is
something mystical and the body is being separate. Well, there's
such an intense mind body connection that trying to separate
them I don't find particularly helpful, to be perfectly honest,
it really comes down to a basic thing. Do you
believe that mental health is health? Do you believe that
(03:58):
mental health is part of sical health? To me, there's
no doubt about it. It's just another aspect of health. So,
for example, from athletes to coaches, you'll hear about how
we hold stress in the body. What's your perspective on that,
and how do you distinguish between physical manifestations of stress
and a mood disorder like depression. I'm not sure that
(04:20):
I can scientifically explain it, but i can tell you
what I've seen in my clinical experience. When people are stressed,
they have a lot of physical symptoms. We've all had
the more back pain, more neck pain, having your shoulders
be tight, and so there is something about being stressed
that gets your body to react. That's why so many
(04:42):
of the really helpful relaxation techniques are about muscle relaxation,
deep breathing. It's also the case that when someone's going
through serious depression and anxiety that they often experience physical
symptoms more intensely. Now there is something different about amount
illnesses they are experienced in these intensely personal and private ways.
(05:06):
I think it's very very hard for someone to think
something so intensely personal is medical, but it is. I
want to kind of zoom in on that. Why is
it so hard for us to believe that something so
personal is medical. With depression and anxiety, so many of
the symptoms people have don't show up. It's not like
(05:28):
you broke your leg and there's a bone sticking out.
It's not that dramatic, but it can be that devastating.
And so if what you're experiencing is that your thoughts
are distorted or slowed down, or you start really feeling
awful about yourself, no one will know that if they
don't know the right questions to ask, and if you
(05:49):
are not sharing it with them. So all of those
things feel like I've just become a bad person, or
I'm someone who's unlovable, or no one wants to be
my friend. What I can tell you is that those
are classic symptoms of depression. Those are the medical symptoms
of depression. But they all feel like they're just coming
out of who you are. It makes it really hard
(06:11):
to recognize this for what it is, a treatable medical
condition when those are the kinds of experiences you're having.
Let's talk about some of those symptoms. What are the
classic symptoms of depression. So when someone is going through
the kind of depression that's a medical problem, Big D depression,
they have symptoms that show up in three different areas.
(06:31):
One is their mood, the second is physical symptoms, and
the third is how they feel about themselves. So as
far as mood, most people think that they must be
sad if they're depressed, and if they're not sad, they're
not depressed. Interestingly, it's fewer than fifty of people with
depression that actually report feeling sad. Many people feel irritable there,
(06:53):
they feel nothing, and then the other part of mood
changes that you're not able to get joy or pleasure
from things you usually love, and so those kind of
mood changes with depression. They're obviously all in a negative direction.
The physical symptoms yet a lot of different parts of
the body. Sleep is disturbed, with problems falling asleep and
waking up in the middle of the night. Appetite is
(07:16):
usually decreased, but sometimes people find that their only pleasure
is comfort eating, and people do not comfort eat with carrots, right,
so they eat pie and French fries and then gain weight.
As far as energy, that's usually down, and focus and
concentration and ability to be productive and be able to
(07:36):
process information is down. Those are all challenging enough, but
in many ways, the most painful part of depression comes
from your self attitude, changing your confidence in yourself, your
ability to believe in yourself. And you can imagine if
someone who's really self critical, there's only a few steps
to start thinking that perhaps everyone would be better off
(07:59):
without you, perhaps would be better to not wake up,
or even the most serious part of depression, that maybe
it would be better if you ended your life. Depression
is potentially a life threatening illness, and that's why it
is so critical that if someone is going through depression,
that they get the help that they need. Absolutely, And
you've been using the word medical versus mental. Why is
(08:21):
that depression is a treatable illness. It's a treatable medical illness.
This idea of it being a mental illness instead of
a physical illness, that's just that's semantics. But it's putting
it to the side, isn't it. It's saying it's different.
It's not different. We just don't understand it as well.
Now you've been talking about big D depression. What about
(08:45):
little D depression? When we go to high schools and
talk to them, I talked to the students about little
D versus big D depression. You know, little D being
the kind of sadness or frustrations or negative feelings we
all have, versus the kind of depression that's a medical
problem that needs formal treatment. And the ways that I say, oh,
I think this is big D. It's interfering with your functioning.
(09:08):
There are physical changes, so changes in things like sleep
and energy and appetite, and most importantly, people start feeling
really negative about themselves. Plenty of us have been overwhelmed
or tired or feel like, oh there are too many things.
Am I to do list. That's not the same as
feeling like I think this is my fault. I think
(09:30):
it's not going well because I'm just basically not a
good person. Unfortunately, depression can actually get people feeling that way,
and so to me, when you're functioning has changed, when
you're not able to follow your usual routines and do
what you typically can do. When there's a change, that's
the time to think, perhaps I need more formal help.
(09:52):
I want to come back to what formal help looks like.
But can you talk a little bit about anxiety, And
as you did with depression, could you please distinguish between
capital A and little A anxiety. We all get anxious
about some things, but at times anxiety can be so
crippling that people find it hard to get to work,
(10:12):
do what they need to do in their home, even
leave their home with anxiety. Some people have what we
call generalized anxiety, where they feel tense and on edge
all the time, lots of physical manifestations with muscle tension,
heart going a little faster, feeling a little queasy, and
just feeling nervous. We all naturally feel nervous about things,
(10:34):
but imagine having the kind of anxiety you have before
a big talk or having to do something new all
the time, and weigh out of proportion to what you're facing.
The other part of anxiety that people are pretty commonly
or panic attacks where you have these really intense spikes
and anxiety where your hearts beating a mile a minute,
(10:54):
you can't catch your breath. Sometimes, even you have chest pain,
you often will start hyperventilating, feel nauseated, and have a
sense that something terrible is about to happen. Often, anxiety
attacks lead people to seek medical care because they're worried
they're having a heart attack or something more serious. Depression, anxiety,
(11:17):
panics or sort of these are all very treatable, and
why it's so important that people learn about them so
they don't just put up with feeling that awful. You
compare depression to a broken leg earlier, and that's such
a vivid analogy, and it's so true. Most of us
probably wouldn't ignore a broken leg. But even though depression
and anxiety can be just as debilitating and are just
(11:38):
as treatable, many of us might not seek formal help
or treatments. Why do you think people put up with
feeling so awful when what they're experiencing is a treatable illness. First,
they're huge parts of the world, and this in our
country that really don't believe that mental health problems are
medical problems. They're wrong, but they just don't believe it.
(12:02):
And it's also the nature of depression and anxiety and
other mental health conditions that you have cognitive distortions where
you're thinking gets distorted by having the illness. So imagine
an illness where you blame yourself for having it. You
think it's your fault, You're sure it's your fault, and
(12:24):
so that's the problem. You have an illness that other
people are taking seriously, and the illerness itself makes you
blame yourself for having it. That doesn't really lead to
saying this isn't my fault and someone should help me.
What do you say to listeners, and especially younger listeners
who may not know where to go for help, and
(12:44):
who may even feel like there's nowhere to turn for help.
I would say that they probably do have someone that
they can turn to. So again, I've been working with
high schools and what I've learned is that every high
school student has a counselor. Now maybe they don't connect
with their own counselor. But there's a group of counselors
in each of these high schools. I've been impressed by
(13:06):
how committed they are to helping students, So that is
a resource if they feel, as some do, that they
can't really talk to their parents, or they worry that
their parents won't take it seriously or tell them, you know,
what do you have to be depressed about. I hear
that from parents they have a good life. Well, people
that have good lives get depression. That's like saying, how
could you possibly have an asthma attack? You have a
(13:28):
good life. We don't say that to people. Okay, So
I want to dig into the treatment side. With many
physical injuries, for example, you have a rough timeline for recovery.
But what does that look like with depression? How fast
can people expect to bounce back and return to what
they consider their normal self once they begin treatment. Of course,
(13:49):
my first response to that is much faster if you
actually get treatment. If you do nothing, it's quite possible
that you'll cycle out of it. These are episodic illnesses,
particularly depression, but it can take a long time. So
the first way to shorten the amount of time is
to actually go and get treatment, whether that's talk therapy,
cognitive behavioral therapy, or for some medication might have a role.
(14:13):
The challenge with medications is that we at this point
have to do some trial and error. It's not like
with an infection where you can send a sample to
the lab and know whether you have the right antibiotic. Now,
from experience, we know certain medicines do a good job
with certain kinds of depression or anxiety, so it's not random,
(14:33):
but sometimes you have to try one or two things.
I will say there's a challenging aspect of antidepressant treatment,
and that's that it takes weeks, not days to get
an effect. So if you are going to respond to something,
even if you're gonna have a great response, it typically
can take two to four to six weeks before you
(14:55):
start seeing a benefit once you're on a decent dose. Now,
that is frustrated, and most people don't believe that. Most
people think of medicine being antibiotics and pain medicine, especially
young people having their first episode. They've never had a
medicine that takes four to six weeks to work, and
they say to me, come on, doc medicine don't take
four to six weeks to work. So it's really important
(15:17):
that there's a lot of education about that so that
people don't give up on the treatment, because that happens
really commonly. That people are appropriately frustrated. I'm taking this
and I'm not feeling better, and so we know that
there is a delay and that it's not going to
be in a few days that you'll start getting a benefit.
We might have a parent, or a coach, or a
(15:39):
friend listening to this podcast who has someone close to them.
They may be experiencing symptoms that are hard to understand,
some of which you've described. How can those who are
close to someone that may be suffering from what could
be depression or anxiety support that loved one, that friend,
or that person who they are close to. First of all,
(16:01):
when things are happening that don't make sense, you're making
an excellent point. You want to consider that it might
be from anxiety or depression. If someone's more volatile, if
they're more angry, if they're more reactive, or they're more isolated,
or they can't get engaged. I remember a young lacrosse player.
I grew up in Pittsburgh, I didn't know that lacrosse existed,
(16:22):
but now I'm in Maryland and it's a big sport.
And he explained to me that when he was depressed,
he couldn't play well because there's so many decisions you
need to make. Should I passion? I keep going to
all these things? And that made sense to me, said,
I can't make decisions quickly, So I do think that
coach has noticed this. The first thing people should do
(16:42):
is encourage someone to get evaluated, or at least have
a conversation with someone with some expertise. That might be
as simple as speaking to their high school counselor or
someone at the school, perhaps a social work or someone
with some expertise, to see is there a problem where
we should take action. Say the person has had a
(17:02):
problem identified. So here's a young person. You know they're
going through depression and anxiety. Things you can do to
be helpful. One thing is to not tell them it's
not a big deal, and not tell them it's all
going to be fine in the moment. That's the think
pretty upsetting and even insulting. I think instead it's to
(17:22):
be with someone to try to get them to go
for a walk, to say why don't we watch a
TV show together or a movie, just to be able
to say it's okay, and to reiterate over and over again,
I'm really proud of you for doing something and getting help.
I believe this is going to get better and I'm
going to support you. So you tell me what I
(17:44):
need to do. Some coaches might hesitate before they refer
an athlete to talk to a psychiatrist or a psychologist,
even if they suspect the athlete, especially a younger athlete,
is experiencing depression or anxiety, and it might be very
well intentioned. The coach doesn't know how to approach the conversation.
They don't want to make the problem worse. They don't
(18:06):
want to make the athlete feel like something's wrong with them.
Can you speak to that? Well, that's a reflection of stigma,
isn't it. If you had twisted your knee, you wouldn't
say I don't want you to go to see the
orthopedic surgeon because we might be identifying you with someone
with a bad knee. You say, let's get on this,
let's figure out what we need to do. We want
to modify your training schedule. We don't want it to
(18:27):
get worse. So the conversation I have, and I suggest
that others have, is to share what you genuinely believe.
I think you're suffering when you don't need to be.
I think things are harder for you than they need
to be. And I'd like us to get input from
an expert to see if there's something that could help.
(18:47):
But you have to believe that to say it right.
I would argue that many of those coaches are afraid
they're going to label this young person with something terrible,
as opposed to identify find a treatable problem. So they're
bringing their own stigma and their own view of mental
illness to those interactions, like well I don't want to
(19:08):
say you have that. It's like, well, okay, well that
is a treatable problem that could change your life to
have it taken care of. Huh. That's a really important point. Now,
what about family? How can family support a loved one
who may be experiencing depression or anxiety. One thing they
(19:28):
can do is recognize that it's going to take some
time and be supportive in patient. The other thing is
to adjust their expectations the same way that a coach.
I hope would if someone's hurt their knee and they
can't train in the same way. So you don't want
to have someone not be part of the family, but
maybe you have to be a little more realistic about
(19:49):
what they're able to do. Another thing is to be
realistic about how much someone is able to do, say
if they're in school, or how much they're able to
do at work. Being able to be their part time
and work part time can often be incredibly supportive because
you're not at home and isolated, But to go in
and face a job that's simply undoable day after day
(20:12):
can be demoralizing and actually make things work. So ongoing
support patients, kindness, and realistic expectations, I think are things
we can all do for the people in our lives
going through these conditions. How do you approach uncomfortable conversations
with people you care about? If someone is really worried
about their child, someone they're working with, whether that's a
(20:36):
teacher or coach, someone, If they're worried about someone and
they're uncomfortable because these are uncomfortable conversations, the first thing
I hope they would think is I have to do
something because it seems like they're suffering, the same way
that you might actually get the young person or your
friend to take action as by talking about suffering unnecessarily.
(20:58):
I think it's how you get over your own worry
about it. I have had many uncomfortable conversations with people
that I care about in my life, not that I
know professionally, just because I know they could feel better,
and so when I think, well, maybe they don't want
to really hear from me, that's what I focus on.
I could help them feel better, and I'm not going
(21:20):
to deny them that opportunity to feel better. It's very
awkward to have these conversations with people, so it really
is the ultimate demonstration of how much you care that
you'll do something uncomfortable for them. I have to ask
you about the yips. Have you ever seen the yips
in your practice? And how do you think the yips
(21:41):
relate to what we've talked about today If they do
in my practice, I haven't really had someone who has
the yips or the twisties. Instead, what I've seen is
people that are losing their confidence in the work they do. Depression, anxiety,
challenge your infidence and what you really care about most
(22:02):
in the way you define yourself. So in that way,
I see them as related. Before we wrap, if you
had to pick one thing that everybody listening to this
could take home with them, one thing that will benefit
their mental health, what would that be. If I have
to pick one thing, it would be sleep more. I
mean that seriously, because being sleep defrived is stressful for
(22:25):
the body. It worsens anxiety, it worsens depression. We're terrible
by getting enough sleep. We're all overscheduled, we're all trying
to do too much. So that's a very basic thing.
In a broader sense, I would hope that people would
be more open to at least talking about the possibility
(22:47):
of getting help with someone they trust if they're not sure.
So sleep more great advice, But how do you accomplish that?
This is gonna sound simplistic, but you know, put down
your darned phone. And if you think about how much
time we all waste checking more emails before going to bed,
(23:07):
or reading one more news story, and so it comes
down to give yourself a bed time. Say I have
a goal. My goal is not to be in bed
at twelve thirty because I'm exhausted when I wake up
I'm going to try to move that back a half
an hour. When people try to do dramatic things like
saying I should really be going to bed at ten
and I've been going to bed at one in the morning,
(23:27):
they're not going to have any success. So move it
back fifteen minutes or a half an hour, and if
you had success with that after several weeks, try another
fifteen minutes or a half an hour. Now, we all
need time to do things that are just fun and
relaxing and not productive. So I don't mean that you
should not do those things, but most people will tell
(23:49):
me they feel a lot more satisfied if they made
a choice to do something read a book, watch a movie,
listen to a podcast. I'll say that instead of just
sort of doing nothing or channel surfing or flipping through
things on the internet, be more purposeful in your time
and carve out a little more for sleep. We'll be
(24:10):
back with Rick Ankiel after this. I'm justin Sewa and
this is losing control. Rick Ankiel is a former Major
League baseball player who had an impressive career as a
picture and an outfielder, which basically means he made it
(24:31):
to the big leagues not once, but twice, and that's
because Rick also had what is probably the most famous
case of the yips in the last twenty five years.
Rick was a young pheno, barely twenty one, and many
thought he was going to be one of the all
time greats until his pitching abruptly fell apart in the
middle of the two thousand post season due to a
(24:52):
severe ten out of ten case of the yips. And
if you want to hear that story, head back to
episode one. But there's much more to Rick, and today
we're not only talking about the yips, but about mental health,
about Rick's triumphant comeback, and about how Rick's experiences have
shaped his relationship to sports and to life. Here's the
(25:14):
one and only Rick Ankiel. Everybody has stuff, you know,
it doesn't matter if you're an athlete or not. We
all have ups and downs, we all face challenges, and really,
you know, it's not what happens to us, but it's
how we respond to what happens to us is what
makes who we are. Everybody has stuff, and nobody, not
even the greatest athletes, are immune to the yips or
(25:36):
to the mental health issues that so many of us face.
We look at like the greatest athletes in the world,
and you talk about the biggest moments. What bothers me
sometimes is when I hear a guy say, oh yeah,
none of that phases me. It's like I'm sitting on
the couch. What you've figured out is how to use it.
You've heard it before. Focus on what you can control
(25:58):
as a picture, right, the language want to control yourself
with is I'm gonna bury this ball in the outside
corner or I'm gonna dot it on the inside corner
or whatever you're trying to do in a strikes one
and as a hitter, you know I'm gonna make solid contact.
But as the picture all the only thing you can
control is what your mindset is, how you're coaching yourself
in the moment, and once once you've released the ball,
everything is out of your control, whether the umpire calls
(26:20):
it a strike, the catcher catches it, the hitter hits it,
the fielder behind you makes the play. And that goes
back to focusing on what you can control. You can
control your effort, and you can control how you can
coach yourself, and then how you coach yourself after what happens,
do you allow it to rattle you, or do you
move on to the next play or the next pitch.
It's really understanding what you can and cannot control them.
(26:42):
So you try to simplify it into the smallest things. Right.
If you try to grasp the whole complexity of it,
it could be overwhelming. So relate it this way. You know,
as a picture, my job is to throw baseballs at
targets with hardly breaking movement period, simple and end of discussion.
As a hitter, I'm up there trying to make solid contact.
That's it playing his day. That's like the simplest form
(27:03):
you could keep it at. And you try to stick
with that mindset because, especially in baseball, in a lot
of sports, you're dealing with a ton of failure constantly.
And if you only focus on the results, and we're
such a result orientated world in society, the game will
eat you alive. So as a hitter, if I go
up there and I make solid contact five times out
of ten, whether I got a hit or not, I
need to understand that. I want how do you measure success?
(27:27):
Is it about the result or is it about the process.
There are so many distractions in sports and in life
and the mind tends to want to jump to the
results or to the outcome. But the best players I've
seen are the athletes who are able to control their focus,
their attention, and who, when their mind begins to wander,
(27:49):
know how to bring it back to the process. It
may sound simple, but it's not easy. It was that
mindset which in part got ricked back into the major leagues.
I asked him about one of the greatest hits of
his career. It's two thousand seven, seven years after his
pitching blew up. In two thousand and Rick is back
(28:09):
in the major leagues for the first time since then,
but this time as an outfielder. Rick's team, the St.
Louis Cardinals, are facing the San Diego Padres. Yeah, so
I get the call that I'm gonna make it back up.
I was in Triple A. Um, we're out in the
Pacific West, so it's a far flight, you know. Anyway,
land back in Memphis. My wife was in Memphis, and
(28:31):
I got the word around midnight and I called her, Hey, well,
I'm called up. I'm playing tomorrow right field. She's like,
I'm packing the apartment now. So by the time I
land at six in the morning, get over to the apartment.
We finished packing up the car, and now we're taking
that four hour drive to St. Louis. And when I
walked into the clubhouse, the amount of high fives, hugs,
(28:52):
smiles from guys. Honestly, that would have been enough in
itself to be an unbelievable day. And starting right field,
I get up to bat. My first at bat, I
end up popping up. It's popped up in the infield amount.
Strike out my second a bat, strike out my third
at bat, and it felt like you could just feel
the energy of the crowd and everyone like, is you know,
(29:12):
is this gonna work? Is this a joke? Is this
just you know? They feel bad for the guy. And
in my fourth at bat, I was facing dub Broke.
How I got a t one hanging curveball and I
got just enough of it as a hitter. When I
hit it, I wasn't sure it was gone, but I
knew I had a chance and heil out to deep.
I failed. He's a chance to leave the ballpark. It's
(29:33):
gone shot for Richard hail back in the major leagues.
As soon as I realized that it was gonna be
a home run, it was the most unbelievable emotional explosion
of of things. Just it's hard to even explain, but
I felt like I felt like I was watching it
from above in a way, and I was. I was.
(29:56):
It almost felt like I was floating around the base
on a magic carpet. And I remember rounding second and
I can see Jose Kendo, who's my third base coach,
and I see the smile on his face and it's
and I felt like, oh my gosh, this is like
I just did it. I did it. I had a
home run, a three run home run back in my
first game. And I when I rounded third and I
was going towards home plate, I could actually feel the
ground shaking from everybody in the stadium, cheering and just
(30:20):
so glad that it happened in St. Louis. And everybody
knew what I went through, you know, they went They
lived it with me, the wild pitches, the balls, the
hard work. They've seen it. They were there with me,
and in that moment, it felt like we all got
to share it together. And it was It's just, uh,
it was a dream. It was a dream come true.
There's no question. What about anxiety, how do you get
(30:44):
from the yips and dropping out of baseball to a
three run of homer back in the big leagues. How
does this all feel today? It was a long process.
It's not like it just worked. Somebody told me that
it worked overnight. It took a lot of visualization for
me to visualize. I visualize that anxiety coming and then visualize,
(31:05):
you know, me accepting it and not fighting it, and
that takes a law. I felt like that took it
took years. But now I'm in a place where I
can feel the anxiety coming and I still get I
still don't like sixty six inches. You know, I could
be thrown to BP to my kids one day and
there's a moment where I just it don't feel right
and I don't like it. But I'm in a place
(31:26):
now where I don't fight it. I can accept it
and I'll get through it. And I always remind myself
of this too. I've been in plenty of situations just
like everyone else, maybe a job interview or a big
test in school where I was as nervous as can be,
but I still passed the test. So it's not always
about how we feel, and it's more about, yeah, I
(31:46):
might not feel great because I got anxiety right now,
But I still know what I want to do and
now I know how to coach myself. Now does that
mean I'm gonna do it? No, But at least I'm
putting myself into position to be successful. You mentioned coaching
your kids. How is your life and what you've been
through shaped how you coach them? So with my my
(32:08):
children they're nine and eleven. They play sports. I really,
I don't want to say never, but almost in when
when they're successful or when they're not, I always praise
effort and add and focus and attitude, things I know
that they can control. So maybe they might had a
double and when we get back home, I'll say something
like that was unbelievable Elford and focus you put into
(32:31):
that swing. And I think that allows them to start
understanding it in a way too that it's not based
on the result, because I'll say the same thing when
they hit a hard line drive and somebody catches it,
so that way they walk away with that. Don't get
me wrong, do I say, hey, great hits sometimes are
nice double of course, because it happens. But I really
try to focus on the effort and the focus when
(32:51):
it comes to mental health. How have things changed in
sports and beyond in your view, we've made giants steps,
especially for men. And this is two thousand and twenty two.
When I first went through my throwing issues, this was
yours two thousand and the way I was raised, you know,
in my household, at least, it was kind of seen
as a weakness to go talk to a head doctor
(33:13):
and you were almost just kind of left to bear
your own issues by yourself. And you know, I'm thankful
the way that the direction that not only the athletic
world is moving, but the world in general. I think
that it's becoming more aware that there's help out there,
and you don't have to feel like, you know, it's
okay to go get help, and and you don't have
(33:34):
to be in a dark place or have something wrong
with you just to go and talk to someone. You know,
more than not the most successful people that I talked to, uh,
they have a psychologist that they talked to, and it's
it's you know, sometimes it's about just being able to
have a conversation with someone that's not inside of your windows,
so they don't have an agenda, there's not a side
(33:54):
that they're trying to pick for one reason or the other.
They're just gonna give you the facts and give you
some tools to help you navigate your way through the
ups and downs of life. I want to bring back
Karen Schwartz, the psychiatrist you heard earlier. Why is it
so impactful when athletes talk about mental health when anyone
who has been successful, whether that's an athlete or someone
(34:17):
who has you know, in the entertainment industry, or someone
who is well known through politics, When people that are
successful talk about something they've gone through and how they
handled it and how they are, usually I hope feeling
better because they've gotten treatment that fight stigma. Well, first
(34:38):
I fight stigma because it allows you to see successful
people can have this, and then it's a positive story.
Oh wow, he had this god treatment and this is
the way he's feeling better. Okay, I will now listen
to that. But I think it really comes from the
idea that a successful person said. It's what I said earlier.
(35:02):
You know, this idea that you can only have these
things if you're broken. That makes no sense, but it
is how people feel about mental illness, and it allows
people to feel so negatively about themselves. It's part of
these illnesses that you feel worse about yourself, that you
start doubting yourself and start thinking, well, come on, only
(35:23):
people like me get this. Then you have someone really
successful being open about it, and that just challenges that
in the most basic way. Here's Rick Ankiel. He's going
to mention a guy named Harvey Dorfman, a sports psychologist
and mental skills coach who passed away in two thousand
and eleven. When I was going through the yips, we
(35:44):
call in a baseball for me, I lost my ability
to throw strikes. You know, I thought Harvey was trying
to save my career, and I now understand that he
thought he was helping me save my life, which he did,
and I wouldn't be the person I am today without him. Really,
once we started, we went into just the childhood that
I had, and you know, he helped helped me understand
(36:06):
that a lot of the guilt and shame and stuff
that I was carrying with me, it just really, you know,
it's it wasn't my fault, and that that was tremendous.
I had to really understand that and accept that to
be able to grow as a person, as a father,
as a person who now wants to run a business
and somebody who for me anyway, you know. Now, I
(36:28):
use those experiences and some of the tools that he
taught me to give back to the to the younger athletes,
and I work with baseball players. I work with all
kinds of people that are going through issues that my
story can help them with. I want to be you know,
I want to be remembered as someone that tried to
better the world and leave it a better place than
I found it. Losing Control is a podcast about the yips,
(36:55):
one of the strangest phenomenon in sports, and over the
past ten episodes, I hope we've assembled a clearer picture
of the yips. The twisties, target panic, and the rest.
By whatever name you know it, The yips are real
and more or less common, depending on the sport. But
you may have also noticed something else. The yips have
(37:15):
an awful lot to do with life and how we
live our lives, from the things we take for granted
to the things that make us who we are. The
yips bring questions that will all confront one day into
focus and bring us back to the fundamentals of what
it means to be human. And that's what I want
to leave you with. When athletes talk about how they
(37:36):
want to be remembered, what I hear most often is
that they want to be remembered as a great teammate,
and that at the end of the day, whether your
career lasted ten years or ten games, for the most part,
nobody's going to remember the stats. What they'll remember is
the kind of person that you were ason here. Thank
(38:00):
you to our guests, Rick Ankiel, a retired Major league
pitcher and outfielder. For more on Rick and is an
incredible story, check out his fantastic book, The Phenomena, Pressure,
the Yips, and the Pitch That Changed My Life. And
Dr Karen Schwartz, the director of clinical and educational Programs
at the Johns Hopkins Mood Disorder Center and a professor
(38:23):
in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the
Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Thank you so much for listening,
and don't forget to rate and subscribe. I'm Justin Suah,
your host, and you can find me on Instagram and
Twitter at justin Suah. That's j U s t I
N s u A. You could also check me out
(38:46):
on the Increase Your Impact. Podcast. Losing Control is a
podcast from Sports Illustrated Studios and I Heart Radio. Original
music by Jerem Suah. Michael McDowell is our producer, ed
it and mixing by Will Stanton. This episode was fact
checked by Zoe Mullet at s I Studios. Max Miller
is supervising producer, and Brandon Getchus and Matt Lipson our
(39:10):
executive producers at I heart Radio. Sean ty Tone as
our executive producer. Special thanks to ty Carlton. For more
podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This podcast
does not provide medical advice, and nothing you here on
this podcast is intended or implied to be a substitute
(39:33):
for professional medical consultation, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the
advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with
any questions you may have regarding your health. Never disregard
professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of
something you have heard on this podcast.
You're listening to Losing Control, a podcast from Sports Illustrated
Studios and I Heart Radio. Can you talk about the
technical part of that vault? You tried, um what happened
and what were you attempting and what happened? So I
was trying it's you and a half and I ended
up doing the one and a half to thot a
little bit lost in the air. That's the voice of
(00:21):
Simone Biles, one of, if not the greatest gymnast of
all time. At a press conference back in July, Simone
is describing the twisties or the gymnastics yips, which led
her to withdraw from the Tokyo Olympics. When the best
gymnasts in the history of the world has to pull
(00:42):
out of the Olympics, everyone reads about twisties and things
like that. When I read about that, I thought, this
is a bizarre way that the body is sending signals
that do not make sense. And I've seen that with
people going through depression anxiety. It's just that they're not
trying him to do these incredible athletic feats. They're trying
(01:04):
to get through their work day. Karen Schwartz is a
professor of psychiatry and a clinical psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins.
And to be clear, neither myself nor Dr Schwartz have
worked with Simone Biles. Although we did reach out, we
weren't able to speak with Simone for this podcast. But
Dr Schwartz is pointing to what maybe the elephant in
(01:24):
the room. Mood disorders like depression and anxiety are everywhere,
and they're an important part of the Yip story, and
that's what we're talking about today. In the first half
of the episode, Dr Schwartz and I will dig into
depression and anxiety, what they look like, what they feel like,
and how you can support the people in your life
who might be experiencing these illnesses. And later on I'll
(01:47):
check back in with Rick Ankiel, who you heard in
the first episode of Losing Control. Rick Ankiel is a
retired major league baseball player who got the yips, fell
out of the major leagues, and then worked his back
into the game, where he had a successful career as
an outfielder until he retired in two thousand and fourteen.
It's mental health and the Yips today on Losing Control.
(02:14):
I'm justin Suah and this is Losing Control, a podcast
about one of the strangest phenomenon sports, the yips, or
when an athlete or elite performer suddenly finds themselves unable
to do the thing that they do better than almost
everyone else on the planet. If you're listening for the
first time, welcome, But if you want the full experience,
(02:34):
head back to episode one. Losing Control is a podcast
told through conversations with athletes, coaches, neuroscientists, and more, and
it's in order. Each episode features a first hand perspective
that contributes a piece to the puzzle that is the yips.
Along the way, you'll learn about some of the challenges
that high performers face and the mental work that enables
(02:55):
them to do what they do. Not only that, you'll
hear how you can accord break these tools, strategies, and
mindsets into your own life. Because it's not just about
losing control, it's about getting it back. So let's get started.
I'm Karen Swartz. I'm a psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins. My
clinical focus is on mood disorders and my passion is
(03:16):
community education about mood disorders. So, in addition to taking
care of patients at Johns Hopkins who have depression, and
bipolar disorder. I also lead a program called a DAP
where we go into high schools to teach students and
parents and teachers about depression. As a psychiatrist, how do
you think about the relationship between the mind and the body.
(03:37):
I think people have this idea of the mind is
something mystical and the body is being separate. Well, there's
such an intense mind body connection that trying to separate
them I don't find particularly helpful, to be perfectly honest,
it really comes down to a basic thing. Do you
believe that mental health is health? Do you believe that
(03:58):
mental health is part of sical health? To me, there's
no doubt about it. It's just another aspect of health. So,
for example, from athletes to coaches, you'll hear about how
we hold stress in the body. What's your perspective on that,
and how do you distinguish between physical manifestations of stress
and a mood disorder like depression. I'm not sure that
(04:20):
I can scientifically explain it, but i can tell you
what I've seen in my clinical experience. When people are stressed,
they have a lot of physical symptoms. We've all had
the more back pain, more neck pain, having your shoulders
be tight, and so there is something about being stressed
that gets your body to react. That's why so many
(04:42):
of the really helpful relaxation techniques are about muscle relaxation,
deep breathing. It's also the case that when someone's going
through serious depression and anxiety that they often experience physical
symptoms more intensely. Now there is something different about amount
illnesses they are experienced in these intensely personal and private ways.
(05:06):
I think it's very very hard for someone to think
something so intensely personal is medical, but it is. I
want to kind of zoom in on that. Why is
it so hard for us to believe that something so
personal is medical. With depression and anxiety, so many of
the symptoms people have don't show up. It's not like
(05:28):
you broke your leg and there's a bone sticking out.
It's not that dramatic, but it can be that devastating.
And so if what you're experiencing is that your thoughts
are distorted or slowed down, or you start really feeling
awful about yourself, no one will know that if they
don't know the right questions to ask, and if you
(05:49):
are not sharing it with them. So all of those
things feel like I've just become a bad person, or
I'm someone who's unlovable, or no one wants to be
my friend. What I can tell you is that those
are classic symptoms of depression. Those are the medical symptoms
of depression. But they all feel like they're just coming
out of who you are. It makes it really hard
(06:11):
to recognize this for what it is, a treatable medical
condition when those are the kinds of experiences you're having.
Let's talk about some of those symptoms. What are the
classic symptoms of depression. So when someone is going through
the kind of depression that's a medical problem, Big D depression,
they have symptoms that show up in three different areas.
(06:31):
One is their mood, the second is physical symptoms, and
the third is how they feel about themselves. So as
far as mood, most people think that they must be
sad if they're depressed, and if they're not sad, they're
not depressed. Interestingly, it's fewer than fifty of people with
depression that actually report feeling sad. Many people feel irritable there,
(06:53):
they feel nothing, and then the other part of mood
changes that you're not able to get joy or pleasure
from things you usually love, and so those kind of
mood changes with depression. They're obviously all in a negative direction.
The physical symptoms yet a lot of different parts of
the body. Sleep is disturbed, with problems falling asleep and
waking up in the middle of the night. Appetite is
(07:16):
usually decreased, but sometimes people find that their only pleasure
is comfort eating, and people do not comfort eat with carrots, right,
so they eat pie and French fries and then gain weight.
As far as energy, that's usually down, and focus and
concentration and ability to be productive and be able to
(07:36):
process information is down. Those are all challenging enough, but
in many ways, the most painful part of depression comes
from your self attitude, changing your confidence in yourself, your
ability to believe in yourself. And you can imagine if
someone who's really self critical, there's only a few steps
to start thinking that perhaps everyone would be better off
(07:59):
without you, perhaps would be better to not wake up,
or even the most serious part of depression, that maybe
it would be better if you ended your life. Depression
is potentially a life threatening illness, and that's why it
is so critical that if someone is going through depression,
that they get the help that they need. Absolutely, And
you've been using the word medical versus mental. Why is
(08:21):
that depression is a treatable illness. It's a treatable medical illness.
This idea of it being a mental illness instead of
a physical illness, that's just that's semantics. But it's putting
it to the side, isn't it. It's saying it's different.
It's not different. We just don't understand it as well.
Now you've been talking about big D depression. What about
(08:45):
little D depression? When we go to high schools and
talk to them, I talked to the students about little
D versus big D depression. You know, little D being
the kind of sadness or frustrations or negative feelings we
all have, versus the kind of depression that's a medical
problem that needs formal treatment. And the ways that I say, oh,
I think this is big D. It's interfering with your functioning.
(09:08):
There are physical changes, so changes in things like sleep
and energy and appetite, and most importantly, people start feeling
really negative about themselves. Plenty of us have been overwhelmed
or tired or feel like, oh there are too many things.
Am I to do list. That's not the same as
feeling like I think this is my fault. I think
(09:30):
it's not going well because I'm just basically not a
good person. Unfortunately, depression can actually get people feeling that way,
and so to me, when you're functioning has changed, when
you're not able to follow your usual routines and do
what you typically can do. When there's a change, that's
the time to think, perhaps I need more formal help.
(09:52):
I want to come back to what formal help looks like.
But can you talk a little bit about anxiety, And
as you did with depression, could you please distinguish between
capital A and little A anxiety. We all get anxious
about some things, but at times anxiety can be so
crippling that people find it hard to get to work,
(10:12):
do what they need to do in their home, even
leave their home with anxiety. Some people have what we
call generalized anxiety, where they feel tense and on edge
all the time, lots of physical manifestations with muscle tension,
heart going a little faster, feeling a little queasy, and
just feeling nervous. We all naturally feel nervous about things,
(10:34):
but imagine having the kind of anxiety you have before
a big talk or having to do something new all
the time, and weigh out of proportion to what you're facing.
The other part of anxiety that people are pretty commonly
or panic attacks where you have these really intense spikes
and anxiety where your hearts beating a mile a minute,
(10:54):
you can't catch your breath. Sometimes, even you have chest pain,
you often will start hyperventilating, feel nauseated, and have a
sense that something terrible is about to happen. Often, anxiety
attacks lead people to seek medical care because they're worried
they're having a heart attack or something more serious. Depression, anxiety,
(11:17):
panics or sort of these are all very treatable, and
why it's so important that people learn about them so
they don't just put up with feeling that awful. You
compare depression to a broken leg earlier, and that's such
a vivid analogy, and it's so true. Most of us
probably wouldn't ignore a broken leg. But even though depression
and anxiety can be just as debilitating and are just
(11:38):
as treatable, many of us might not seek formal help
or treatments. Why do you think people put up with
feeling so awful when what they're experiencing is a treatable illness. First,
they're huge parts of the world, and this in our
country that really don't believe that mental health problems are
medical problems. They're wrong, but they just don't believe it.
(12:02):
And it's also the nature of depression and anxiety and
other mental health conditions that you have cognitive distortions where
you're thinking gets distorted by having the illness. So imagine
an illness where you blame yourself for having it. You
think it's your fault, You're sure it's your fault, and
(12:24):
so that's the problem. You have an illness that other
people are taking seriously, and the illerness itself makes you
blame yourself for having it. That doesn't really lead to
saying this isn't my fault and someone should help me.
What do you say to listeners, and especially younger listeners
who may not know where to go for help, and
(12:44):
who may even feel like there's nowhere to turn for help.
I would say that they probably do have someone that
they can turn to. So again, I've been working with
high schools and what I've learned is that every high
school student has a counselor. Now maybe they don't connect
with their own counselor. But there's a group of counselors
in each of these high schools. I've been impressed by
(13:06):
how committed they are to helping students, So that is
a resource if they feel, as some do, that they
can't really talk to their parents, or they worry that
their parents won't take it seriously or tell them, you know,
what do you have to be depressed about. I hear
that from parents they have a good life. Well, people
that have good lives get depression. That's like saying, how
could you possibly have an asthma attack? You have a
(13:28):
good life. We don't say that to people. Okay, So
I want to dig into the treatment side. With many
physical injuries, for example, you have a rough timeline for recovery.
But what does that look like with depression? How fast
can people expect to bounce back and return to what
they consider their normal self once they begin treatment. Of course,
(13:49):
my first response to that is much faster if you
actually get treatment. If you do nothing, it's quite possible
that you'll cycle out of it. These are episodic illnesses,
particularly depression, but it can take a long time. So
the first way to shorten the amount of time is
to actually go and get treatment, whether that's talk therapy,
cognitive behavioral therapy, or for some medication might have a role.
(14:13):
The challenge with medications is that we at this point
have to do some trial and error. It's not like
with an infection where you can send a sample to
the lab and know whether you have the right antibiotic. Now,
from experience, we know certain medicines do a good job
with certain kinds of depression or anxiety, so it's not random,
(14:33):
but sometimes you have to try one or two things.
I will say there's a challenging aspect of antidepressant treatment,
and that's that it takes weeks, not days to get
an effect. So if you are going to respond to something,
even if you're gonna have a great response, it typically
can take two to four to six weeks before you
(14:55):
start seeing a benefit once you're on a decent dose. Now,
that is frustrated, and most people don't believe that. Most
people think of medicine being antibiotics and pain medicine, especially
young people having their first episode. They've never had a
medicine that takes four to six weeks to work, and
they say to me, come on, doc medicine don't take
four to six weeks to work. So it's really important
(15:17):
that there's a lot of education about that so that
people don't give up on the treatment, because that happens
really commonly. That people are appropriately frustrated. I'm taking this
and I'm not feeling better, and so we know that
there is a delay and that it's not going to
be in a few days that you'll start getting a benefit.
We might have a parent, or a coach, or a
(15:39):
friend listening to this podcast who has someone close to them.
They may be experiencing symptoms that are hard to understand,
some of which you've described. How can those who are
close to someone that may be suffering from what could
be depression or anxiety support that loved one, that friend,
or that person who they are close to. First of all,
(16:01):
when things are happening that don't make sense, you're making
an excellent point. You want to consider that it might
be from anxiety or depression. If someone's more volatile, if
they're more angry, if they're more reactive, or they're more isolated,
or they can't get engaged. I remember a young lacrosse player.
I grew up in Pittsburgh, I didn't know that lacrosse existed,
(16:22):
but now I'm in Maryland and it's a big sport.
And he explained to me that when he was depressed,
he couldn't play well because there's so many decisions you
need to make. Should I passion? I keep going to
all these things? And that made sense to me, said,
I can't make decisions quickly, So I do think that
coach has noticed this. The first thing people should do
(16:42):
is encourage someone to get evaluated, or at least have
a conversation with someone with some expertise. That might be
as simple as speaking to their high school counselor or
someone at the school, perhaps a social work or someone
with some expertise, to see is there a problem where
we should take action. Say the person has had a
(17:02):
problem identified. So here's a young person. You know they're
going through depression and anxiety. Things you can do to
be helpful. One thing is to not tell them it's
not a big deal, and not tell them it's all
going to be fine in the moment. That's the think
pretty upsetting and even insulting. I think instead it's to
(17:22):
be with someone to try to get them to go
for a walk, to say why don't we watch a
TV show together or a movie, just to be able
to say it's okay, and to reiterate over and over again,
I'm really proud of you for doing something and getting help.
I believe this is going to get better and I'm
going to support you. So you tell me what I
(17:44):
need to do. Some coaches might hesitate before they refer
an athlete to talk to a psychiatrist or a psychologist,
even if they suspect the athlete, especially a younger athlete,
is experiencing depression or anxiety, and it might be very
well intentioned. The coach doesn't know how to approach the conversation.
They don't want to make the problem worse. They don't
(18:06):
want to make the athlete feel like something's wrong with them.
Can you speak to that? Well, that's a reflection of stigma,
isn't it. If you had twisted your knee, you wouldn't
say I don't want you to go to see the
orthopedic surgeon because we might be identifying you with someone
with a bad knee. You say, let's get on this,
let's figure out what we need to do. We want
to modify your training schedule. We don't want it to
(18:27):
get worse. So the conversation I have, and I suggest
that others have, is to share what you genuinely believe.
I think you're suffering when you don't need to be.
I think things are harder for you than they need
to be. And I'd like us to get input from
an expert to see if there's something that could help.
(18:47):
But you have to believe that to say it right.
I would argue that many of those coaches are afraid
they're going to label this young person with something terrible,
as opposed to identify find a treatable problem. So they're
bringing their own stigma and their own view of mental
illness to those interactions, like well I don't want to
(19:08):
say you have that. It's like, well, okay, well that
is a treatable problem that could change your life to
have it taken care of. Huh. That's a really important point. Now,
what about family? How can family support a loved one
who may be experiencing depression or anxiety. One thing they
(19:28):
can do is recognize that it's going to take some
time and be supportive in patient. The other thing is
to adjust their expectations the same way that a coach.
I hope would if someone's hurt their knee and they
can't train in the same way. So you don't want
to have someone not be part of the family, but
maybe you have to be a little more realistic about
(19:49):
what they're able to do. Another thing is to be
realistic about how much someone is able to do, say
if they're in school, or how much they're able to
do at work. Being able to be their part time
and work part time can often be incredibly supportive because
you're not at home and isolated, But to go in
and face a job that's simply undoable day after day
(20:12):
can be demoralizing and actually make things work. So ongoing
support patients, kindness, and realistic expectations, I think are things
we can all do for the people in our lives
going through these conditions. How do you approach uncomfortable conversations
with people you care about? If someone is really worried
about their child, someone they're working with, whether that's a
(20:36):
teacher or coach, someone, If they're worried about someone and
they're uncomfortable because these are uncomfortable conversations, the first thing
I hope they would think is I have to do
something because it seems like they're suffering, the same way
that you might actually get the young person or your
friend to take action as by talking about suffering unnecessarily.
(20:58):
I think it's how you get over your own worry
about it. I have had many uncomfortable conversations with people
that I care about in my life, not that I
know professionally, just because I know they could feel better,
and so when I think, well, maybe they don't want
to really hear from me, that's what I focus on.
I could help them feel better, and I'm not going
(21:20):
to deny them that opportunity to feel better. It's very
awkward to have these conversations with people, so it really
is the ultimate demonstration of how much you care that
you'll do something uncomfortable for them. I have to ask
you about the yips. Have you ever seen the yips
in your practice? And how do you think the yips
(21:41):
relate to what we've talked about today If they do
in my practice, I haven't really had someone who has
the yips or the twisties. Instead, what I've seen is
people that are losing their confidence in the work they do. Depression, anxiety,
challenge your infidence and what you really care about most
(22:02):
in the way you define yourself. So in that way,
I see them as related. Before we wrap, if you
had to pick one thing that everybody listening to this
could take home with them, one thing that will benefit
their mental health, what would that be. If I have
to pick one thing, it would be sleep more. I
mean that seriously, because being sleep defrived is stressful for
(22:25):
the body. It worsens anxiety, it worsens depression. We're terrible
by getting enough sleep. We're all overscheduled, we're all trying
to do too much. So that's a very basic thing.
In a broader sense, I would hope that people would
be more open to at least talking about the possibility
(22:47):
of getting help with someone they trust if they're not sure.
So sleep more great advice, But how do you accomplish that?
This is gonna sound simplistic, but you know, put down
your darned phone. And if you think about how much
time we all waste checking more emails before going to bed,
(23:07):
or reading one more news story, and so it comes
down to give yourself a bed time. Say I have
a goal. My goal is not to be in bed
at twelve thirty because I'm exhausted when I wake up
I'm going to try to move that back a half
an hour. When people try to do dramatic things like
saying I should really be going to bed at ten
and I've been going to bed at one in the morning,
(23:27):
they're not going to have any success. So move it
back fifteen minutes or a half an hour, and if
you had success with that after several weeks, try another
fifteen minutes or a half an hour. Now, we all
need time to do things that are just fun and
relaxing and not productive. So I don't mean that you
should not do those things, but most people will tell
(23:49):
me they feel a lot more satisfied if they made
a choice to do something read a book, watch a movie,
listen to a podcast. I'll say that instead of just
sort of doing nothing or channel surfing or flipping through
things on the internet, be more purposeful in your time
and carve out a little more for sleep. We'll be
(24:10):
back with Rick Ankiel after this. I'm justin Sewa and
this is losing control. Rick Ankiel is a former Major
League baseball player who had an impressive career as a
picture and an outfielder, which basically means he made it
(24:31):
to the big leagues not once, but twice, and that's
because Rick also had what is probably the most famous
case of the yips in the last twenty five years.
Rick was a young pheno, barely twenty one, and many
thought he was going to be one of the all
time greats until his pitching abruptly fell apart in the
middle of the two thousand post season due to a
(24:52):
severe ten out of ten case of the yips. And
if you want to hear that story, head back to
episode one. But there's much more to Rick, and today
we're not only talking about the yips, but about mental health,
about Rick's triumphant comeback, and about how Rick's experiences have
shaped his relationship to sports and to life. Here's the
(25:14):
one and only Rick Ankiel. Everybody has stuff, you know,
it doesn't matter if you're an athlete or not. We
all have ups and downs, we all face challenges, and really,
you know, it's not what happens to us, but it's
how we respond to what happens to us is what
makes who we are. Everybody has stuff, and nobody, not
even the greatest athletes, are immune to the yips or
(25:36):
to the mental health issues that so many of us face.
We look at like the greatest athletes in the world,
and you talk about the biggest moments. What bothers me
sometimes is when I hear a guy say, oh yeah,
none of that phases me. It's like I'm sitting on
the couch. What you've figured out is how to use it.
You've heard it before. Focus on what you can control
(25:58):
as a picture, right, the language want to control yourself
with is I'm gonna bury this ball in the outside
corner or I'm gonna dot it on the inside corner
or whatever you're trying to do in a strikes one
and as a hitter, you know I'm gonna make solid contact.
But as the picture all the only thing you can
control is what your mindset is, how you're coaching yourself
in the moment, and once once you've released the ball,
everything is out of your control, whether the umpire calls
(26:20):
it a strike, the catcher catches it, the hitter hits it,
the fielder behind you makes the play. And that goes
back to focusing on what you can control. You can
control your effort, and you can control how you can
coach yourself, and then how you coach yourself after what happens,
do you allow it to rattle you, or do you
move on to the next play or the next pitch.
It's really understanding what you can and cannot control them.
(26:42):
So you try to simplify it into the smallest things. Right.
If you try to grasp the whole complexity of it,
it could be overwhelming. So relate it this way. You know,
as a picture, my job is to throw baseballs at
targets with hardly breaking movement period, simple and end of discussion.
As a hitter, I'm up there trying to make solid contact.
That's it playing his day. That's like the simplest form
(27:03):
you could keep it at. And you try to stick
with that mindset because, especially in baseball, in a lot
of sports, you're dealing with a ton of failure constantly.
And if you only focus on the results, and we're
such a result orientated world in society, the game will
eat you alive. So as a hitter, if I go
up there and I make solid contact five times out
of ten, whether I got a hit or not, I
need to understand that. I want how do you measure success?
(27:27):
Is it about the result or is it about the process.
There are so many distractions in sports and in life
and the mind tends to want to jump to the
results or to the outcome. But the best players I've
seen are the athletes who are able to control their focus,
their attention, and who, when their mind begins to wander,
(27:49):
know how to bring it back to the process. It
may sound simple, but it's not easy. It was that
mindset which in part got ricked back into the major leagues.
I asked him about one of the greatest hits of
his career. It's two thousand seven, seven years after his
pitching blew up. In two thousand and Rick is back
(28:09):
in the major leagues for the first time since then,
but this time as an outfielder. Rick's team, the St.
Louis Cardinals, are facing the San Diego Padres. Yeah, so
I get the call that I'm gonna make it back up.
I was in Triple A. Um, we're out in the
Pacific West, so it's a far flight, you know. Anyway,
land back in Memphis. My wife was in Memphis, and
(28:31):
I got the word around midnight and I called her, Hey, well,
I'm called up. I'm playing tomorrow right field. She's like,
I'm packing the apartment now. So by the time I
land at six in the morning, get over to the apartment.
We finished packing up the car, and now we're taking
that four hour drive to St. Louis. And when I
walked into the clubhouse, the amount of high fives, hugs,
(28:52):
smiles from guys. Honestly, that would have been enough in
itself to be an unbelievable day. And starting right field,
I get up to bat. My first at bat, I
end up popping up. It's popped up in the infield amount.
Strike out my second a bat, strike out my third
at bat, and it felt like you could just feel
the energy of the crowd and everyone like, is you know,
(29:12):
is this gonna work? Is this a joke? Is this
just you know? They feel bad for the guy. And
in my fourth at bat, I was facing dub Broke.
How I got a t one hanging curveball and I
got just enough of it as a hitter. When I
hit it, I wasn't sure it was gone, but I
knew I had a chance and heil out to deep.
I failed. He's a chance to leave the ballpark. It's
(29:33):
gone shot for Richard hail back in the major leagues.
As soon as I realized that it was gonna be
a home run, it was the most unbelievable emotional explosion
of of things. Just it's hard to even explain, but
I felt like I felt like I was watching it
from above in a way, and I was. I was.
(29:56):
It almost felt like I was floating around the base
on a magic carpet. And I remember rounding second and
I can see Jose Kendo, who's my third base coach,
and I see the smile on his face and it's
and I felt like, oh my gosh, this is like
I just did it. I did it. I had a
home run, a three run home run back in my
first game. And I when I rounded third and I
was going towards home plate, I could actually feel the
ground shaking from everybody in the stadium, cheering and just
(30:20):
so glad that it happened in St. Louis. And everybody
knew what I went through, you know, they went They
lived it with me, the wild pitches, the balls, the
hard work. They've seen it. They were there with me,
and in that moment, it felt like we all got
to share it together. And it was It's just, uh,
it was a dream. It was a dream come true.
There's no question. What about anxiety, how do you get
(30:44):
from the yips and dropping out of baseball to a
three run of homer back in the big leagues. How
does this all feel today? It was a long process.
It's not like it just worked. Somebody told me that
it worked overnight. It took a lot of visualization for
me to visualize. I visualize that anxiety coming and then visualize,
(31:05):
you know, me accepting it and not fighting it, and
that takes a law. I felt like that took it
took years. But now I'm in a place where I
can feel the anxiety coming and I still get I
still don't like sixty six inches. You know, I could
be thrown to BP to my kids one day and
there's a moment where I just it don't feel right
and I don't like it. But I'm in a place
(31:26):
now where I don't fight it. I can accept it
and I'll get through it. And I always remind myself
of this too. I've been in plenty of situations just
like everyone else, maybe a job interview or a big
test in school where I was as nervous as can be,
but I still passed the test. So it's not always
about how we feel, and it's more about, yeah, I
(31:46):
might not feel great because I got anxiety right now,
But I still know what I want to do and
now I know how to coach myself. Now does that
mean I'm gonna do it? No, But at least I'm
putting myself into position to be successful. You mentioned coaching
your kids. How is your life and what you've been
through shaped how you coach them? So with my my
(32:08):
children they're nine and eleven. They play sports. I really,
I don't want to say never, but almost in when
when they're successful or when they're not, I always praise
effort and add and focus and attitude, things I know
that they can control. So maybe they might had a
double and when we get back home, I'll say something
like that was unbelievable Elford and focus you put into
(32:31):
that swing. And I think that allows them to start
understanding it in a way too that it's not based
on the result, because I'll say the same thing when
they hit a hard line drive and somebody catches it,
so that way they walk away with that. Don't get
me wrong, do I say, hey, great hits sometimes are
nice double of course, because it happens. But I really
try to focus on the effort and the focus when
(32:51):
it comes to mental health. How have things changed in
sports and beyond in your view, we've made giants steps,
especially for men. And this is two thousand and twenty two.
When I first went through my throwing issues, this was
yours two thousand and the way I was raised, you know,
in my household, at least, it was kind of seen
as a weakness to go talk to a head doctor
(33:13):
and you were almost just kind of left to bear
your own issues by yourself. And you know, I'm thankful
the way that the direction that not only the athletic
world is moving, but the world in general. I think
that it's becoming more aware that there's help out there,
and you don't have to feel like, you know, it's
okay to go get help, and and you don't have
(33:34):
to be in a dark place or have something wrong
with you just to go and talk to someone. You know,
more than not the most successful people that I talked to, uh,
they have a psychologist that they talked to, and it's
it's you know, sometimes it's about just being able to
have a conversation with someone that's not inside of your windows,
so they don't have an agenda, there's not a side
(33:54):
that they're trying to pick for one reason or the other.
They're just gonna give you the facts and give you
some tools to help you navigate your way through the
ups and downs of life. I want to bring back
Karen Schwartz, the psychiatrist you heard earlier. Why is it
so impactful when athletes talk about mental health when anyone
who has been successful, whether that's an athlete or someone
(34:17):
who has you know, in the entertainment industry, or someone
who is well known through politics, When people that are
successful talk about something they've gone through and how they
handled it and how they are, usually I hope feeling
better because they've gotten treatment that fight stigma. Well, first
(34:38):
I fight stigma because it allows you to see successful
people can have this, and then it's a positive story.
Oh wow, he had this god treatment and this is
the way he's feeling better. Okay, I will now listen
to that. But I think it really comes from the
idea that a successful person said. It's what I said earlier.
(35:02):
You know, this idea that you can only have these
things if you're broken. That makes no sense, but it
is how people feel about mental illness, and it allows
people to feel so negatively about themselves. It's part of
these illnesses that you feel worse about yourself, that you
start doubting yourself and start thinking, well, come on, only
(35:23):
people like me get this. Then you have someone really
successful being open about it, and that just challenges that
in the most basic way. Here's Rick Ankiel. He's going
to mention a guy named Harvey Dorfman, a sports psychologist
and mental skills coach who passed away in two thousand
and eleven. When I was going through the yips, we
(35:44):
call in a baseball for me, I lost my ability
to throw strikes. You know, I thought Harvey was trying
to save my career, and I now understand that he
thought he was helping me save my life, which he did,
and I wouldn't be the person I am today without him. Really,
once we started, we went into just the childhood that
I had, and you know, he helped helped me understand
(36:06):
that a lot of the guilt and shame and stuff
that I was carrying with me, it just really, you know,
it's it wasn't my fault, and that that was tremendous.
I had to really understand that and accept that to
be able to grow as a person, as a father,
as a person who now wants to run a business
and somebody who for me anyway, you know. Now, I
(36:28):
use those experiences and some of the tools that he
taught me to give back to the to the younger athletes,
and I work with baseball players. I work with all
kinds of people that are going through issues that my
story can help them with. I want to be you know,
I want to be remembered as someone that tried to
better the world and leave it a better place than
I found it. Losing Control is a podcast about the yips,
(36:55):
one of the strangest phenomenon in sports, and over the
past ten episodes, I hope we've assembled a clearer picture
of the yips. The twisties, target panic, and the rest.
By whatever name you know it, The yips are real
and more or less common, depending on the sport. But
you may have also noticed something else. The yips have
(37:15):
an awful lot to do with life and how we
live our lives, from the things we take for granted
to the things that make us who we are. The
yips bring questions that will all confront one day into
focus and bring us back to the fundamentals of what
it means to be human. And that's what I want
to leave you with. When athletes talk about how they
(37:36):
want to be remembered, what I hear most often is
that they want to be remembered as a great teammate,
and that at the end of the day, whether your
career lasted ten years or ten games, for the most part,
nobody's going to remember the stats. What they'll remember is
the kind of person that you were ason here. Thank
(38:00):
you to our guests, Rick Ankiel, a retired Major league
pitcher and outfielder. For more on Rick and is an
incredible story, check out his fantastic book, The Phenomena, Pressure,
the Yips, and the Pitch That Changed My Life. And
Dr Karen Schwartz, the director of clinical and educational Programs
at the Johns Hopkins Mood Disorder Center and a professor
(38:23):
in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the
Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Thank you so much for listening,
and don't forget to rate and subscribe. I'm Justin Suah,
your host, and you can find me on Instagram and
Twitter at justin Suah. That's j U s t I
N s u A. You could also check me out
(38:46):
on the Increase Your Impact. Podcast. Losing Control is a
podcast from Sports Illustrated Studios and I Heart Radio. Original
music by Jerem Suah. Michael McDowell is our producer, ed
it and mixing by Will Stanton. This episode was fact
checked by Zoe Mullet at s I Studios. Max Miller
is supervising producer, and Brandon Getchus and Matt Lipson our
(39:10):
executive producers at I heart Radio. Sean ty Tone as
our executive producer. Special thanks to ty Carlton. For more
podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This podcast
does not provide medical advice, and nothing you here on
this podcast is intended or implied to be a substitute
(39:33):
for professional medical consultation, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the
advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with
any questions you may have regarding your health. Never disregard
professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of
something you have heard on this podcast.
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