1 week Ago By Danny Russell
Star forward Harry McKay has opened up about his decision to take three weeks personal leave away from Carlton’s struggling senior outfit, revealing he was in such a bad place he had to put his hand up for help. As the 2021 Coleman Medallist prepares for his senior return against West Coast Eagles on Saturday during Gather Round, he said his mental health started to suffer on the eve of the AFL season. Harry McKay made his return through a VFL scratch on the weekend.
Credit: Getty Images “I guess five or six weeks ago, late Feb, I started feeling in not a great place mentally,” McKay told The Ben and Harry Podcast. McKay played the first round in Carlton’s shock loss to a rebuilding Richmond outfit and then stood himself down for the following three weeks - losses to Hawthorn, Western Bulldogs and Collingwood. “I think the most challenging part of that was me thinking I shouldn’t be feeling the way I was, and everything in my life, to be honest, was in a really great place,” he said.
McKay told his twin brother on their podcast that as he began to feel worse he started to “put on a bit of a facade to pretend to be okay when I really wasn’t”. His brother asked him if that meant he “put on a mask” to hide his struggles. “Exactly right,” Harry replied.
McKay said the defining moment came when he realised he had to put his hand up and say “I needed some help”. “Since the moment I did that, the support and the love has been so profound and everyone’s ability to be able to shed some light on what’s been happening and a bit more understanding on this world has been really important,” he said. “It was so irrational because [before that] everything was in such a great place - footy, family, life.
“On paper it made no sense. Which probably added to the want to keep pushing through kind of thing. But the more you did, the worse you felt.
” McKay played a VFL game for the Blues last weekend. MORE TO COME.
