Ronan McNamee: Light at the end of the dark tunnel

Tyrone defender Ronan McNamee knows that if he hadn't taken a chance to open up about his mental health struggles his life would have taken a very different path.

There certainly wouldn’t have been the All-Ireland title with the Red Hands in 2021 and the All-Star from a few years pervious. Chances are he wouldn’t be in Ireland right now, instead travelling as far away from his problems as possible just to learn the cruel lesson that distance wouldn't soften them. In truth, he doesn’t know just how far things would have spiralled.

As a teak-tough defender and a male who kept his thoughts to himself, the idea of speaking out had to fight against his strong internal instinct to contain. To bottle up. To tell nobody.

But it was a battle that he won, and through counselling, public discussion and the weighty helping hand of former manager Mickey Harte, McNamee faced up to his issues.

And as an ambassador for this year’s Darkness Into Light campaign, the annual fundraising event organised by Pieta and supported by Electric Ireland, McNamee has urged others to fight against those bottling instincts and speak out.

"The reason I didn't speak about it was because I thought it would be a pity party in a way, hence you don't bother. It was the complete opposite.

"The amount of positivity that I got from it and the amount of people that reached out saying that they had their own problems and could relate to mine was rewarding in a way.

"Personally for me still, it's not something that I would talk about often enough. Or enough in a way that when I do speak about it still I would be uncomfortable speaking about it.

"The amount of positivity that I got from it and the amount of people that reached out saying that they had their own problems