I stopped cycling as a
full-time occupation in March 2016.
Shame delayed the
announcement.
Once upon a home voyage,
I awaited a train in Nantes Gare. A
soldier came across me, and I was addressed in a friendly French tongue. Grunts
of bewilderment responded to his talk. Granted his audience was an
English-speaking oaf, his lips tensed as he forced out foreign words,
‘You two euro? Me train
Lille…’
I flipped the two euro he
was short to get the man of duty on his way. With a goofy smile and a ‘chow’, I wished him well on his journey to
wherever, for whatever.
When I got to Dublin, and
realised I needed that two euro to get me back up to Belfast, my thoughts were,
‘I really hope your man was actually a
soldier’.
That experience always
made me think. Not about my lack of organisation and my general incompetence; but
my reasoning to giving my last monetary scrapes to a soldier, and not anyone
else.
‘Why should I deserve all this support when so
many people are not as privileged?’ I was happy to hugely inconvenience my
journey home to help a soldier out, but why would you do it for an
underperforming cyclist?
Exhausting bank accounts,
help and the European public transport system, I pushed my mental and physical
capabilities to the limits. Money, bikes, hope, time and effort were thrown at
me throughout my cycling career, to no avail. Doubt and insecurity crept into
my life and laid down their anchors. Every failure hit me harder and harder.
Throughout 2015, I lived mostly
on my own, in a ghost town in north-west France. Shutter Island had become embedded
in the centre of Brittany; consisting of a bakery, a hair-dressers and a tabac. I hated living there. When I went
out on the bike, eyes burnt into my fluorescent pink kit, as everyone in the
little village documented my movements. It got to a peak, when the baker had
pre-prepared all the things I was going to ask for, before I got there.
Paranoia
haunted me. I needed to know what
these people were thinking of me. I needed
to know why I wasn’t getting results. Going out on my bike wasn’t solving
my problems anymore, but creating them.
In November 2015, I encountered
Jake Bailey upon my phone screen, whilst staying with my girlfriend in London.
Diagnosed with terminal cancer the week before, the head boy of Christchurch
Boys High School rolled onto the stage in a wheelchair, delivering a
scintillating speech, which soon became a viral YouTube hit.
Bailey was so pale and so weak, but the fire still surged from his eyes. Two brown
microcosms of optimism and passion radiated into the camera, rejecting his
body’s degeneration. Enthusiastically, he urged his peers to make the most of
their gifts, in a moving twenty-minute address. He states,
‘Let
others lead small lives, but not you. Let others argue over small things, but
not you. Let others cry over small hurts, but not you. Let others leave their
future in someone else's hands, but not you. Of course doing this will mean at
some point we may have to face our fear of falling short. Fear of looking like
a fool. Fear of not being enough.’
Bailey crippled me. Emotions crumbled out as I was
swallowed by my girlfriend’s bed. Disgust and distain seeped into my being like
never before. Why can a man staring death in the face be a beacon of
motivation, encouragement, and positivity; while I am just a wretch?
My girlfriend rushed in and told me I had a problem. The
internal monologue of personal, hateful slander had to stop. I made a promise
to seek help.
I held the promise, and went to see a therapist to
help me with my, mostly abnormal, thoughts. Depression and anxieties had leaked
into my mind and distorted my view of life. Things got a lot worse before they
get better as I started lifting my sub-conscious barricades and ventured into
my darkest thoughts.
But I still rode my bike. The colour-coded
TrainingPeaks calendar remained green, as I focussed on making 2016 the best
season yet. Coming into the New Year, I was the strongest I’d ever been. When
times were tough, I thought, ‘Give it two more years, and see what happens.’ I
kept plugging away, hoping the stars would align.
But the stars never would. A sticky web of weaknesses
lined my conscience, as the season started. I no longer felt like the young boy
at Orlock, whizzing up the Springwell. I was fitter, stronger and leaner than
ever, but the feeble inaccuracies I still had, melted my remaining self-esteem
away.
Races were no longer about pushing hard, about
enjoying the quest to the limit. They became a sobering highlighter of
disappointment, of how I still was not good enough. The unknown distance of
necessary improvement, crushed my soul every time I pushed down on the pedals.
But I still kept faith. I refused to give up. I
refused to be associated with the cyclists who had given up before me. I wanted
to be the one who prospered, not the one who failed.
Encroached in emotional turmoil, my flight to Belgium
got closer and closer. I desperately pleaded with myself to wise up, and get on the bloody plane.
But I just couldn’t. Enslaved by the unanswered questions wickedly dancing in my
mind’s eye, I had to give up.
Abhorrent, black weeks followed. I was walking into a
wall whilst remaining in cycling; but when leaving it I felt I had turned
around to walk into a wall directly opposite. Not a fibre in my body wanted to
get on that flight to Belgium, but not a fibre in my body wanted to finally
admit defeat to achieving a professional contract in cycling, either.
Demons from another department started to plague my
head. They made me avoid seeing anyone I knew from cycling. They made me not
want to ride my bike for the potential of being spotted. They made me a slave
to my own existence.
But I survived. I received a lot of help and am better
for it. Now, a few months on, I feel it was definitely the right choice. I feel
better, less stressed and more determined to enjoy life.
An exercise fanatic from no age, I’ve realised that
physical exertion was my coping mechanism for depression. When cycling became
an occupation, it fuelled my woes rather than extinguish them. This is what led
to the downward spiral.
I still love every minute of riding a bike. I am
trying to pack my weeks with any sport I can think of, because now I know it gives
me peace of mind.
To finish, I send a message out to two sets of
readers:
To the full-time cyclists, I commend you. Cycling is
in a new light, for me, now. Every cyclist projected on a television screen
earns every ounce of airtime. They are hardened, driven individuals, and I will
always be in awe of their achievements. To me, cycling is still a magnificent
spectacle, and I will always love to see people conquer it.
To the
depression sufferers. You are not alone, and you are the reason I wrote this post.
I took no pleasure creating it and I am glad to finish it. If you have started
your journey to vitality, I wish you all the best. If you are still on your
own, talk to the right people to make things right. You will be alone if you
act alone. Seek the right help and you can fight it. It is a horrible illness,
but one which is made to be beaten.
I write to live, and I endeavour to live to write. This
is my next target. Any advice in any work experience within the writing
stratosphere would be greatly welcomed.
Thanks for reading, and see you on the road.
