Matt Wragg is a professional photographer, writer and has been an editor-at-large for Pinkbike since 2011. Matt has been in the industry for many years, he's travelled the world for numerous projects and was one of the first photographers to actively shoot enduro. Matt recently posted a blog article here on Pinkbike called
'The Day I Lost Control Of My Brain' where he openly talked about his struggles with mental health and the resulting anxiety/depression.
On this episode we discuss everything from how he first got involved with mountain biking, travelling the world, photography and take a deep dive into how his mental health battles first came to the surface and what he's been doing to overcome them.
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By the way, I was once feeling quite groggy in the head. I was driving and I would turn my head to clear my corners and felt as though my eyes and mental focus were on delay. My face was looking right but it felt as though my eyes had not caught up to it yet. A doc told me it was from deceleration injuries from riding. I tend to plow over things which is not at all smooth. Your brain is surrounded by liquid but that liquid cannot prevent it from rattling around, and sometimes, impacting the inside of your skull. It is not a concussion but a brain injury nonetheless. Just another thing you guys discussed that I could relate to pretty immediately.
Hopefully you will chat again in the future?
Yes, feeling sad and hopeless randomly or occasionally is normal. Some people experience extremes of this and can descend into clinical depression which can be pretty ugly, but those are the extreme cases.
I have lost several friends to suicide/depression, sometimes there were signs, sometimes not. You think that changes my opinion? Silly. I never said that you ignore someone who is depressed, I'm just saying so many people say they have depression and anxiety as if it's some lifelong struggle when maybe it's only been affecting them for a year or so, and they don't recognize it as a mental/spiritual rut they'll push through.
If you are going to grossly misrepresent what I'm saying, at least make it easy to read.