Mental Illness is a Thing, Let’s Talk

Photo courtesy of Lakeview Church in Regina.

By SCOTT BILLECK

I was Rick Rypien. I was Wade Belak. I was Derek Boogaard. I am a man who lives in the clutches of a sickness. Let’s talk.

Mental illness is a thing. It always has been a thing, but it never was a thing that was talked about all that much. Like most things before they become things, something has to happen. Not always, but frequent enough to notice, that “something” ends up being a tragic event.

Before I started dabbling in sports journalism, I fell ill. It wasn’t a cold or the flu. It was, however, a chronic illness, although I didn’t know it from the beginning.

It doesn’t come on like a normal illness either. My throat didn’t start to get a scratchy feeling. My nose didn’t start to leak a little. But it happened, and it happened slowly.

It doesn’t last long at the beginning. I could remember one time as a 13-year old. I was playing golf on my front lawn and I suddenly felt terrible. Then at 15, I spent a whole summer wondering if I would make it through at all.

You have your down moments, but you pass them off as something that happened in your day, or week, or month. Then it starts to last a little longer. First a day, then a couple more, then it’s a week and after a while you can’t remember when it started and you have no idea when, or even if, it will end.

Next thing you know, you find yourself bed-ridden. Curtains pulled shut. The dishes aren’t getting done, neither are your clothes. You haven’t showered in days. You find yourself irritable, trying to find an escape. You lose yourself for hours, days, in a “hobby.” Even the things you used to love doing, playing hockey, listening to music, etc., become burdens on your very existence.

You want out, but you are so deep in it that there is no light. You hate the sun and begin to embrace the darkness of night: Its bleakness is the only thing that resonates true. I used to long for winter, not because I wanted hockey, but because the days were shorter.

Phone calls come and go, often unanswered. Friends show concern until they get tired of trying. Relationships tank — just as hard as you’ve have.

Despair doesn’t even begin to describe how you feel. Words don’t do it justice.

I was lucky. I had a few people who cared enough about me who directed me to help. When I didn’t feel like I could move, they gave me strength. When I was dehydrated from all the tears, they gave me the water I needed.

Getting help seems like a helpless task. Admission is the hardest part of mental illness, at least in my case. As a 23-year-old man, feeling that weak is debilitating.

First you see a psychologist. Thank goodness the one I saw was perfect from the start. Then comes the first doctor’s appointment. That was a moment. I told him I was feeling sick, but not that kind of sick. I finally verbalized it. I was depressed, I told him. He stopped writing in my file. He was caring, he told me we would figure this out. What a blessing he was.

Then you have to tell the people that you haven’t cared about in a while. Your friends, or what is left of them, and your family.

Pills suck. They hurt. Things don’t work the same way they used to. The physiological effects are noticeable, I’ve put on a lot of weight. The psychological issues that result from the pills are worse. They can make you feel worse than you felt before you started taking them. It takes a while. Getting the dose and brand down can take weeks, even months.

It’s never easy, but it is worth it. I mean that — it IS worth it.

I spent a year and a half on unemployment insurance. I lost two jobs, one because I couldn’t cope at all, and the other because I couldn’t have cared less. Both a direct result of being “sick.”

I spent days and weeks during that time doing absolutely nothing. What a waste. This illness took time from me I will never get back. I don’t remember 2010, it came and went and I only existed in it, like a pebble on a beach.

I wondered every day how far I would get. How many days I was stuck at a 1 (on a scale of 1-10), I’ll never know. It’s not something that you want to keep track of. Those days are the worst of the worst.

“Pills with skills,” is how one of my Psychology professors explained the need for both. I tried the natural methods but they never worked. Medication is often needed, as it was in my case. It still is today, and, I would imagine, it will for the rest of my life.

Chronic depression is just that, chronic.

It’s not often that people want to talk about this sort of thing. It’s rough, it can be tragic and often the person listening to the “ill” person feels awkward, confused and without the knowledge needed to proceed.

“Sick not weak” is an incredibly accurate term used by TSN personality Michael Landsberg. His definition of a person suffering from mental illness can give people hope, much like it gave me hope when I needed it. No one wants to feel weak. It isn’t just a feel-good term either.

If you know someone who is “sick” please reach out to them. Listen to them. Do not judge them.

The people that helped me gave me a second chance. I am where I am right now, writing about sports and enjoying every minute of it because someone came beside me and walked with me.

I am not without my sickness. Like I mentioned above, it doesn’t go away. Anxiousness and self-doubt are a daily occurrences. Some more than others, especially in the industry I find myself in.

Some don’t get out of it.

Last year, Winnipeg Jets marked Bell Let’s Talk Day and Hockey Talks by wearing No. 11 jerseys during warmup before a home game against the Nashville Predators. One of their own, Rick Rypien, fell victim to this sickness. He wasn’t so lucky. But his story is a reminder of what could have been.

Project 11 was initiated in his memory, a program to raise awareness at a young age, in children as young as I was when I stumbled upon this wretched disease. Please give, if you can, and support initiatives like projecteleven.ca and SickNotWeak.com.

You can help someone. You don’t have to have the right things to say, you don’t need to have the all the answers. All you have to do is listen. Walk beside that person. It just might save a life.

Fight for your happiness and the others around you.

Faceoffs, power-plays and elite goaltending

By Scott Billeck

The Winnipeg Jets’ inadequacies on the power play and in the faceoff circle have been well documented this season.

To fans, these things are common knowledge; it’s something you can see. It’s tangible. But the question is, does it matter? For a team looking towards the playoffs in a few short months, do improvements need to materialize to ensure a coveted spot in the postseason?

Conventional wisdom would say yes. The more faceoffs won equates into higher possession and higher possession offers more scoring chances and on and on she goes.

Similarly, success on the power play is associated with more goals. More goals win more games. More games won sees more points in the standings, and more points in the standings gives a better shot at the playoffs.

You get the picture – it’s elementary, right? It makes sense, but recent history suggests that winning draws and scoring on the man-advantage may not really make a difference when it comes to late April hockey.

At the moment, Winnipeg owns the 24th spot in faceoff percentage across the NHL at 48 per cent. Nashville, the Central Division leaders, is the only team with a worse faceoff percentage. St. Louis and Chicago are first and sixth respectively, sit in playoff positions at this point, but Dallas, Minnesota and Colorado, 11th, 16th and 17th respectively, are outside the playoff bubble yet higher than Winnipeg and Nashville in success from the dot.

This is all fine and dandy, but without a larger sample size, the point is moot. Enter last year’s statistics.

The New York Rangers made a Stanley Cup Finals appearance on the heels of a 48.8 per cent faceoff success rate during the regular season. That’s not much better than the Jets so far this year.

Philadelphia, Montreal, Colorado, Tampa Bay and Anaheim also finished outside the top-16 teams in terms of faceoff efficiency yet all stamped passports to the postseason.

Similarly, the Jets aren’t in the upper echelon of successful power-play teams this season, although they are a far cry from where they were just a couple months ago.

Sitting at a 17.5 per cent, the Jets’ power play ranks 18th in the league. The number might not startle you, but consider that in late November, the Jets ranked 29th, clipping along at a paltry 8.4 per cent.

It’s a notable improvement to what was a dismal and often frustrating to watch man-advantage. The Jets have scored 22 goals in their last 89 power play attempts, an impressive 24.7 per cent. The team is 15-5-5 in its last 25 games.

A good power play definitely helps, but it’s not the be-all, end-all.

Consider this: the lowest-ranked power-play team in the NHL in 2013-14 was the Los Angeles Kings, which finished the regular season at 15.1 per cent and finished the year hoisting the Stanley Cup. Dallas, Anaheim, Detroit, Montreal, San Jose also finished outside the top-16 in the NHL yet made the Stanley Cup tournament.

So if we conclude that both power play proficiency and success from the faceoff dot aren’t crucial factors in a team making the playoffs, then what is sustaining the Jets’ drive to the Promised Land?

The answer is simple: Goaltending.

Winnipeg currently sits seventh in team goals against at 2.40 a game. They are in some pretty elite company there, too, with the likes of St. Louis, Boston, Pittsburgh and even the lofty Nashville Predators (now without Pekka Rinne) within striking distance.

For a refresher, the Jets concluded last season 22nd with 2.82 goals-against per game.

Elite goaltending covers a multitude of sins.

In terms of goal scoring, the Jets are slightly above where they finished up last campaign; resting at 2.70 goals-per-game through 47 games, up a few ticks from the 2.67 they averaged over the full 82-game skid last year.

The difference comes between the pipes. The Jets are averaging more goals then they are allowing. It’s notable, because despite their best efforts, they are struggling in other areas but are still producing results where it matters – on the scoreboard and in the standings.

One analytics mind has the Jets on pace for the 38th-best finish (out of 240 teams) in terms of save percentage since the 2007-08 season. Take out the lockout shortened season, which is a smaller sample size, and they are shooting for the 32nd spot among 210 teams.Michael Hutchinson and Ondrej Pavelec have combined for a .918 save percentage between them – above the league average of .912 this season. Compare this to the .907 Pavelec and Al Montoya put up last year, well below the .914 league average, and the Jets have improved, arguably, where it matters the most.

Remember the Kings and the Rangers from above? They sat two-three in save percentage at the end of the regular season in 2013-14. In fact, every team in the top-10 in terms of save percentage last season, sans Washington, made the playoffs.

Elite goaltending is like a good Advil – it alleviates nagging pain(s). 

So what do all these numbers really mean? Right now, a six-point cushion on a wild-card spot and the 11th-best team league wide.

The Jets are in uncharted territory. Sure, this team could go in the tank tomorrow and fall from grace, but that seems unlikely. This team seems built for the playoffs. They offer size and speed and have proven this season they can stand tall with the juggernauts of the Western Conference.

The Jets are becoming less and less a team intimidated by their opponents and more and more the team who is beating them into submission. And they are doing so on the back of solid netminding.

So far, it’s a successful concoction.

Awards, egos and paying it forward

Jack Matheson. Photo courtesy of the Canadian Football Hall of Fame.

By Scott Billeck

First, a caveat: I don’t really care for blogging. I am tasked with doing it again for the second semester, so once again I will be posting something (hopefully) on a weekly basis.

It’s not that blogging is bad or whatever, but blogging for the sake of blogging isn’t very productive in my mind. I am a journalist and a story teller. I enjoy digging for something, finding an angle and running with it. I know blogs can provide a medium for that, but it seems pointless when the readership isn’t strong.

Anyways, maybe I can grab a better attitude about it. But near midnight, and after a long week of school, it’s not happening.

Now for the meat an potatoes of this post: I am now an award-winning journalist.

On Tuesday afternoon, I received a call from the Manitoba Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association. A month earlier, I had scrounged up some of my clippings and freelance work and submitted my application along with my portfolio for the Jack Matheson Memorial Award. The award, named after the legendary John “Jack” Matheson, is handed out each year to students who show promise in the world of sports journalism and sports communications.

After getting slow-rolled a bit, I was informed I had been named of of two winners.

Truth be told, it was one of my goals heading into Creative Communications. I was anxious for a good month about the award. I had to win it. I would have been devastated had my name not been called.

It’s not about ego or arrogance. It is, however, about recognition for myself. I have to know that I am progressing as a writer and as a journalist. I am endlessly looking to improve, whether it is late night emails to copy editors asking them for advice to practising gamers in my spare time.

This is my passion, and if I am not getting better as a writer, I am failing.

The phone call and the subsequent news was an admonishment that I am on the right path.

And I haven’t got there alone.

After I found fellow winner, CreComm student and all around great guy Zach Peters and congratulated him, I immediately drafted a note to a good 25 people. It wasn’t to gloat or parade myself, but to say thank you.

As much effort as I put into what I do, I know where I came from and who has helped me along the way. I remind myself of that anytime I feel my head might be getting a little bloated.

The best piece of advice I received might have been simply to keep my head down and work hard. In Winnipeg’s sports media landscape, while ego’s exist, they are also earned. And even then, the crop of pencil pushers in this town is quite healthy.

I have had enough people help me out along my journey in journalism that I now forget some of them. It’s unfortunate, because even the smallest tidbits of wisdom have gone a long way in helping me get to where I am at.

I am thankful for those people, all of them. I get a chance to formally thank them in a speech on Jan. 25 at the gala dinner put on by the MSSA. I will receive my award – a plaque and a monetary reward – and I will be proud for a moment or two.

A goal achieved. I’m not one to bask in my own glory, so I probably won’t. What I will do is up the ante in my work. One goal down and many more to go.

And I hope I can eventually pay all of this forward. Someone is inevitably going to be in my position one day, coming to their first practice and not knowing anyone. And they are going to want someone to say “hi,” introduce themselves and tell them if they need anything to just ask.

I hope I can be the person who makes time for the small guy, to pay tribute to all of those who did that for me.

Fortunately, there have been many great examples set for me.