 All right, hello everybody. I sure hope you are doing well. Thanks for your patience as we try to get through the technical difficulties. And thanks so much for tuning in today. My name is Dr. Ashley Hoffman, Program Specialist in the Sports Diplomacy Division at the US Department of State. And I'm here today with some incredible humans to talk about a really important topic, the topic of mental health. So before we get started, I would just like to give a special shout out to the masterminds of this event, Kalisha Holmes in the Sports Diplomacy Division, Estella Stasio, Office of Global Health Diplomacy, and Asha Bay, Office of Alumni Affairs. You all rock and it's been such an honor to work with you on this. I would also like to shout out all the embassies worldwide who are cross-posting and hosting watch parties and our teammates at the MBA, WNBA, University of Tennessee, Cleveland Cavs and the National Institute of Mental Health. This message is important and we're thankful for your willingness to amplify it. So 2020, what a year, one heck of a year. And I think it's critical that we take time today to reflect on the year that it's been, to reflect on our own needs, and in a year of social distancing that we not isolate ourselves, but come together to fight collectively for peace and hope. So today we're gonna take a timeout for all my basketballers out there. A timeout is critical to any game. A timeout is when you huddle, it's when you regroup, it's when you talk strategy, you get your people, you look them in the eye and you focus forward. A timeout changes the momentum of a game. So today for the next 45 minutes, we are calling a timeout. We're gonna huddle, we're gonna identify our people, our teammates in this game of life, and we're gonna talk about strategies to change the momentum of this year and maybe even change the momentum of your life. We're gonna break down the opponent, whether it's fear, isolation, rejection, loneliness or anxiety, and we're gonna find ways to navigate these mental health challenges together. To do this, we have two very special people with us today who also happen to be basketball players and gold medalists, Shamiqua Holtz-Claw and Kevin Love. Before you clap it out for these two, let me set the context with their accolades. So, Shamiqua is a graduate of the University of Tennessee, woo-hoo, Rocky Top, where she was a three-time national champion and then went on to become a six-time WNBA All-Star, a sports envoy for us to Senegal and a women's basketball Hall of Famer. If you haven't seen her jump shot, truly you're missing out, it's just rise and release. So happy to have you on this segment, Meek, how are you? I'm doing well, thanks for having me, Ash. Yeah, absolutely, my honor. And also with us today, we have Kevin Love, a UCLA Hall of Famer, a five-time NBA All-Star, and oh yeah, he helped LeBron get the ring with the calves. He's a playmaking big man that can do just about anything from the post-up to the pick and roll and drain the three balls. So, Kevin, thanks for being here, how are you? I'm great, thanks for having me. I'm with Meek, so I'm in good company now, so I'm good to go. Thanks, Allison, man, thanks, Allison. Yeah, that's how we all feel, for sure. So it's an honor to have you all with us in this moment, honestly, given everything going on in our world, I can't think of a more important or timely topic, this idea of taking a time out to talk about mental health, and I wanna get started. So Meek, maybe you can kick us off, and then Kevin, but take us through your journey, share with us just a brief synopsis of life and the moments that you've lived and maybe the time or that moment in time when you thought, hey, maybe I'm struggling and I need to talk to somebody. So Meek, can you just kick us off with your journey? Well, you know, I experienced mental health challenges very young as a young kid. My parents separated due to addiction issues and I had to go live with my grandmother. My grandmother realized that I experienced some trauma, it had affected my day-to-day. I really started to isolate myself. So with that being said, she sent me to therapy. Now, I grew up in a household where, we're very close knit, so it was always said, what happens in your household stays in the house, what happens here stays in the house. So now my grandmother is sending me to therapy to talk with someone that I really don't identify with and wants me to open up. So I was like, I'm not really talking to this guy about my family and stuff. And I proceeded to just move along, just to do enough. And around that time, I found a game of basketball and I was really good at it. So that just kind of like followed. I would hop into sports. Sports became a great distractor for me, but I guess the not dealing with things, those behaviors were more sustainable. And here I was now in college at the University of Tennessee playing for legendary coach Pat Summit. And I, we went to championships. It's a great time there. Peyton Mann is on campus. And I found myself just wanting to stay in my dorm room, wanting to sleep all the time. So I knew I needed to get some help. And I talked to coach Summit about it and she was able to get me to go to therapy off campus because I didn't want my friends or teammates to find out because I thought having those issues were a weakness. I was not educated on mental health. And again, I did enough. I went to six or seven sessions. I started feeling better. But in my head, I'm like, when it got uncomfortable, man, I just got to go get this 20 and 10. And I ran away from a lot. It's followed me through my delt hood, even in WNBA. And I hit rock bottom. I hit rock bottom around the time when my grandmother passed away. I had suffered mania. And it's been a long journey for me. I don't think that I really started to make a change in my life until the age 33, 34. And that was with the help of amazing friends and support. Awesome. Thanks so much for sharing that. It's important. Kevin, would you mind sharing a little bit about your story? Yeah, I mean, I relate so much to what Meek said there. I mean, I've had mental health issues and dealt with a lot of anxiety and depression really early on in my life. And you mentioned your grandmother, one of the biggest moments of my life in terms of mental health and never allowing myself to grieve and just having basketball as an escape and just continuing to run from that was when she passed. And it was right in the middle of the season. And it wasn't until years after, actually, I had this on-court public panic attack in 2017. And it was a moment where I thought I was having a cardiac moment. I couldn't catch my breath. I ended up on the floor, connected to oxygen, went to the Cleveland Clinic, which is arguably the best hospital in the world, go through all the tests, I check out. So I'm looking at myself in the mirror and I'm thinking, what has happened to me through this? And it was in that moment, in that time, after so many years of putting it off and not being able to grieve about my grandmother or, as Meek said, like closing myself off in a room when I was young and not coming out only maybe for school and basketball practice, because as we know as source players, that's such an escape force. That's our safe place. That's our place where we go and be able to put out any emotion, put things to the side, put it something just out of arm's reach and what we're dealing with. But for me, I finally said, okay, I need some help. So I wasn't an early adopter. Like Meek was to get in help, to be unfortunate enough to have medication, fortunate enough to be able to even open up and talk to my best friends about it. Because I think as men, and I know that we'll probably get into this, is that it feeds into that idea of toxic masculinity we're just not, I'm not gonna say allowed to talk about it, but because there is such a stigma and because we have to be that rah-rah, masculine guys and we just, there's so much of that going on in the sports world in general that we just did not talk about it. So it wasn't until I shared all of that that I was really able to open up, but both my articles in the Player's Tribune, especially the one recently really dove into my depressive and my depression in a really big way. So there's a lot to unpack there. There's been a number of moments in my life where I've dealt with very dark periods and times where my social anxiety was so bad that I didn't wanna go out. So I relate to so much of what Meek said there. So it's, I think that in general, feeling like you're part of the winning side of history and you feel like you're not isolated and you're not alone. I mean, it makes all of what we as a collective are doing really special and be able to pay it forward and help a lot of people. So I think it's awesome that, again, that we're having this conversation. Yeah, I think you touched on so many good points and really a segue into this year, right? Where we've been asked to social distance, where we've been asked to stay six feet apart, where we've been, you know, so what does that look like? How do we take stock of everything that's happened this year? I mean, you gotta be mental Hercules right now. And I mean, from COVID to racial injustice to the impending election, it's all so very much. And I just like to hear from you all, you know, how do we take time to reflect on what we need? How do we take care of the people we love in our lives? Like, so whoever wants to start Meek or Kevin? Yeah, I think for me, I'm just really focused on taking it one day at a time and just showing compassion for, we have to show compassion for one another, empathy, have to check in with friends because there's a lot going on, like you said, and it's not going away anytime soon. For me, I've had to limit, consuming all the videos and the stories that are being shared on the internet because for me being a black woman, I see the justice of society. I experience microaggressions daily, but to be exposed to like black lives lost on tape every day and other people's awakening to these things, it's just very heavy for my mental health. And I just really try to focus on being hopeful and taking things one day at a time. No, I think that's really a great point. I think a lot of being on your phone and, you know, getting the analytics, every week I'm like, all right, can my screen time go down a certain percentage? Because we're getting so many, like the 24-7, 365 news circles are coming at us so fast that the long-term effects of that, especially with how heavy this year has been and people losing jobs, not knowing when their next paycheck's gonna come in, if they're gonna be able to take care of their family, social injustice, black lives matter, we're seeing black people being killed every day that we wake up, even, you know, we talk about climate change for me, I'm from the West Coast, Portland, Oregon, where the West Coast is completely burning down. I mean, it just continues to evolve and become more complex. So the best thing that we can do, I think, is just be apathetic, be kind, have these tough conversations, allow it for a period of growth. I think the worst thing that we can do coming out of this time is remain unchanged. I think this is an amazing opportunity for us, and I mean, to collective us as a whole, not just in the US, but collectively as a whole around the world that we can elicit and make big change. And as far as the mental health component goes, I really feel like mental health is really the pandemic that nobody's really talking about. But I think right now, because you see the numbers increasing in such a big way, you see in 2019, the second quarter to the second quarter of 2020, anxiety rates have tripled and depression rates have quadrupled. So I think the best thing that can happen now is that it's coming to the forefront of conversation, like a lot of these major issues are. And everything that's kind of hanging out by the wayside of everything that we mentioned prior to that, I think is mental health. It's a big centerpiece, but nobody really wants to talk about it because there is still that stigma and there still is, it's just so taboo to talk about it. So again, I'm gonna keep saying it, like having these conversations is so huge, but we need to have them with everybody because they need to feel like that was one of the biggest things for me too is when I had shared my story about my anxiety first in a big way, just knowing that there was, while it sucks, there's so many people that are in it with you and there's that community that are not alone. I think that's the, for me, the really the biggest thing. So listening, being kind, showing people love and making them really understand that they are not alone and continuing to establish resources, tools, education, everything that we can to help them out. Yeah, I love that. And Meek, I mean, I feel like, what you said one day at a time, it's like back to past some at right left foot, right foot, breathe, it's just this moment right now, only today, we have to survive this moment. And Kevin, I think what you're talking about in terms of, in a season of isolation, how important it is to surround ourselves with other people, to have the courage to share, to just open up. There's a ton of stigma around mental health and mental illness. And so, when we think about, why do people not open up? Why do people not share it? Maybe it's fear. Maybe you feel like you're gonna be rejected. Maybe people are gonna label you as something, right? Or maybe there's the societal barriers or the expense of it. So, for you all, what were some of your own fears? What was it that kept you from really seeking help sooner and or being okay with having more than six therapy sessions right at that time? You know, it's like, oh, I'm good now. It's like an injury, right? You go to therapy for a month and you're like, nice, y'all good, I'm good to go. But it's not actually that simple. So, who were you all 10 years ago? Who were you now? And what were some of the reasons why it maybe took so long to get to this point? Yeah, I mean, I didn't, no, go ahead, go ahead, sorry. No, no, go ahead, no. You're just leading us off and kicking ass. I'm like, how do I follow that every time? So, I'm like, no, no, no, no. You go first in time. All right, no, I mean, God, it's funny. Every couple of few years, I always feel like, I look back, I say, man, I didn't know anything. I know, I just turned 32 now. I look back when I'm 34, 35, I say, wow, I didn't know anything. So, I'm a much different person than I was 10 years ago, five years ago, two years ago. But I think the good thing about young people now in terms of what we're talking about is I believe that they're a lot more susceptible to change. Like there is real, I mean, if you look at Parkland, Florida, which actually is a little bit of a part of my story and leading up to telling mine in 2018, and youth uprise is a real thing. And that's where through this time, I feel like whether it be voting or whether it be intervention at any space that's important to somebody, I feel like young people feel like they can make a change and they need to feel like they can. And I really do believe that they can. So if you're watching and whatever demographic you're in, that your vote, whatever it may be that you're working on, you can make a difference. But I'm so much in such a better place just from making that for me, which was a major leap forward into telling my story because when I remember it was All Star in Los Angeles, so it was Valentine's Day weekend of 2018. And one of my favorite writers, somebody who's covered me for my entire career, Jai-Phee McMullen, at ESPN, she started asking me all these questions about mental health and she brought me behind the curtain after media availability, started asking about all these different players, would guys come out and speak about their mental health? Or was something that continues to have a stigma, continue to be taboo? And a lot of the players were saying that I can't speak about this because it's gonna affect my livelihood. I don't know how my teammates are gonna look at me. I don't know if people are going to be able to trust me. Is my time or is my number dated on how long I'm gonna last in the NBA if I do expose this on a public scale? So for me, I had those same fears of the big way as well. It was just that it became so bad. And for me potentially life-threatening that I was just so tired of, I guess living in the shadows or just compartmentalizing and putting it aside. And as Meek said earlier, like running away from it, that was a real thing for me for so long. And there are still things that daily, I need to address and sometimes I don't. So I'm forever a work in progress. And I think knowing that, that has kept me going back to therapy. It's kept me on my medication so that I can set a baseline to do the real work. But on top of that, I think another very healing component is, you know, this is therapy as well. Like having these conversations, knowing that we are paying it forward, knowing that, you know, either I'm on here or Meek is obviously a Hall of Fame player, first pig, three time champion attendance. Like that is huge that we are on here talking about this. So I think, you know, you start with that Crest guys, I wouldn't be here without DeMarco Rosen. I mean, it just, people continue to pay it forward. And I think sports as such a unique storytelling and component and it's such a commonality to it that it's really special to see these athletes that we look at as superheroes exposed that, hey, listen, I deal with this too. So like, if I can deal with it, you can deal with it, let's do this together. It just, you know, breeds a lot of empathy and I think a lot of positivity. And in 2020, we need that. Amen. I mean, Kevin, you hit it on the nose. I mean, just you, you know, speaking up right now, listening to you, you know, it's almost therapeutic to me because I remember those days when I feel like, man, no one understands me. I'm the only one going through this. And that led to, you know, me to operate a fear. You know, I didn't want to be caught in the locker room. I didn't want them to think, well, I didn't want the perception of being crazy or sick or damaged goods. And so add that on to my lack of, you know, miseducation of mental illness. I wasn't at a place to like fully accept myself, you know? And today I'm just much better. I understand, you know, offering myself grace and just allowing those people who are my support to really like love me. I mean, I'm just, you know, I've grown so much in talking to my friends and obviously I'm going to therapy that's really helped me a lot. And I'm just aware of my feelings. I'm not afraid anymore. And that's just really helped me grow. I just wanted to be better because on the rate, well, the road I was taking, it was all bad. I mean, I, you know, tried to take my life. I suffered from bipolar disorder. So it's essential for me to take my medication and having to deal with that. Can you imagine like we're world-class athletes, you know? Well, I'm not anymore, but I was one time and as I feel it every day now, the arthritis and everything. But, you know, for someone to tell you in your prime, like your life, man, you know, you have this disorder, you're going to have to take medication, you know? You're like, what? Nah, nah, I'm not taking that, you know? Because we know, hey, I'm going to get in the gym, get these shots up or, you know, I want to jump higher. I know how to do all these things, but for me, that was a rocky road, man. I had so many highs and lows and, you know, going to isolation, just wanted to escape. So for me, the person that really helped me and I've never met this person was Captain Zeta Jones, because when I started really reading up on bipolar disorder, I heard about her and her story and just how open she was about it and that gave me hope. And like Kevin said, as I speak to a lot of youth, they're the change agents. I mean, these kids get up in front of 300,000 people and will share their story. I don't know about you, Kev, but when I was in college or something or somebody would ask me, nah, I'm like, hey, no, I don't want to discuss it. So times are changing and it's a beautiful, beautiful, beautiful things. And I just don't, I don't think you understand Kevin for like some of the athletes that I've had the opportunity to work with on the collegiate level, especially the male athletes, that I share your story. I'm always like, hey, read this, read what he says, just because you're getting help. You know, you need to talk to someone. Doesn't mean that you have mental illness because a lot of these kids don't know, like, hey, therapy is a good thing. You're dealing with as an athlete so much pressure, having to perform, you have pressure in your household, being, taking care of your family, being a better dad or whatever it is, why not talk to somebody and just get it off your chest? So just those experiences has this, it seems like it's allowed you to be better and it definitely has allowed me to be better also. I love that. Yeah, well, I used to be a professor at the University of Tennessee and I would tell my students all the time, I see my student athletes just really struggling and I would say, just peel back that layer of perfection and protection and just get real with who you are and be comfortable in your own skin. And I think, Meek, what you said, allowing people to love you and to know that I am lovable no matter what, right? So I think that's a really important point and I think also, Kev, what you said in terms of sports and allowing it to shine a light and to provide hope. I mean, that's why we love sports. It's the underdog story, it's the unlikely comeback, it's the hope that it provides for us. And so I think all of that was really important to talk about and also think, both of you alluded to it, you have as athletes, for your professional job, you are physically invincible, right? You are made out to be superheroes or superheroes. And a lot of times you're told to shake it off, play through the pain, get up, rise again. And so I wanna know where does the idea of vulnerability fall within sport? And then how do things like masculinity and or race shape our willingness to be vulnerable? You could go first. Yeah, nice we are now. We're like trying to let each other know who's gonna take it. No, you got it. I did the first two, so I'll let you go. Okay, okay. See, now I'm gonna forget the question. No, but in sports, I actually really like what you said about hope as well. I wanna touch on that for a second because I think that's such a great word when it comes to and such like a heavy hitting word for me when it comes to mental health because I think all mental health disorders whether it be bipolar disorders, meek said, or acute anxiety, major depressive disorder, skin difference, like so on and so forth. Like it's all a crisis of hope. I mean, at the root of all mental illness is a crisis of hope. So, you know, it's like anxiety is a crisis of hope and that it's the fear of a failed future. And then depression is the fear of a meaningless future. So to inspire hope for any demo. I mean, it's such a, we talked about in the last answer. Like it's such a mental illness is such a thief of human potential. So as Meek said, with your in college whether man or woman, like you should look to give help for me therapy has become so much more now of like a growth session. How can I pay it forward? Not only and obviously take care of myself first but then you don't understand the ripple effect it has on everybody else because when you're in it, you have these blinders on and you're thinking, you know, everything else doesn't matter. I'm gonna sit in this dark room, nothing else matters but you don't understand the impact that you're having on the people around you which then is gonna go and impact other people and so on and so forth. So that idea of hope is huge to me but the masculinity part, I feel starts really young. I mean, I was taught and I said it, again, I'll reference my first article about my anxieties and my fear and fear of being exposed as well, walking around and always kind of being wary of and if somebody get to find something out about me or am I doing something wrong? And I wasn't. It was just something that I always felt was hanging over me and I think in sharing my story, I'll tell you this, it's really liberating, extremely freeing and I've never, I was actually just hearing you talk, speak, Meek and I was like, I can hear it in your voice in the way even you're carrying yourself through this screen. Like you were so much more comfortable in your own skin than where you were. Like I can feel your story. I feel like through this lens here. So that was amazing. But I think in terms of masculinity, it starts so young. Like my playbook was to, you know, you celebrate a man or woman or other, it doesn't matter. We celebrate people that beat their emotions in the submission, right? Like that's just who we are. I think as a culture, other cultures, I'm not so sure and I never pretend to be an expert. I'm still figuring these things out but we really do tend to celebrate those people. I think that's incredibly, incredibly unhealthy. So I think in young men, like I was never a bully by any means, I use the example all the time but I wanted to be accepted so bad and middle school and high school and college is such like a tough time. You wanna be able to sit at the table, so to speak. So, you know, sometimes you try to be funny or do something at somebody else's expense, not knowing that, not only were you hurting that person, you're also hurting yourself. And I think that was something that I had to learn and people talk about, oh, I don't regret anything. It was a good teaching component. But for me, I'm like, I do live with a lot of regret. I think 2020 has made me connect the dots looking back and think, wow, there's a lot of things that I regret but I'm gonna try my damn best to improve everything linearly and move forward. And I think in terms of racial lines, I mean, just in speaking with a number of NBA players and so many guys coming to reach out to me and under the radar asking how can I get help and also speaking with DeMarco Rosen, like in racial lines play a major part in people's relationship to mental health because whether it be in sports or, you know, big business, corporate life, whatever it may be, it's, I feel like in exposing that people of color feel like it's just another weapon that you're giving to people that you know can use it against you. And that's really, really unfair. It's really unfair. So that's where I'm hoping that we're gonna be a major paradigm shift in how we address these areas, address mental health moving forward in big business, in sports and school, otherwise, all across the country, all across the world. I'm hoping that that has a major shift. And I think that this is a moment for change all across the board. So I think that's where it could be incredibly positive. When we talked about the early 2020 coming out of this change, I think that that's gonna be something that we should look forward to. Right, right. Man, Kevin, I feel like so much of what you said is, I think the same way I wrote down like when you were saying, like I thought about boxes, you know, if for me, being a black woman, you know, it's just so many boxes that I have to pack myself into daily, you know, you hear of the angry black woman, you know, how black women, how we have to be like so strong and so constantly, this is how I'm navigating through society. And I just have to remember like, okay, I have to let that go and I really have to focus on my mental health. So that's something that just really jumped out at me. Another part is being an athlete, right? I want the people out there to know, yes, me and Kevin, Kevin is a professional athlete and I was at one time, but I know people that, you know, work out every day and compete in races. I have a nephew who's differently abled and he's won all these medals with the special Olympics. And I know how that has helped him in his confidence. So sports definitely is a great tool to like help us like navigate it and deal with the thing. But just remember, I always want people like, it's almost like one size doesn't necessarily fit all because it was times where, you know, I'm out there, it was a safe haven for me. It was really great, but going to practice being around my teammates, you know, for some, that's a good thing. But when you're having these struggles for the next person, it may not be so good. You know, they may need a timeout and that's something I think we really have to be aware of. And something else you said, it's just really being able to like be there. I can't express and talk about empathy enough, you know? And yes, you may not know what another person is going through, but you have to kind of sometimes just step outside of your comfort zone and just really try to educate yourself or really think about it. And I think that's the way real change occurs because this stuff is like so heavy. I'm in New York, born and raised in New York City and the protests hit. It was very powerful, but it was also very sad to understand like we're in 2020, the opportunities out there and still these things are happening. And I grew up in an environment where I really got to see these injustices meaning your colleague, former colleague, met a world, you know, we grew up together and to see, man, that was so long ago and we've been able to make a different lives for ourselves but still have to be boggled down and bothered by this shit, it's frustrating. So, you know, obviously like you said, have the conversations and if there are situations because I have a lot of friends, you know, I went to school in the South, the deep South and I have friends that, you know, were like, what can I do? Me, you know, I love you, you've been to my home. I'm like, talk to your grandfather that you said that, you know, really has had another, I never had a black man or anyone black step into their home, you know, educate them because when people fear the unknown, you know, I've had an opportunity to play professional sports living in all these different countries. And when you first get there, I remember being in Poland, I would never see anyone that looked like me, you know, my teammates, they would ask me all these questions and think that every black person went to McDonald's and listened to hip hop, but the longer we were around each other, they got to get educated on who I was. I got to get educated on who they were. And I saw how sports brought us together and their families inviting me into their homes. And today, those are some of my closest friends. So sports does so much healing and it just really pushes things forward. Yeah, I love that. I love that because right now we need solutions, right? We can identify so many challenges, but right now we need solutions. And so, you know, when I think about Meek, you're a new mom, not to share that with the world, but Meek, you're a new mom and can. I'm a proud mom, I'm a proud mom. And you look not tired at all. So that's amazing. I don't know how you're doing it. And Kev, you talked about how, you know, youth that they're ready to rise up that, you know, 2020 is the moment of change. And so both of you all talks, you know, a little bit and have personal ties to the next generation, right? Like, what does it mean? One in four people in the world are affected by mental illness. That means more than 450 million people are currently fighting. You know, you've got among youth suicide rates are astronomical. It's, I don't, I mean, it breaks me inside that especially among young girls, they just tend to 14 have increased by 73%. You know, among the black community, among LGBTQ, all of those rates are staggering. You see anxiety and depression, as Kev mentioned, three times, four times more than what it used to be. So how do we take back our world? How do we reclaim the minds of youth? What do we need to do? What are some solutions we can put forward? All right, I'm gonna jump in. No, I think, I mean, Doc, I tell you I wasn't gonna plug the Kevin Love Fund, but no, we're actually working on solutions. But I think the first and foremost, I mean, our first pillar is always stigma. I think we got to continue to have these conversations. And, you know, we're far, you know, more likely to detect if somebody is going through something, if they're willing to share it. If, you know, because it's not something that you can quantify and say, reach out and touch and say, okay, oh, he's got ankle sprain or, you know, related to sports here, but knee or shoulder or whatever it might be, this is something that you can't see. So being able to detect it and being able to intervene early is very tough. And, you know, so much of what's going on in the brain and the chemical imbalance and things that are changing in the brain are happening at such a rapid pace so early that it comes out in a behavioral change much further after, way, way down the line. So being able to diagnose, have early intervention and continue to have these conversations on the stigma side is huge. You've got to educate, you've got to educate people around mental health continuing to, I always say that numbers tell a story as an athlete, I know me can say the same thing, like numbers tell a story. They can show a lot of weakness, they can show you on film, like film don't lie, we say the same over and over. So continue to educate people, resources. We need tools and resources for people that are under privilege or under, I know how fortunate and blessed that I am that I am able to afford therapy. I can afford medication and healthcare but there's so many people out there that can't, not only in the US but across the world. So allowing for those resources and people to be able to reach out and get help and not have to sabotage or substitute maybe even a meal for it. So having those resources and tools for people is huge for both physical and emotional wellbeing. And then at the end of the day, big thing that we're working on is research. How can we better help people in number of different ways? Cause again, Meeks said it, you can't put somebody into a box and say, oh, these three people have bipolar disorder. This is how we're going to treat each person. Cause I mean Meeks story is different than the next person. My story is different than the next person. You can't treat everybody, put everybody in the box and say, okay, this is how we're going to treat this particular set or group of people. Cause everybody's story is different. Every relationship that they have with themselves, with their mental health, with their physical body and the people around them is different. So I think that's how we continue to grow. And I think it will continue to tell a compelling story in itself, but I think there's going to be a lot of great research and a lot of great tools, education. And at the end of the day, us continuing to talk about it like this and the stigma is absolutely huge. And the tack on what Kevin said, just remember people want to be heard and not judged. And it's so key. I know for me, when I was going through my challenges, the breakthrough was when I had a friend that just will listen. Cause the thing is, no one that's going through these challenges wants to feel like they're broken. I had a lot of pride. I had a lot of confidence within myself. But here I'm now talking to people and everybody wanted to fix me. And I know it was that one friend and I really appreciate that individual that just really listened to me. Because while they were, while I was saying that I was actually processing things, you know, through my own head, my own head to better myself. And I also, I just think that within sports, I think like a lot of coaches need to really focus and get on board. When you look at companies, I think having those resources for your employees, you know, this is a thing that we're all battling. And people want to feel safe. You know, I run across a lot of people that are free to speak about their mental health concerns, you know, in a workplace, because they think that they're going to be judged. The same with us and sports. And so we just really have to make a safe haven for those who have these struggles so that we can just be better as a society. Because right now, with the way 2020 is going, things are going to, you know, things are getting worse, you know, it's a lot of uncertainty out there. And so yes, you know, check on your friends right now, try to be a little empathetic, ask questions, educate yourself. And there's a ton of resources out there, you know, from Kevin's Love Fund to, you know, JED Foundation, NAMI, Mental Health Association. There's so many resources and people that want to help you. So if you're going through it, just remember you're not alone. And if you go to a therapist, I want to, I don't know, Kevin, how many therapists you have dated? Right, at least the relationship though. Right, right. But I like to always say, you go, you go to a therapist and if it feels uncomfortable, you know, try someone else. You have to really date around a little bit. And for me, when I first went, I'm up in there complaining like, ah man, you know, he or she, this is not working, there's no connection. So I would just say, hey, I'm not going anymore. And that wasn't a solution to that, you know, find someone, search, talk to people, find someone that works for you. Because if you need it, it's definitely a blessing when you have that right connection. So very important. Everybody wants to be seen, they want to be heard, they need to be validated, not judged, they need a safe space to do that. I love that. And so we have about 15 minutes left and so many questions from all over the world. So let me get to those because I want them to feel seen as well. So we have the first question from Megan Overton. And I don't have her location, but I think here in the United States says, do you have any mental health timeouts or ideas that youth coaches can implement with their players at practice to take a break from the X's and O's and talk about mental health? So do you have any like mental health timeout tips or anxiety reducing moments or strategies in the middle of a practice for coaches? You're active right now, you know, Kevin, as far as a player, do you guys implement anything? I don't know. So I'll let you go first. Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, almost like an advanced form of meditation, something that I do. I know that we do as a team quite often and we actually did. We're doing it twice a week on zooms through the pandemic. We had a yoga instructor come on and like take us through breathing exercises, taking a step away, like getting in a real dark room, cold, safe space and just like, you know, not only speaking to each other, being like, yeah, I'm thankful for, you know, saying what we're grateful and thankful for, which seems funny, but it opened up like a whole conversation and it just layers from our team of people where they were in their lives, who they were spending their time with, what they were doing outside of working out, trying to stay in shape, you know, if the season were to resume, but also like we were taking care of our bodies as well. So like there was an all-encompassing thing where I think that, you know, sports, that's a great way to just, you know, whether it be before, after practice, like just take the time in order for, you know, you mentioned a growth agent earlier, it's just, you know, the baseline of really any relationship is communication. Without communication, you're, you know, it's dead. There's no way that there's gonna be growth for that. So I think, you know, finding ways to getting each and every player, you know, for us to be one through 14, one through 15, to be able to share and create an understanding or empathy or be able to, you know, just speak at length. Even the people that don't talk all that much, getting them to share their thoughts, I think it's huge. And I think that, you know, transitions onto the court as well. And it's funny and awkward or different as it sounds, especially, I would say in the NBA and what we do, but it really does, you know, breed a number of good things I feel like. And I think there's a number of ways to answer that question, but I know from what we have done, you know, at the Cavaliers, that was something that we did early on and continued to do, you know, throughout all of COVID. Yeah, and, you know, like I said, Kevin, you're active, but I know for me, you know, as soon as I wake up in the morning, I have to be the first one to wake up because I need that quiet time and I go, I do my 10 minute stretch and then I just sit there another 10, 15 minutes and meditate and then I start my day. And I know that really helps me stillness, the stillness, this sort of grounds you. So it's just very important visualization, you know, the things that I want to accomplish and my goals, I kind of like process those things when I have that time to myself. Yeah, so visualization, breathing, stillness, meditation. Yeah, I think controlling what you can control, right? I mean, those are reminding yourself of what you actually have control over in this life. And then we have another question, Willie from Nicaragua. Thank you, Willie, for the question. Do you have any, okay, so kids are home right now, they're not going to school and maybe they're participating in sport or maybe not. Do you have any specific tips for parents and teachers who may notice that their child is struggling? What would you do? What would you tell them to do? What's the kind of the first steps if they're a child is struggling? Well, first of all, just having a conversation or I'm really trying to, you know, talk to your child. And if there's not a connection there, because I understand that can kind of be sort of tough sometimes, you know, it's like, hey, you know, mom and dad are telling you this or you're guarding, oh, I don't want to hear it, but just letting them know, hey, if you're feeling this way, there's a lot of resources, there's other people like Kevin and myself who have gone through these things that, you know, read about their stories, you know, you're not alone and most importantly, let them know that you love them. It's just so key and touch. I think right now, you know, like, you wouldn't believe it, but a lot of people, they don't hug and embrace, you know? It's like just a touch. It's just touching someone on the shoulder. This shows that human connection, like I'm near for you, I love you and it's just so key. No, I think you nailed it. I think just that check-in is so paramount to people's mental health and I don't think it matters the age, but when it's, I feel like, you know, I would say, you know, I've had depression my whole life and I tend to fall apart a lot of the time, like disproportionate to the circumstances and I think when you're a child, that happens even more so. Like you'll just keep compounding and just keep throwing things into accumulation of like this giant bucket just again and again and again. So it's really finding out, at least for me, I would have loved somebody to ask, you know, what, like, how do you feel really? What do you need really? So that check-in, I agree with the human being able to reach out and touch somebody or hug somebody is a major component as well because that all bleeds and blends into that idea of the safe space again. I think that is so key, you know, for that nature and nurture aspect of a parent and their child to be able to, you know, really have a lasting impact on them and I think that those long-term effects of checking in with them and knowing that, you know, you're there, you have that relationship of also being able to reach out, hug them and touch them is, you know, really, really key because that's, you know, just a form of therapy in itself. Yeah, and just be aware of what your children are consuming. Nowadays, a lot of the music is really sad, you know, and depressed and I listen to, you know, I'm a little older, so, but I have to listen to like all different types of music to stay connected with the youth. And a lot of, I'm like, oh my goodness, a lot of this is really dark and, you know, just being aware of that and saying, hey, you know, hey, are you feeling these things? And, you know, just trying to stay connected, you know, like, like I've said. I'm glad you said that I was feeling old, but now I see that you see it also. So that's good. Man, listen, listen, hey, you know what? I had a question. So, Kev, like, a lot of people were like, hey man, you know, I knew you were dealing with these things and, you know, I was reading about it, but man, it didn't really affect your play and I know for me, it was just like, that was like my time, you know, it's like I was just so locked in, you know, when I was out there like playing, it was when I left the court and I'm curious like, did you experience that also? Exact same thing, exact same thing. Like I've spoken about that at length because basketball, again, safe space, like it was always the place where I knew I could go, I could work on my game, it was my first love. It's, you know, in my family had a father that played in the NBA, so it never, it never even crossed my mind that it would affect my basketball because even through my darkest moments, you know, I was still out there performing and then when I got away from the court, I would just go either lock myself in a room or I would just isolate myself and, you know, it was a very, very unhealthy relationship and it didn't longevity wise. I mean, as you know, like you're burning the candle at both ends and before he came on here and said, father time is undefeated, but yeah, it was always, basketball in the court or the gym was always a place where I could go and either blow off steam or a place I could just go to escape and that for me was, I mean, probably helped save my life, honestly, was having that ball. Because nothing really happened without it but I really do fully agree that or I kind of on the same wavelength as you is that when I got away from it, that's when a lot of the darkest moments, you know, would arise and when I had the game taken away from me from an injury, that was when things would get, you know, really dark because I think on top of having that crush with basketball or that cooler basketball taken away, when you're injured, you know, it's almost like that lifespan of basketball is just coming at you so fast. It's like that time that you're gonna be able to put in work and work towards, you know, a hall of fame type career. It's taken away and it's, you know, I only have so many years left. I'm heading into season 13. I hope to make it to, I'm not gonna say a number but as many as I can get injured, it takes a lot of, you know, your relationship with yourself and the game and other people away from you because you're in just such a dark place. So, you know, totally, yeah, very much. Yeah, yeah, I hated being injured like you said, you're on an island by yourself and it's almost like you're not a part of the team. You're not with the team. Yeah, you're frustrated. You're not a part of the team and I was like, oh yeah, how are you doing? Like it's a built-in question almost like to COVID. It's like, oh, how's it going? Okay, let's get to the next thing because it's like when you're not traveling or you're sitting there in a suit or whatever you're on the bench, you're just not a part of the team and I think that creates even more of a sense of that isolation and that on an island alone feeling. 100%. Okay, so I'm gonna try to squeeze in one more question even though we have many and I apologize that we didn't get to them all but essentially we have similar questions Taylor from Ohio and Cutler Wellness Program asking similar things. Did the places where you went to school and or the NBA, WNBA, did they provide enough support for mental health and or what is the role of sport organizations? What should they provide in addition to the physical care or how could we improve upon that in terms of resources from the Federation or the team or the university? What kinds of things would have been helpful? Right, I'll go first and I'll let Kevin go because it's like, I think it's like 11 years different. So back when I was in school, yeah, you had a sports psychologist but mental health was something that wasn't really talked about fast forward to me being a pro athlete still back then. This has started my career at 99 to 2000, was it 2010 and still the resources weren't there. It was something that really people didn't really talk about. It wasn't towards the end of my career where I was able to feel comfortable going to coaches and they would help me connect me with therapists but it's grown so much, it's so much better and I'm sure Kevin can talk about that now. Well, it is so much better. I think in terms of when I first came into the league and even thinking about Delante West and kind of what he had struggled with bipolar disorder and he had said it publicly and even looking back now people kind of, I wouldn't say laugh at it but smirked at it and said, he's got this problem and I think in a lot of ways that he was failed by the system, but I think all that started probably very early in his life and not having that intervention and not having somebody say, hey, listen, like there are these resources and maybe at the time he didn't have them or maybe where he's from, it wasn't something that you did but I think that's where I think that the education component and that early intervention component, even in schools because you learn about physical health, sexual health but it's never mental health. Like I had nobody to go to at that age that I could speak to in middle school, high school, college, like my academic advisor, Kenny Donaldson, he was basically my therapist, my first therapist. I didn't know it at the time but he was basically my first therapist. I can remember I was taking comm 110 at UCLA. I was a student athletes and there's athletes students. You can guess which one I was. And I remember and maybe you had mentioned this like young kids speaking in front of like these 30,000 people, 3,000 people, 30 however many. I had to speak in front of like 15 people and it was the first speech, the first day of my college basketball career. And I'm sitting there like shaking, I can't do this. I got to walk all the way up, brew and walk. If you've ever been on UCLA's campus, it's a fish bowl. So I have to walk all the way up. I'm gonna be sweating. I'm the first to go. And like I'm really gonna have a panic attack. Like I'm sitting in there crying. I'm like, there's so, I have so much stress on me. There's so much coming at me. I mean, you've been on the teams where number one in the country, you know, on this new hot shot guy coming in and everybody's gonna be watching me saying this speech. And I'm like, I'm about to have a breakdown. I haven't had a no resources or anywhere to go here at UCLA or anywhere that I can get help. But I think the really important thing is to see where we've come from then. And the NBA has slowly really done a really good job, continue to implement more resources, a licensed therapist on every single team now. And with the WNBA, it's an amazing thing because we can scale up these messages and by putting out a PSA, we can get to tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of young kids or their parents or otherwise. I mean, it's amazing that, you know, we're around this game that has such a common place. And I mentioned that storytelling component, but also brings people together on a global scale because it is such a global game on both sides. So being able to scale up those message and have these conversations is almost like a life hack because we can reach so many people. So I think that's really cool. And they're not just WNBA, they don't just support us in these issues, they're a driving force. They help us with whatever we choose to talk about, wherever we want to talk about. So I think that has changed as well. And I'm proud to be a part of a league and a brother, a sister league and WNBA that is able to do that on such a massive, massive scale. So refreshing to hear. And unfortunately we are out of time, but man, can't thank you both in advance. Invaluable nuggets and willingness to share your story. I think honestly, it's your authenticity that makes you both so special. And then the basketball part is incredible, but it's really who you are as people and what you're willing to stand for that really makes you incredible and made today so worthwhile. But if this topic hit home with you and during the conversation you thought, hey, that's me, please have the courage to talk to someone, be brave enough to share with a family member or a friend, even if you don't have all the answers, just be willing to talk about how you feel. There is no shame in this conversation. If you're looking for resources here in the United States, please check the National Institute of Mental Health, CDC, Kevin Love Fund or JED Foundation. And if you're living outside the United States, please check out the World Mental Health Alliance for information in your area. Thank you all so much for tuning in. Please take care of your body, take care of your mind. We only get to this life once and until next time. Me, Kev, thank you all. Really appreciate it. Thank you, Ashley. You take care, Kev, and wish you the best. Stay healthy, brother. Thank you, me too. All right, thank you. I love with the little one. Thank you so, thank you so much. You're welcome. All right, have a good weekend. All right, take care, guys.