ATLANTA — Originally from Buford, Georgia, over the years, Ohio State University football player Harry Miller has received much praise in his career as an offensive linebacker, student and volunteer. However, earlier this month, he announced in a Twitter post that he would be “medically retiring” from football due to struggles with his mental health.
On Monday on the Today Show, he retold his mental health journey, explaining how he has been living with depression and anxiety since he was just eight-years-old.
Although he got treatment as a child, Miller said that the stress of being a college athlete brought up those feelings once again.
“It’s just sort of difficult, you've got these young people being thrusted under these bright lights and as a student athlete, you play a game, and it’s a hard game. Perhaps you made a lot of mistakes, and people send you messages saying, transfer you suck. Some people have even gotten death threats.”
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These feelings led Miller to reach out to his football coach to receive help.
“Prior to the season last year, I told Coach Day of my intention to kill myself,” he said on Twitter.
During the season, Miller was seeking treatment, but he stated on the show that he describes it like the weather, "You go outside and it's raining and people say, how about the weather today, and instead of raining cats and dogs, it's raining young people off of buildings, and you look around and say, something is going on right now."
He said that he is grateful for the support that he has had throughout this time and to bring awareness to the issue, Miller had a message to anyone struggling with mental health, “Hope is just pretending to believe in something until one day you don’t have to pretend anymore. And right now, you have all the logic, all the rational in the world to give up on it, and I would just ask, pretend for a little bit, until one day you don’t have to pretend anymore and you’ll be happy.”
With a 4.0 GPA, Miller plans to continue to pursue his degree in Mechanical engineering at Ohio State University.