06: OCD & Suicide Survivor to NHL and Mental Health Ambassador // The Story of Clint Malarchuk

It wasn't just a bad dream. I was really reliving that trauma again. My heart would be pounding, I'd wake up, I'd be sweating, grabbing my neck, and I did this all in silence. Good people sometimes do bad things or make a mistake, you know, doesn't make you a bad person. Makes you human and just move on. Do the next right thing.

Welcome to From Rock Bottom to Rockin It. I'm your host, Eric Gilbert Williams, and this is the podcast where we explore personal stories of people who hit absol rock bottom, then got back up, wiped off the dust, kicked failure to the curb, and now they're rocking it like you'd never believe if you didn't hear it. Live Right here, we cover subjects in business, sports, and life in general. If you like this podcast, please share it. These interviews are intended to inspire, to motivate, to give hope and vision. So please share this episode with someone who needs it. Use your Instagram Account, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn. Hand signals. Trained pigeon sent smoke signals up in the air. Use Morse code, whatever you like. Just share the love and share this episode. Also, email me anytime. Podcastricilbertwilliams.com Send me questions you would like to have asked of future guests and I will incorporate them. Or just send me some suggestions on how to run a better podcast. Or just say hello, I'd love to hear from you. That's podcastricilbertwilliams. I know you're going to love today's interview, so let's get started with us here today on From Rock Bottom to Rockin it is Clint Malarchuk. Clint's career took him through the NHL as a goaltending hockey star and a coach. In 1989, he experienced the most gruesome sports injury in history, which nearly ended his life instantly. He's now a public speaker, an author of the book called the Crazy Game, and he's helping people across the country to heal from mental illness because one of his rock bottom moments, other than the injury, took him through the subjects of ocd, sleep deprivation, alcoholism, and ultimately attempted suicide. Clint, welcome to the show. I'm so grateful to have you here today. How are you?

It's funny you say here with you soon life because I was going through my Facebook the other day. It was 31 years ago on I believe it was Sunday the 22nd. Anyways.

Oh wow.

So I was getting tons of messages on Facebook on, you know, glad you're here. Glad you're doing what you're doing. Glad you survived. Not just my accident with almost dying on the ice, but my suicide attempt.

It's the timing. You said 31 years.

Yes.

Wow. You know, in your own words, where do we even start here? There's so much. I mean, maybe let's start with hockey. If you can explain to listeners here today, I mean, you were a star, you were doing great, you're stopping slapshots from Wayne Gretzky. Then everything just changes on a dime. And people listening to this, we all understand that sometimes in life, things happen to us that we just didn't predict, we weren't ready for, we didn't anticipate. We call them Black Swans, and everything just changes in an instant. Now, what was that for you? What happened?

I would even go back further, Eric, because as a kid, I really struggled with some issues. Anxiety, ocd, you know, obsessive Compulsive disorder. Undiagnosed, of course, this is all reflecting back now. I was very anxious as a kid, struggled in school. I talk about my father, who was an alcoholic, and I say a lot of times he was an abusive alcoholic, but he was also a great guy. And we know so many people that can relate to people that we know or maybe went through it themselves, just good person. But just add alcohol or drugs, and it's a progressive disease. So I grew up with a lot of anxiety and all undiagnosed. And yes, I made it to the NHL. And I partly credit having obsessive compulsive Disorder to help me get there, because everybody thinks of hand washing or contamination or whatever it might be when you talk about ocd. And yes, I went through different phases, but I somehow was able to be obsessive about being an NHL hockey player, a goaltender.

Okay.

My work ethic was beyond anybody. That was my deal. Just repetitiously and outwork everybody. I didn't have a lot of confidence, so I thought if I was going to attain that goal, I had to outwork everybody. So my work ethic, I believe, is what got me to the NHL. And OCD was part of that. Having that work ethic. And I'm cruising along, having a decent NHL career. And then 1989, what I'm known for, I'm not known for many great saves or shutouts or I made the All Star team once, which was a highlight in my career. But, you know, that accident, severing my jugular vein in the game, almost bleeding to death on the ice, preparing for death, basically, I got off the ice on my own power because I didn't want my mother to watch the Game on TV and see her son die. Those were the thoughts that went through my head. I was preparing for death. The blood was gushing out 6ft in front of me at first, and then it was just gurgling, man.

So like the skate just cut right through your neck. For those of you that haven't seen the replays or saw the game just clarifying here, like that's what happened.

Yes, it did. But I was lucky. People say that had it not been a major sporting event where immediate medical attention was right there, I probably would have died. You know, I lost a third of the of my blood in my body.

Wow.

Yeah. So basically, to, you know, surmise all that, I was preparing for death, but that was just trauma, big trauma, you know, near death experience. I called for the team chaplain, I called the trainer, called my mom, tell her I love her. What I'm really trying to define here is, you know, I was preparing to die. I thought I was going to pass out and never wake up again. And that accident really changed my life. I came back in 10 days. As soon as the stitches came out, I started resume my play against doctor's advice and everything. And I grew up on, you know, Alberta up. And, you know, you're familiar with that country up there in Alberta, Canada. You know, you get bucked off a horse, you get right back on. So I came back probably quicker than I should have. No counseling was offered. I didn't think of it back then either. I just thought the right thing to do was face your fear as quick as you can and conquer it. Obviously. Coming back that quick. I became quite the hero in Buffalo where I was playing, just coming back quick. They just thought I was this courageous. I had so much love and support from upstate New York and western New York. And I rode that support and that adrenaline, being that kind of hero worshiped almost. I couldn't even buy a meal in Buffalo after that. I mean, walking into a restaurant, it was just. I was like a rock star. It was the next season where things really started to spiral downward for me. And I started to have panic attacks, undiagnosed ocd, you know, I had. And now it's hard for me to leave the house. The panic attacks, the contamination issues started to come back again. But it was the nightmares. I started to have flashbacks where I'd sit, you know, in my dreams. It wasn't just a bad dream. I was really reliving that trauma again. My heart would be pounding, I'd wake up, I'd be sweating, grabbing my neck and I did this all in silence because of the stigma of mental illness. And being the NHL goalie, you're supposed to be the mentally tough guy. So I did this in silence. And it got to the point where I couldn't sleep. I didn't want to sleep because I didn't want to keep reliving that incident. I'd see that skate in my sleep, and I'd just freak out, wake straight up in bed. And it got to a point with sleep deprivation, not thinking right about 10 days, I couldn't sleep. So I would sit in a chair and just kind of nod off. I wouldn't go into a REM dream sleep or anything like that. And we had a Super bowl party at our captain's house. And again, sleep deprived for 10 days. I didn't stay there long. I was suffering in silence. And I can remember going home and I had some painkillers. I was playing through an injury. I looked at the bottom and do not drink with alcohol will make you drowsy. I'm like, right on, brother. I took a few extra pills. It wasn't like I emptied the bottle or anything. And then I drank a bottle of scotch and my heart stopped. So now I've almost died twice, you know, the jugular vein and basically an overdose on painkillers and alcohol. And I'm in the hospital. I wake up, and the psychiatrist, they're thinking it might have been a suicide attempt. And I said, no, no, no, no, I don't want to die. This is what's been going on. I haven't slept. I'm not thinking straight. I'm not thinking clear. It's hard for me to leave the house. I have panic attacks. I explained about my obsessiveness. Now. It had gone into the back to the contamination and cleaning and things like that. So for the first time, I think it was 27 years old. First time I ever been diagnosed with any of these mental disorders that started a treatment plan with different doctors, specialists, medications, and nothing was working. And I did that for about two and a half, three years. Consequently, my play was really getting poor. And I got sent to the minors, and it was in the minors. But my first game, I got pulled after the first period, and I was devastated. I let him four goals on six shots. And I'm like, oh, my God, I can't even play in the minor leagues. And I went into the coach and I said, I have to retire. I can't do this. And he said, well, I thought you just came to. What's going On. And I explained to him, for three years, I've been doing this, having all these struggles. And he said, I thought all that was kind of taken care of. And you just came down here to get your game back and you'll go back to the NHL? I said, no, I'm a mess. Well, I finally got into a doctor down. I was in San Diego, California, and this doctor was amazing. He was the leading expert in OCD at the time. Did many lectures around the country. And getting to see him got me on the right medication. I'll never forget week six of that medication, driving to see him. I had to see him once a week. And I'm driving in Southern California going, wow, the weather sure is nice here. The temperature is great. That's how deep my depression was. And so I told the doctor that, and he said, okay, we're going to bump your medication little bit more. And at week nine of being on that medication, my obsessions left, my OCD left. I was like, is this what it's like to be normal?

Wow, that's really powerful.

Yep. 15 years, I took that. That drug and did great. And unbeknownst to me, you know, now I resumed my playing career. Then I got into coaching. I went to school because I struggled so mightily at school. This was a big, big deal for me to go to school at about, you know, late 30s, now, 37, 38.

And I've got to insert this here because, you know, we're getting to know each other here. When I was little, I really struggled in school. I couldn't focus. I didn't fit in. I didn't have words for it back then. I didn't know what was going on or what was wrong.

Oh, no.

And ultimately, I took matters in my own hands and I left. I left high school. And that was my solution back then because at that time, like, there was no one there to help me with this stuff. No one really talked about it. There was no one there to explain what was going on or that wanted to listen to what my problems were. There were no solutions presented. I was just told to stop messing around and focus more and study harder. And it just didn't make sense to me. So I just took matters in my own hands. The subject and the phrase mental health essentially didn't exist back then. Not in my life anyways. And ultimately my solution was to run away and, of course, live in the drug house for a little while. And I'm lucky that things turned out better and turned out well for me because it very Easily could have ended up in a very more difficult and dangerous scenario and direction than it did. So when I'm hearing your story right now, I'm hearing also a lot of parallels, and I'm fascinated personally.

What happens is there's such a huge, huge correlation between mental illness and self medicating with drugs or alcohol. Right. Because it worked.

Yeah. It's just a theory I have. But to me, when a person snaps at the extreme, and the definition of extreme is very different and personal for each person. But when a person does snap, then in my opinion, in my theory here, then one of three things happens. There's either harm to self, which in the worst case is suicide. There's harm to others. In the worst case is, you know, for example, shootings at schools. And, you know, when I was a teenager, that's what was going on. Tragedy at Columbine. And the third one is avoidance. Avoidance usually involves drugs and addiction. And for me, I didn't have any violence in my system whatsoever, either towards myself or others, but I certainly had avoidance in my system. So, you know, when I ran away from home and dropped out of school, I went into a new group of friends, into a house where I could explore the subject of avoidance. And I'm very lucky that it didn't go worse for me because certainly some other people that I know personally ended up getting addicted. And that's just one of the extreme outcomes.

Avoidance, or another word like isolation, avoidance, you got anxiety issues. But the avoidance for me was the numbing effect of alcohol. I could numb my. Like, if I'm really anxious, beer would make me feel less anxious. If I'm really depressed, beer made me happy. So that's why people struggle with certain mental issues. They self medicate because it works. The only problem with that is, you know what two beers would do, then it was four, and then it was eight, and then 12.

Yeah, it's unsustainable.

Yeah. I was drinking 25, 30 beers a day.

Wow.

Just to get through a day. And the bar just gets higher and higher. It takes more of the drug to help you get to where you feel like you're numbing. That's a lot of beer in a day. But, you know, there's American beer and I'm Canadian. So you figure that out.

And. Born and raised in Alberta in the Prairies for a long time. Now I'm way off track when I bring this subject up, but I saw this little YouTube video that was talking about how hockey raises and breeds the toughest athletes. And that's all relative, of course, but from an injury perspective, you know, it's very common to see a hockey player lose a bunch of teeth or take a puck to the shin or whatever it happens to be or be injured in some way, shape or form and still be up on the ice. Compared to other sports, of course, soccer is the most extreme example where, you know, they're rolling around and anyways, it's pretty comical out for weeks on what might be considered a smaller type of an injury. And here you are back on the ice after that many stitches and such a near death experience and you're just back out there. So anyways, yeah, that YouTube video, it's a light subject. It's not meant to be taken too seriously. But in your opinion, Clint, where do you put hockey on the level of rough or challenging or rugged sports?

Obviously, I think it's one of the you have to be tough to play the game. And back in the day when I played, even the skilled guys had to be pretty gritty as well. Like now with the game, it's changed a lot. There's different rules. It allows for just a real talented, maybe even A small guy like 5, 7, 5, 8 can play in the NHL. Now back in those days, not too many guys, unless they had some sandpaper to their game, could play. But you know, you got your other sports where, you know, individual sports like boxing or mma. Those boys are pretty tough too.

Now, right, when we come back from this short little break, let's pick up where we left off. Right? So you said that you were essentially cured and life just seemed better. But that's not the end of your story at all. Let's dive into the rest of that as soon as we come back from this short break. Remember to share this episode with someone who needs to hear it. These stories here on From Rock Bottom to Rockin it are designed to help inspire and motivate people to become better versions of themselves. To help people have motivation and get out of your own rock bottom moments. And Clint's story is amazing and made available in full detail on Amazon. You can buy his book anytime called the Crazy How I Survived the Crease and Beyond. In fact, right now I'm on Amazon right now as I'm recording this because I just bought a copy of his book. I bought it for three reasons. One, because I think it's fun to say that I bought it live while I'm recording this. Maybe that's my own entertainment. Second, is because the story is fascinating and there's so much more detail inside the pages that we can't cover on an episode as short as this. And the third reason is, is because once I'm done reading, I can give the book to someone else who also will find it fascinating and who also needs to hear it. So check out Clint's book on Amazon.com or CA. You can check it out. It's called the Crazy How I Survived the Crease and Beyond. Remember to also please share this episode. I would really appreciate it. And now back to the show. Okay, we're back now on From Rock Bottom to Rockin It. Clint, thank you again for joining us on the show. Now, where we left off was you told me you had found this good doctor. Things were looking up, life was looking better. But that's not the end of your story. What happened next?

You say restabilize your life. It's funny because I really look back, I don't think I ever felt normal. Okay, from a kid on, I always had issues, anxiety, depression, all these things. But that was like I said, my quote, you know, is this doc, is this what it feels like to be normal? And you know, just resumed my career, got into coaching, went to school, did all these great things. And as a coach or a player on a team Sport like the NHL or any other sport, you always have a team doctor. So I'm going along and it's about 14, 15 years. And I'm just taking that medication, but I'm not checking in with my psychiatrist. I just take this pill every day and I'll be fine. So over time, not checking in with my doctor and with a team doctor, just getting a prescription renewed, on and on the medication, my body was getting immune to and it wasn't working anymore. Just a gradual over the 15 years. And then another hockey player, Richard Zednik, cut his jugular vein. I'm coaching in the NHL, so I'm very, very media accessible. And of course, media, I was the first guy that happened to. So I had to tell the story over and over and over. And I was reliving the incident again. And you know, this has been a long time. Now I've got PTSD from the jugular vein undiagnosed. I don't think PTSD was a set of words back then. You know, post traumatic stress disorder. That's when things started to spiral down. The depression came back, the anxiety. I started to self medicate again. I'm thinking, what is wrong? I'm taking my medication. And so the reliving my story again with the media, my meds aren't working. I'm drinking a lot of beer again. One day I go behind the barn and I was shooting targets. I had a.22. And I'm just kind of what we call planking. And just my mind is going 100 miles an hour. I hadn't slept the night before. And my wife comes home and it was about 2:30 in the afternoon. She said, what is going on? She could see up my face, she could see me sweating. And my eyes are probably showing the signs of what was going on inside my head. And I said, you know what? I just feel like doing this. And I put the gun under my chin and pulled the trigger. I didn't even know if it still had bullets in it. And it did. Yeah. I was very fortunate that I didn't lose consciousness.

So you pulled the trigger. The gun was to your head. You pulled the trigger, the bullet came out, the bullet got stuck in your head.

Right. Went through my tongue, knocked out a couple teeth, ricocheted and lodged in my skull. So I didn't lose consciousness. And I'm like, okay, my wife's called 911. I'm saying, don't tell them I did this. I say, it was an accident. The gun went off. Because if it. Here I am thinking I almost killed myself. If they find out it was a suicide attempt, I'll never get another job coaching in the NHL. So I'm begging my wife, tell them it was an accident. And, you know, the cops show up and it's a gun incident and they got their guns pulled. They don't know what they're coming into. They don't know maybe my wife shot me. They don't know. And the paramedics. And then they wanted to life flight me to Reno, and I was not getting on the helicopter. I said, no, I'm fine. I was bleeding, bleeding profusely. But other than that, I've stitched my own chin before. So anyways, they had to kind of snuck up and sedated me and got me on the helicopter, and I was in a. They put me in a coma for a couple weeks because of the swelling.

Was it shock that you were responding from, or was it like training from growing up in the prairies, all rugged, or from being in hockey and being a professional athlete? I mean, you skated off the ice while your throat was slit wide open. There's really something special about you here, Clinton.

I'd like to say it's toughness, but I'm sure a lot of it was shock, because I remember when the gun fired, I didn't lose consciousness, and I went, oh, my God. I just put a bullet in my head. And I'm alive and I'm not, and I'm conscious. How is this even possible? And then I think it was a lot of the shock was setting in, and I'd been drinking heavily for days and not sleeping. And, you know, just the combination of a lot of things.

For people listening to this right now, there's so many people that have experienced their own version of a rock bottom moment. And for me, myself, when I talk on the air about these subjects in my own rock bottom moment, back when I dropped out of high school and got into drugs and arrested a few times, to me, there's a fear. It took me a long time to find the courage and the motivation to share my story like I am. And my motivation for sharing my story is. Goes back to when I was around 18. I was having a conversation with this mother of a son, and she was asking me for help. She wanted to know my story. She wanted to understand what I went through and how I got out, because her son was deep in the gangs and he was getting addicted to coke and coming back all beat up and cut and skipping school, and she didn't know what to do. And so she was asking me for help. She was reaching out. And I had no idea at the time how to help. I didn't know what to say. I didn't know what to do. I was too young. And all of the experiences that I had just gone through were way too fresh. And I remember that woman. I remember the conversation almost like it was yesterday. And now that I'm an adult and of course found myself with a bit of free time here, that's the memory that I carried, and it's motivated me to doing this podcast, to writing the book that I wrote, and to people who are listening to this right now who have a fear about sharing your story in the dialogue usually goes something for me anyways. It went something like this. It went like, wow, what if someone hears my story and then I lose a business deal? Or what if I can't cross the border? Or what if someone thinks badly about me? Or what if I lose an opportunity?

Or.

Or. Or. Or what? What? What? And, Clint, you found the courage to share your story, and what you're saying is that it was a little bit too early, it was too fresh, you weren't ready to go there, and there were some consequences, some severe consequences, and that's an understatement, Eric.

What we're talking about here is the sad stigma surrounding mental illness or addiction, and we suffer in silence because of the shame, the judgment, being perceived as crazy. There's a big stigma. We've come a long ways of racing, but it's still there. And so, so many people that struggle, and once they do come out and get help and then get well, I feel like I wake up in a hospital with a bullet in my head. I thought, oh, my God, it's almost three times dead for me. God spared me for a reason, and I better figure that reason out. And I knew what it was. It was to heal, to get help and treatment, which I did. And I was six months in a facility for the first time. They said, well, you have, you know, 20 years of undiagnosed PTSD, and it's been causing you a lot of grief and a lot of issues. Once I accepted this PTSD thing because I had accepted my mental illness of depression, anxiety, ocd, but now, oh, my God, don't tell me. I got this other thing called ptsd. Took me two months. I was in that facility for six months, and the first two months, I was just fighting it, like, no. I said, why do I have ptsd? Well, you almost died with your jugular vein. You never had counseling, this and that. And I think, are you kidding me? I was a hearer in Buffalo. I came back in 10. I was insulted, you know, the ego, after about two months. And I accepted it and got. Did the therapy, got well. And that's when I came out and resumed. Actually was able to get another coaching job even eventually, you know, spent a number of years coaching in the NHL, and then I wrote a book. And the whole time I was coaching, I was always. I got to write this book. I didn't know how to write a book. So I hired a guy to help me, a kind of a ghostwriter who was fantastic because it was a lot of emotion opening up these somewhat healed wounds that I'd done so much therapy and treatment with. So that was. That was probably the greatest thing. You know, we talk about rock bottom. I certainly hit that. Suffered in silence and darkness, like so many people do, because of the stigma. I really felt I was spared for a reason. And then the reason was to write a book. The book I didn't hold back at all. It's. It's described as raw, as soul bearing. A lot of, you know, different blurbs that were out there and on the book jacket. You know, the saying, this is the rawest book I've Ever read. And I'm so glad I didn't hold back, because I had no idea, Eric, how many people. How many Clint Willard Chucks are out there. I was getting emails after the book came out, like, oh, my God, you're my twin. Oh, my God, I'm going to get help. If you can do it, I can do it. And I think I opened up a lot of eyes that you're not alone. You know, people think they're the only ones. And once they say, well, I know there's other people that struggle, but they're not as sick as me. And I don't want to tell anybody because they're. They're going to judge me or I'll feel shame or guilt or whatever. And again, that damn stigma. But it made me realize how many people out there really do struggle with mental illness or addiction or usually they're intertwined, as we discussed. And it was very, very gratifying for me. People say writing. Was writing the book therapeutic? Hell, no. It opened up a lot. I was cautioned by my counselor, be careful. And I'm like, I'm all right. I'm good. Well, it caused me a relapse because I became sober. I was living sobriety. And the book writing, it caused me a relapse to alcohol again. I immediately got that under control and realizing that I didn't want to go back down that road. So for me, the book was not therapeutic. It was the hardest thing I've ever done in my life, but also the most gratifying thing I've ever done in my life. You know, I feel my purpose. My. Felt my purpose was to be an NHL hockey player and then a coach. And you know what? That. That was just one line of maybe some success, but there was a parallel line going right along with it of the demons that I'd had since childhood. So I guess the NHL has kind of given me a platform to public speak to write the book. But conquering demons and fighting them off, and I'm not gonna lie, I still have those. Not the same demons. Some demons, they come back, and I have to be very conscious of my. Well, I have to keep my balance. And I have a daily routine to keep that balance, because I don't want to. I am still mentally ill. You. It's in me. My brain does not produce enough serotonin. So if I don't take my medication, I got into meditation. Meditation. And so I work out to keep the endorphins up, you know, but being of service, counseling, of course, I Started to have flashbacks about a year ago again. And I went to a counselor immediately and they did a thing called emdr. And it stands for eye movement desensitization, hypnotization, reprocessing. Something to do with left, right, brain, left, right, and your eye movement triggering the left boy. I did three sessions, and I'm not saying anybody that might take them only three sessions, but that's all it took for me to get rid of the flashback nightmares again.

Oh, no kidding. I didn't know that.

Wow.

Okay.

I processed session one, I processed my childhood trauma with my father. Session two, I processed the jugular vein incident. And session three, I processed the suicide attempt. And even the counselor said, you know, that this is. You're the quickest to process. I mean, it takes more than, you know, three sessions on one topic. So I was very fortunate. But I did take the initiative and the common sense and say, whoa. Just like when I relapsed with alcohol, I went, whoa. I got. I don't want to go down this road again. And. And you know, when that happened, on my relapse, I immediately checked into a 30 day rehab and I knew I wanted to get my feet under me again and be healthy.

And you have, and that's what you've done. And right now, while we're recording this, we're in the middle of the COVID 19 pandemic, right, while the lockdown is happening. And I know that that's affected your public speaking. Tell me more about what you're focused on right now, because now going into that, there's so many things fascinating about your story, and one of the things that sticks out to me and is anchored in my mind here is that you went back to school and went to study something that was completely different than what you had ever been doing before. I mean, I know that you grew up in the Prairies, but you went to school and you graduated as an equine dentist and chiropractor, which is a huge leap from being an NHL player.

Right.

Like, I didn't have that in me. When I dropped out of school, I never went back. To this day, I just went to Calgary, Alberta. Right. As you know, and got into construction. So work, work harder every day, keep on pushing every day. Obsessively, probably it was obsessive. And the idea for me to go back to school, well, it's basically terrifying. But you also overcame that too. And can you tell me a little bit about that?

It was a bit terrifying, but I was in a good mental state then. I didn't have the anxiety, depression, things like that. So, yes, I was very timid going in and signing up and going through the course, horses and that. But once I got in there, I was very surprised that, hey, you know what? I always thought I was stupid when it came to school. I did struggle with the written part of any exams, the written exams, but in what they call the wet lab, working on live, you know, horses, I was top of the class. And, you know, I'm kind of like you. I'm more on the physical, manual type of thing. That's kind of my gift, I guess. So the real thing, I was real passionate about it. I've always been a horseman. I rodeoed, you know, grew up around horses. They've always been a part of my life. So I was very comfortable and passionate about, hey, I'm helping animals and making them feel better. And that gave me a lot of gratification. And again, that kind of goes back to my keeping my balance. Being of service is the biggest thing, like going out and speaking, doing book signing or whatever it is. High schools, it's amazing. I had an example when I first started speaking. A girl came up to me after the assembly and she rolled up her sleeve and showed me all these cut marks, deep gouges and old scars and fresh scars. And I was the first person she ever showed. She was about 17 years old, so she could wear long sleeves if she wanted to. And just my talk to the school, I was the first person she shared it with. And I said, would you like to talk to your school counselor and let's get this thing going? And she said yes. And we kept in touch for a number of years through emails, and she was doing fantastic. But she took that well. First of all, she had to realize by hearing my story that she wasn't alone and that this big, tough hockey player, former hockey player, had struggled through life and was suicide survivor. And it helped her. She realized that she was not a weak person. That's the thing, is with mental illness and addiction, people think we're weak. We're not. We're sick. It's a disorder. Like I said with me, my brain doesn't produce enough serotonin, which is a mood chemical for happiness and hard for me to explain. I can explain it in lay terms.

For sure, but there's people out there listening to this right now who are experiencing it, so you don't have to explain it to them. You know, they get it right.

And that's what's so cool, is you are not alone people. And you're not weak. It's a disorder. Like the doctor that really helped me, the guy explained in San Diego, he put it to me like this. He said, you know, a chemical imbalance of the brain is just, you know, your brain isn't producing enough of this one chemical, and that's what's causing depression and anxiety and OCD and all these things. He says it's like a diabetic. It's a chemical imbalance, a different organ. But there's no shame or guilt with diabetes now, with mental illness, there's still the stigma, and a lot of it is shame and guilt. And that's why people think they have to hide it. And we're good actors. Oh, man, I was a teen clown, you know, I could turn, like, go into the locker room and everybody think I was funny and outgoing, easygoing, good teammate, got it together. But as soon as I left that rink, boy, that mind. I could only keep it shut off for a certain amount of time. Then it would come back and haunt me. Most of us are very good actors. I like to say I'm Bradley Cooper, except better looking.

I'm no Bradley Cooper and I'm no Clint Malarchuk, but I sure do my fair share of acting. Usually it's when I'm out on a date or I'm with my friends or whatever the scenario is. I just put on this mask, right? I put on this, you know, I don't want you to know how I'm actually feeling or I'm scared for you to know how I'm feeling. And I have to put on a happy face, right? I have to bury down these issues deep inside and put on my happy face here. Because that's just how my brain was processing, right? And it's trained me to be a great actor in my own unhealthy sort of way, to be honest. And the net result of all this is that when I do go to my friends and I say, look, I had a terrible day, or I'm having a really tough time right now, they look at me and they almost don't even believe me, right? They're like, what do you mean you had a bad day? What do you mean you're not okay right now? Because they can't see through the mask. The mask is so well established. It's so deeply ingrained into who I am and to their image of who I am that they don't even understand when I say I'm having a problem. It's because I've reached this point where it's really big. It's a really big problem. And when I let it out to them, it doesn't look like anything at all. They don't understand. And without understanding, there's not much that they can do. It's a scary thing.

Yeah. Because we're good at it.

Yeah.

If you said, I'm having a bad day, they're going, well, you sure looked happy to me.

That's the words exactly. And how are we doing as a society, do you think, when we go back and look at how things were back when you were a kid or when I was a kid, where there basically was no support or awareness or understanding for subjects related to mental health. And we've come a long way. Right. We know that we. We've come a long way, but how far do you think we are from being where we actually need to be? I mean, great progress. Yes. But how much farther is there to go? I mean, I'd like to see us get to a point where mental health is a daily dinner table conversation. It's something that comes up inside the classroom and that globally we're all aware and supportive of each other in bringing these subjects up and helping each other work through it. Like, how far is there to go?

I'll tell you a quick story. When I was a kid, I was so anxious. They put me in the hospital for two months trying to figure out this anxiety. Uncontrollably crying, couldn't function in school. After two months, they turned me loose to my mom and said, you know, I'm sorry, man, but, you know, you just got a very anxious kid. There is no diagnosis. There is not. There is nothing. That's the way it was. And that was when I was, you know, 10 or 12 years old. And now we've come so far a long ways, but I still think with the stigma, we got a long ways to go. And I look at this, you know, the gay community, I don't know if it was the 90s or whatever. You know, all of a sudden there's sitcoms and that there'd be gay people. You know, at first, people like, oh, my God, those two guys just kissed. You know, it was like, oh, my God. And then they did parades and they wanted gay rights and everything. Now it's very acceptable in society with gay and lesbian because they've worked hard to get. If they want to get married now, they can get married. And people aren't like, overwhelmed going, oh, my God. I mean, I'm sure there is still Some people that are the stigma, but you know, they, they've worked hard for it. I think that's what we need to do is the same thing, you know, is to get the acceptance. Like if you've got an illness like cancer, let's say, and you go to your boss and say, look, I've been diagnosed with this, they're going to go, I will do what you need to do. Get your, if you need to work at home or you need time off or whatever, you take your treatments, whatever. Now if you've got mental illness, are you going to go into your boss? Probably not, because, yeah, probably not.

I'd get fired.

You might get fired. Or with the statement, oh, this guy's crazy. I mean, yeah, we got to get rid of this guy somehow because we're not crazy. There's different forms of it. Yes, there are sociopaths, and that's a mental illness too. But the average mental illness that we're talking about is depression, anxiety, ocd, ptsd, things like that. That's the things you and I are discussing.

And we are indeed definitely making good progress as a society on this subject. Now, if we were to put a scale on it, say like one to 10, one being extremely long way to go, say that's maybe 30 years ago, and 10 being, hey, we're perfected, where are we on this scale, do you think? Are we running a five or a seven or what do you think?

Just because now I'm mental health advocates such as you, and so I meet a lot of people that have gotten help, come out of the darkness. So I see the progress as being more okay because I talk to people like yourself and other people in my public speaking and meet people that come up to me after and they share their story. So I think we've come more than on the 5 scale. I would say more, you know, probably on a 7.

Great.

Yeah. Out of 10. But those next three numbers, like 8, 9, 10, they're going to be a challenge. There's still going to be that stigma that we have to erase.

Right. And that takes time and courage for people to find that safe place. A counselor or a friend or a family member or a support group, you know, whatever it happens to be, whatever and wherever that safe place is for you to be comfortable sharing your story and getting it off your chest. Chest. To get it out into the open and on the flip side, to be that safe place for someone else to be the listening ear or the supportive friend or the person who can help direct someone in the right direction. If you don't feel qualified to help them, there's a lot of ways to get help, and there's also a lot of ways to help people. So, Clint, what are your recommendations? What do you think about this subject?

You know, one of the things I do when I'm speaking, I say, you know what? You may not be mentally ill, but you can darn sure relate to emotional sickness, whether it was a divorce or losing a loved one or some trauma that happened in your life. It doesn't make you mentally ill, but you can relate to a degree to somebody like me or you that has struggled with mental illness, because when you went through that period of losing a loved one or a divorce, it was a challenge. You were probably depressed. You were probably very emotional. You probably had anxiety. So, really, come on, you can relate to us a little bit to a degree, because life is tough sometimes for all of us, like you said, to have a person that's not mentally ill, but to maybe sit back and hear somebody's story and go, you know what? That anxiety thing, I forgot I had that when I went through that divorce.

Right?

Ten years, you know, because we have all struggled emotionally at some point in our life, so I kind of stress that, too. Just to say, it's not always mental illness, but we can all relate to some degree of anxiety or depression or whatever it might be.

And when we come back from this short break, I want to ask you, Clint, if you were able to go back in time and talk to your past self, if you were able to go back to that moment when you were behind the barn by yourself, if you were able to be there and talk to yourself back then and give yourself a little bit of advice, you know, what would you say? That's my question for you as soon as we come back from this short break. Eric here. I hope you're enjoying the episode today. This is a passion project that I put together. I really wanted to do this. I really want to help people out there. I had so many people reach out to me when I was younger and when I was having a tough time and struggling. I've written a book about it. You can check it out on my website. Please do. But most importantly, reach out to me. Give me some feedback. What could I do better with this podcast? What am I doing that I should stop? What am I not doing that I should do? To tell me your experience, give me some tips and suggestions. I really want to design this to suit your needs, and all you got to do is send me an email it's ericericgilbertwilliams.com or use the contact me button that you'll find on my website. Just send me an email. We'll have a phone call or we'll chat online. Doesn't really matter. I would love to hear from you and figure out how to make this show even better with your help. So please reach out and don't be shy. Okay, we're back. Now here on From Rock Bottom to Rockin It. Thank you again, Clint, for joining us today. And where we left off was I was asking, if you were to go back in time and give yourself some advice, what would it be?

That's very easy for me to answer that I am sick and I'm not weak. I mean, to play in the NHL as a goaltender, you're the mental rock. It's a tough position, and you have to be very mentally strong. And I look back now and I always thought I had mental weakness. Weakness because I struggled with the mental illness, yet I was able to handle the pressures of being an NHL goaltender. And so the advice I give would say to myself, look, you are sick. Your sickness has come back. You're not doing well, but you're not mentally weak. It's not a weakness. It's a sickness or disorder. Get help.

I'd like to help out where I can. So, Clint, what are you working on right now? Is there an organization or a charity that you work with right now? How can I help out?

Well, you know what I'm doing? I'm trying to get a certification in equine therapy because we found that it's very. And I'm a horseman, so I got horses, and I'm perfect for it. Plus, I've suffered severely with ptsd. And so a lot of our veterans that come back from combat, I mean, think of this. Here's an example. Just Iraq and Afghanistan veterans. I believe the number's down now to about 19. But at one time, it was 22 suicides a day just from those two wars, the Veterans of those two wars. Now we're talking the most mentally tough people, men and women, to do that job, to go to war, to go to Afghanistan or Iraq or wherever they're sent. Mentally tough, but they come back. And are they weak mentally because they got ptsd? No, they got a disorder now and they can get help and get well. My point being is it doesn't matter how strong you are, mentally or physically. This is like any other disease. It doesn't matter how tough you are. It's a Sickness and not a weakness. That's where I find that helps people that are suffering in silence. They go, you mean I'm not crazy? Oh, you mean I can get. Well, it gets them into a safer place, I think, to talk about it and to get help. Does that make sense?

Yeah, it does.

Well, better, because that's the best I got.

So what can I do to help out Clint? Tell me, can you point me to a certain organization or what's on your mind? Like, how can I help out a bit?

I'm very, very accessible. In fact, I spend a lot of time on the phone talking to people. I try not to give. You know, I can say what worked for me and what didn't work, but, you know, I'm not going to say. The advice part is you got to be very careful about that. I'm on the support end, and through emails and Facebook and a lot of these things, I've made a lot of contacts and some people I've never met face to face. But through Internet and technology, I'm able to be a support for a lot of people in the process of starting my own foundation. So if somebody is struggling with an addiction or a mental illness or both, my foundation will pay for the rehab or their treatment because a lot of people cannot afford that. And so my foundation, I have a website, it's just MalarchUK.com a lot of stuff on my website. And I love to speak, you know, if people want to hear me. And it can be a high school, it can be a corporation. I do, I do. I'll speak to anybody. I do. A lot of first responders with PTS talking about PTSD and military. I've been to several military bases speaking to the troops. I've been to Washington, D.C. i'm a big part of Wounded warriors, so I go to D.C. twice a year to help our wounded warriors. We coordinate hockey tournaments through in D.C. we have one in Vegas, we have one in Tahoe. So it's amazing. These disabled veterans, a lot of them, it's not the physical. They got their. They have their limbs, but this hockey. And some of them are just learning the game and it doesn't matter. We. We put it. And it just. They say that the hockey, the camaraderie of the sport and it's the ptsd and they can relate. Everybody in that locker room can relate to each other. No one's judging because they've all struggled in some way through being in the military or first responders or whatever it might be. When we talk about PTSD or trauma. Everybody thinks it's a military thing and it's not. Or a horrific car accident. Yes, those definitely PTSD issues. But I mean, there's so many different degrees of ptsd, you know, a divorce or a bad marriage and being in a certain situation, these situations, our first responders, a lot of them, it's a cumulative ptsd. It's not just one incident. I know you're in California. I just did a deal there with the firefighters, played the. The chp, the cops. They were raising money for a family police officer that had been, you know, really hurt bad. And the stories that these, you know, tough men and women, I mean, that's a high testosterone job. And they see thing after thing after thing, and sometimes it comes up later in life is what I found out. A lot of them go through their career and. And it's at the end of their career, at the retirement where they, all of a sudden they're really struggling. And it's the accumulation of different traumatic events, and some weren't that all that big and traumatic. But I mean, you see in dead bodies, you're seeing. You're helping people out of fires or whatever it might be. They do get damaged and it does accumulate. And what we have to do is teach our first responders, teach everybody. I think we should do more mental health training and school, especially, you know, starting probably in middle school, and make it that. That would help get rid of the stigma. Of course, talking about it, but being educated on it and being aware of the signs and the symptoms that you may be affected. And as tough as you might think, you tell yourself, that doesn't bother me. That doesn't bother me. Well, okay, let's be honest with ourselves. We're human.

We sure are human. You know, we have pros and cons. We have good moments, light moments, we have dark moments, everything in between. And sometimes we don't get to choose some of the details, or we don't get to choose, you know, what happens around us or to us. But we do have this choice to do something about it. We can choose what to do next, right? Yesterday is gone, but today's now. And right here is a time where we get to have this freedom of choice. And on the subject of mental health, it breaks down to be, am I going to seek for help when I need it, or am I going to bottle up inside? Am I going to close myself off to the world, or am I going to open up and reach out? Am I going to stay in this cocoon in this shell and isolate myself, or am I going to let people in and let them help? I'm on your website right now, ClintMilarchUK.com and I'm going to put a link to the show notes of this episode so that people listening can just go to my website, scroll down, and click the link to directly go over to your website. If there's a question of spelling or anything like that, I do encourage you to check out Clint's website. There's some powerful YouTube videos there as well. And so, Clint, do you have any parting notes or subjects that are on your mind right now that we should just get out onto the table? What do you want to talk about here as we wrap up? Because otherwise, I'll just keep you on here forever, and we'll just keep talking about these subjects because you're such an interesting guy. So what would you like to focus on here for the next couple minutes?

Now, with this virus that's, you know, attacking the world, you know, it's especially hard for people with ocd, you know, the contamination issues and things like that. So I think it's important that you're very conscious of your emotions, your feelings. I'm being very proactive because I could go on a slide being isolated, and my wife's out of town right now. I'm by myself. But what I've done is I've made a list of things I can do. I'm. I'm going to clean that barn, you know, things I procrastinated. I'm going to go through my closets and my drawers and, you know, I have got a list that's going to keep me busy because with my OCD and my mental illness in general, I have to be proactive. So I've got my list of things to do. I'm going to. Haven't started yet, but I'm going to write a blog, I think, and put it on Facebook and LinkedIn and all those social media outlets so that people can relate. People can say, oh, man, I thought, man, this is what he's doing. He's making a list. He's going to keep active. He's by himself right now. He's lonely, maybe. You know, these are real emotions that I have to be very proactive with. So, you know, let's help ourselves, help each other. I tell people all the time, you know, love each other, but more importantly, love yourself. I grew up in shame, guilt. You know, if I had a good game as a kid, I was a good kid. If I had a bad game. As a kid, I was a bad kid. And that's very sick thinking. And so even today I have to be on top of these. You know, if I make a mistake, I can't go to that guilt and shame. I learned from a mistake and try not to get that anxiety of guilt and shame.

You're an amazing and remarkable man, Clint, and you're helping so many people. I hope that on that list you mentioned meditation. I hope that on that list as well is you have a little mention to remind yourself to just take a moment and reflect on how good of a person you really are. So there's my little add on to the list, both for you and for anyone listening to this as well. Just take a moment to acknowledge that you are a good person and that there's always going to be a tomorrow and that you always have a choice today that you can make in order to ensure that there is a tomorrow for you.

Well, thank you for that. And I agree with you. We're all good people, but good people sometimes do bad things or make a mistake, you know, doesn't make you a bad person. Makes you human and just move on. Do the next right thing I tell myself. Do the next right thing.

To everyone listening. I hope you have a rockin it day. Remember to do the next right thing as well. And remember to share this episode. I gotta just slip that in there. Share this episode Please subscribe to the channel and we will talk to you guys again next time. Bye for now.

Thank you Eric.

And that's it, my friends. For this episode. We will see you next time. Please send me an email, say hello, give me some feedback, let me know what you think, give me some tips and suggestions. I'd love to hear from you. Also, please share this episode with whoever you think needs to hear it. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, doesn't matter. Just get it out there. I really appreciate it. And and we'll see you next time on From Rock Bottom to rocking it. Have a rocking it.