Aidan Walsh

I can guarantee you knife first hand to put your hand up and say I'm struggling is one of the most courageous things I've ever done and I've fought all across the world against all different opponents and I can tell you that knife first hand because there's so many especially men like there's so many men struggling and again especially men in boxing and combat sports and elite sports we're taught to toughen up and not to show emotion and to be stoic and bravado

And it's almost, there's a stigma around seeking help for men.

And I think that for me is something that I want to change going forward, particularly within combat sports and boxing, because there's so many men struggling out there.

And if you can just ask for a bit of help, if you're going through something,

It can change your life.

It really can change your life.

And there's people out there to do it.

And again, Sport Ireland, Sport NI, there's good people there, particularly for the boxers, who can actually say, we can support you.

We have the resources.

We have the right people in place to help you.

And I think that's the way I'm so dedicated and motivated to go down that direction.

The time I went home from that tournament in Bulgaria, I'd won two fights, and I went to coach at the time, and I just literally broke down.

I'd actually asked to meet him in the reception,

And I was sitting waiting on him.

And he says, the words he said to me, and he says, when I came over and you were sitting down, he said, you were like a crackhead sitting on the chair.

Face all sunk in, had a black eye, had a bit of a cut.

I was all hunched over.

I was thick thin because of the stress and the pressure and anxiety.

He says, you were exactly like someone that was on heroin or crack cocaine.

Like, he said, genuinely.