Paul Green’s best friend revealed that the NRL legend had been secretly battling mental health issues for nearly two decades, a fight his parents admitted they didn’t know the full extent of.
It has been more than a week since Green, 49, was found dead in his Brisbane home, having taken his own life, but the shock of his passing is still affecting many in the community.
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Tributes have continued to flow in, as have pleas for people to speak up about their struggles and reduce the stigma of mental illness.
The daily telegraph has shared new details of Green’s nearly 20-year battle, known only to his closest friends and family.
Best friend and former Sharks and Queensland teammate Craig Greenhill said he believed Green’s challenges began when he retired from rugby league in 2004.
The pair grew up together, first playing as under-8s and all the way to State of Origin.
But when his playing career ended and he was no longer in the spotlight and behind the scenes, Greenhill believes that’s when Green’s struggles began.
“It’s been there for a long time,” Greenhill said. “He first talked about it probably 18 years ago.
“The NRL is like a machine that can spit you out. They (officials) are ruthless and will throw people under the bus because it is a results-driven business.”
Greenhill said that Green was not constantly tormented by demons and was “generally happy”.
He added that he loved his wife and children, his family, and was financially stable.
speaking to The courier mail‘s Peter Badel, Green’s mother Patricia, 82, and father Ned, 93, revealed their utter devastation at the loss of their son.
“We never expected to bury our baby,” said Patricia.
“Her father, Ned, is just heartbroken. We’ll survive somehow, but I’ll never understand.
“I am stunned, devastated, heartbroken. I hope the feeling will go away one day. We have mourned ourselves. There are no tears left. We’re a tough old generation, I guess, and we kind of have to move on.
“But our lives will never be the same.”
Patricia also revealed that she couldn’t believe the news when her other children told her.
She said that Paul was a “man of faith” and that she “couldn’t believe he would do it (take his own life).”
She also added that she saw no signs of depression the last time she saw him: her son’s 10th birthday, which was just hours before his death.
Patricia said they had “sat and laughed and talked and then we went home.”
“I had just dropped off Paul a few hours before it happened. I kissed him and said goodbye, ‘I love you Paul, see you later’. Then we went home,” he said.
The grieving mother said she “never thought” her son was fighting to the point of taking his own life, telling the Courier Mail it made no difference how Green had acted.
“We couldn’t understand why he would do it. We still can’t,” she said.
“It is against their beliefs. It’s so hard to accept.”
Read the full story at The Courier Mail.
Green had a solid coaching career, leading the Cowboys to their first premiership over Bennett’s Broncos in 2015, while also leading the team to the grand finals in 2017 despite losing Johnathan Thurston to injury.
But having left the Cowboys in 2020 after a run of poor results, before a spell as Queensland manager which ended in a 2-1 loss, Green was looking for his next job.
Green had also been offered two assistant coaching positions for the coming year, including alongside Wayne Bennett in The Dolphins.
Despite this, the Sydney Morning Herald reported Sunday that Green had expressed interest in coaching the Gold Coast Titans.
The Friday before his death, he even asked Mat Rogers about the Titans during a round of golf.
The report also told those who knew of his battles that he masked “how harsh and frequent his dark days were.”
“Green did not want his mental health struggle to become widely known, in case it had an impact on his ability to get and keep another head coaching job,” the report said.
The captain of Green’s 2015 premiership, Johnathan Thurston, delivered an impassioned plea Monday, asking people to speak up and get help if they’re struggling.
“Mental health has really come to the fore in the last 10 to 15 years,” Thurston said.
“Before that, it was a ‘she’ll be right, dude’ era. She Well, she won’t be fine! She’s not going to be okay.
“We need to be there for our peers and get them to talk about their feelings and what they are going through and (have them) seek professional help if they need it.
“Gone are the days of ‘she’ll be right,’ of suicides that take too many lives in this country.
“We need to be able to talk about it.”
He also called Green “the rock for everyone else”.
“He was saying, ‘Call me if you need to talk. You have a lot to live for. You have health, family, children,'” Thurston added.
“So it just doesn’t make sense.”
A public memorial for Green will be held on Tuesday, August 30 and is expected to be well attended.
Speaking of memorial, Green’s brother Rick said the event would be held at Kougari Oval. and invited the public to come and celebrate the life of the great of the league.
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