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All Black Anton Lienert-Brown opens up on mental health challenges

Anton Lienert-Brown looks on during the New Zealand All Blacks captain's run at Sky Stadium on September 27, 2024 in Wellington, New Zealand. (Photo by Hagen Hopkins/Getty Images)

Anton Lienert-Brown is an All Black, and a very popular one at that. With 79 Test caps to his name, and the responsibility of serving as a vice-captain for this weekend’s Test in Japan, it seems Lienert-Brown is living what many in New Zealand would consider the dream.

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But, there’s another side to Lienert-Brown that should also be commended. All Blacks are viewed as sporting icons and heroes by millions in New Zealand, and the 29-year-old has spent years expressing vulnerability while advocating for mental health awareness.

Lienert-Brown spoke with RNZ in 2020 about some challenges, and later opened up on trying to be vulnerable in a chat with Rugby World’s Alan Dymock. Today, the All Black is an ambassador for Mind Set Engage, which is a New Zealand Rugby mental health programme.

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As someone who had seen others share their own experiences with mental health issues, the midfielder wanted to do the same. “That’s where my passion grew,” Lienert-Brown said, before going on to explain the challenges he had faced.

“For me, it was anxiety,” Lienert-Brown told Paddy Gower on The F#$&ing News.

“It built up over two or three years. I probably pin it down to whenever I put myself in a place of judgement, I used to get massive anxiety and funnily enough I started professional rugby at 18 years old so I was put into a place of constant judgement week in, week out.

“Through the years from 18 to 21, I probably didn’t look after my mental health that well. I was striving to be the best rugby player that I could be and I was constantly in the limelight or places of judgement.

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“Over years, my anxiety got worse and worse, to the stage where daily I was having constant panic attacks and it got really difficult.”

It was both refreshing and powerful to see such an established athlete talk about their own mental health challenges in depth. As the All Black made clear, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution to managing these issues, but Lienert-Brown openly revealed what worked for him.

Lienert-Brown spoke with a psychiatrist during the early stages of his professional rugby journey. That psychiatrist gave him an antidepressant called Citalopram which increases serotonin to also help manage anxiety.

“It spirals with thoughts. For me, it was around my heart and I’d just feel like it wasn’t beating properly or it felt like I was more or less having a heart attack,” Lienert-Brown explained when asked about panic attacks.

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“With the anxiety, it would just spiral and spiral and spiral to the point where I would have a panic attack. When I first had one, it felt like I was having a heart attack but I wasn’t.

“It’s hard to explain to someone who hasn’t experienced it. I remember I had a friend through high school who had pretty severe anxiety and he would talk to me about his experiences and I couldn’t understand it.

“Until you experience anxiety or experience something similar. It’s hard to understand… for someone that hasn’t experienced anxiety, it’s hard to explain, how can you get yourself into such a spin that you feel like you’re having a heart attack?”

As a takeaway from that interview, Lienert-Brown’s advice for everyone and anyone was clear: don’t be afraid to be vulnerable and “ask someone for help.” Last year, legendary All Black Sir John Kirwan spoke with RugbyPass about managing mental health.

In New Zealand, if you or anyone else needs support, there are multiple organisations that can help you.

  • Lifeline – 0800 543 354 or free text 4357 (HELP)
  • Youthline – 0800 376 633
  • Samaritans – 0800 726 666
  • Suicide Crisis Helpline – 0508 828 865

Louis Rees-Zammit joins Jim Hamilton for the latest episode of Walk the Talk to discuss his move to the NFL. Watch now on RugbyPass TV

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Comments

1 Comment
J
JW 18 days ago

Wow that's crazy, I didn't even know that. Glad he seems to be dealing with/sorted it. Wonder how much it would have effected his prep and gametime.


So a mixture of chemicals and mindset/perspective?

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J
JW 1 hour ago
All Blacks player ratings vs Ireland | Autumn Nations Series

Nah, if you see some picture of a way to blame Dmac rather than the whole team who were slacking and just getting beat by an Argentina team that was up for it then you've got unconscious bias I'm afraid.


The coaching staff (and the team as they had done throughout Fosters era) did just not get them in the right frame of mind. They slackened off after two intense English tests and were slow to build back up into test match intensity after the San Diego run around. You can view that Wellington loss as akin to what went on in Chicago in 2016, it was just delayed a couple of weeks in this instance.


Good reminder of what game management is, unfortunately it doesn't cover all the bases and is missing pivotal parts of lethality.


I think you're misunderstanding the argument, this is about Dmac, not the team, and about his idea of game management, not his application. In none of the games this year, including this weekends one, has he done relentless execution of the basics. His conservative game was neither shrewd or accurate.


The difference here is perspective. You see a win and you want to apply credit, just as you saw a lose and want to apply blame. Dmac's game management in both circumstances was very similar, just in this game I felt that pressure to concentrate on it caused him a few more errors in that application for no real gain in that area, and a much more ineffective attack stop the team from making it a very comfortable game.


The other difference is you a way overplaying Irelands performance imo. They were pathetic. Even in the start of the 2nd when they were trying to get points with the card it felt comfortable they weren't going to have what it takes even if they fixed their error rate. That was the first Bled test where Dmac nearly singlehandedly took an unbeatable 50 lead, a great example of good game management that again just didn't come off. Those tests were not 12 tests ago. Twelve tests ago he was running England around like he'd been in the jersey his whole career. We didn't break any record, the streak is a figment of Irelands imagination to desperately show how good they are to the world. You've been caught hook line and sinker in all these topics sadly.

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