‘I didn’t know if I could control myself’: John Kirwan reflects on his mental health journey

Sir John Kirwan has gone from rugby great to mental health advocate. Photo / Warren Buckland
Sir John Kirwan has discussed the early stages of his mental health journey in a wide-ranging podcast interview.
The All Blacks great has become one of the country’s leading advocates for mental health and has been celebrated for breaking down barriers for men to discuss the topic.
Speaking to Paula Bennett for her NZ Herald podcast, Ask Me Anything, Kirwan said it took a while for him to accept what was wrong and to open up about it.
“My reference to mental health was One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest. I thought that if I spoke to my doctor, I’m going to get locked up with Jack Nicholson.”
It was just at the height of his All Blacks career that Kirwan started to experience symptoms of his anxiety-based depression, and he would experience symptoms unexpectedly.
“I remember going one morning to Radio Hauraki to Kevin Black’s studio, and it was 7 in the morning.
“I opened a bottle of champagne, had a glass of champagne. This is from 7 to 7.20 in the morning. You’re in there, boom, all this energy.
“I go down and I sit in my car and I’m paralysed. I can’t move. Because the first time that I had a suicidal rumination, I felt that if I drove my car I was going to drive off the Harbour Bridge, and I didn’t know if I could control myself not doing that or driving into a lamppost at 150 km/h.”
Kirwan said that he sat in the car for an hour before driving home slowly, and then went to bed and fell asleep, which wasn’t uncommon at the time.
“And I woke up and felt okay. I thought, ‘shit, I’m not having champagne in the morning anymore’. That’s bloody no good for you. So once again, ignored it.”
Eventually, the anxiety attacks wouldn’t go away, and Kirwan would start to deal more regularly with suicidal ruminations. Kirwan said he never planned his suicide but thought about it often, which left him “exhausted”.
In 1991, during an All Blacks tour of Argentina, Kirwan was on the 10th floor of the Hilton in Buenos Aires. He had just finished having an anxiety attack and told Bennett he was sick of fighting.
“So I decided that I was going to run and jump out the window.”
He lay in bed building up the “courage” to do it. “And Michael Jones, who was my roommate, said to me, ‘JK, you’ve got a good heart’. And he saved my life.
“I never jumped out the window, but the thing that I said to myself every second for the next sort of 48, 50, 60 hours or whatever it was, was ‘JK, you got a good heart’. I said that to myself every second because I was too scared to think of what the other thought was.”
Kirwan now runs several charities and organisations focused on drawing attention to mental health, most recently launching “Mitey” to help include mental health education into the curriculum.
He is also developing an inland “surf park” in north Auckland.
Kirwan told Bennett that one thing he has always struggled with has been self-esteem, but has got past that as he gets old.
“One of the problems I had that affected my mental health is I have what I call a dumb shark. I think I’m dumb. I got told I was dumb at school, I’ve never passed an exam in my life.
“So part of my mental journey has been making peace with my sharks. I had an imposter shark, I had a dumb shark, I had a guilt shark, I had I wanna be like shark, and they were all influencing me and my ability to be the best I could be.
“And so I still have a whole lot of different ideas and now I will share them with people and I take it or leave it. I don’t worry too much about it.”
Kirwan would like to see all New Zealanders be more ambitious and pointed to the recent attention Christopher Luxon received for his profits from a house sale.
“I love successful people. And when I say success, if you’re successful financially, I think good on you. If you’re successful politically, I think good on you. If you’re a successful mum or a successful dad and your kids are good kids, that is success.
“But I just think New Zealand, we need to be very careful that we don’t take this humility that is very positive in our culture a little bit too far and start beating people up for being successful.”
Listen to the full episode for more from Sir John Kirwan, including his thoughts on the issues facing rugby, and more on his mental health journey.
Ask Me Anything is an NZ Herald podcast hosted by former Deputy Prime Minister Paula Bennett. New episodes are available every Sunday.
You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.