Roisin Willis opens up about struggle with insomnia and depression

It has nothing to do with being an adult, jackass. Because you certainly are not an adult with a response like that. Jackass.

I always thought depression made you sleepy and you wouldn't get out of bed for days. This post made me look up some facts:

Depression and sleep problems are closely linked. People with insomnia , for example, may have a tenfold higher risk of developing depression than people who get a good night’s sleep. And among people with depression, 75 percent have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep. - Johns Hopkins

Boomers need understand that social media has changed how the younger generation interacts with people (yes many times it has negative effects on them.) Stop putting her down for using IG to express herself. The IG aspect seems to have triggered many people. Try pretending she gave an interview with a print publication or newspaper like it was 1990. Her statement can only help others who may be struggling or feel alone in their battles. I wish her the best and hope she continues to make positive strides. This is nothing to joke about or make dumb macho posts mocking her or her generation. In many cases this is a life or death situation.

You're projecting your aversion towards boomers while completely ignoring the fact that boomers or genXers are actually Roisin's parents and these parents do actually understand their child's suffering. ...And being parents of older children, are far more sympathetic with her plight than most Zs or Millennials.

I struggled with depression in college and it impacted my running immensely. But I went to school during a time when mental health was not really discussed. So I suffered in silence believing my struggles were my fault.

Had I logged into instagram and saw my favorite runner speak out about her struggles, I really think it would have helped me.

I developed severe insomnia back in 2015 into 2016, I was intro'ed to Bobby, one of the nicest people I ever talked to, as he had already dealt with a severe case. we talked thru a lot of stuff. Imagine trying to get to 75-85 miles a week in your developing years as a monster talent and not sleeping. I still do not sleep "right" but I am not up all night. God bless her in her struggle with this stuff, I would not wish this on my worst enemy, it's awful.

There’s a huge safety issue with gymnastics that is not present with running. If you’re Willis and compete at a meet when not feeling great, you might be exhausted or sustain a minor injury. If you’re an Olympic gymnast and experience severe spatial disorientation and loss of air sense, you could end up with a spinal cord injury or die. Biles didn’t quit on her team; she stopped competing for her own safety. No competition is worth your life.

I still believe freshmen redshirting is a good thing. Used to be mandatory. Too many adjustments in life for most 18 year-olds.....

Yes! There is a reason why running is the last event in a triathlon; it is the least dangerous.

Lots of haters, but I told the truth. Insomnia is a conditioned fear of sleeplessness that leads to a strong level of hyperarousal which prevents your body's natural sleep drive from taking over. It's essentially a vicious cycle or feedback loop. Check this guy out. I've been through this so I know what I'm talking about. You're going to need to be proactive in doing the work and learning to live with uncertainty, i.e. you don't have control over this which is apparently a big mental hurdle for all you Type A perfectionist competitive runner types, the kinds of people who get things like insomnia by the way.

After a long bout of sickness followed by injury plus social and academic stresses I had a bout of insomnia (2015-2016 as well). I sucked at running but kept trying until one day I had to tell my coach I had gotten 1 hour of sleep the night before and couldn't do my workout. I think he could tell something was wrong and let me go without ever asking another question. Eventually I think I got into a strict sleep ritual and was set back enough in training that running fast the rest of the year seemed unrealistic and I was able to ease out of it. I still have trouble sleeping during periods of high stress but nothing like that month or two in college.

I was lucky to be in a situation where I wasn't under a microscope and had a coach that gave me room to figure things out and I was actually in a great place mentally and physically about a year later. I wasn't going to Stanford, contending for NCAA titles, or well-known enough to have anyone care how I was running outside my personal life. I can imagine breaking that cycle would be much much harder in Roisin's situation and feel for her.

Yes, here was a quote that I found helpful from this post: "Curtis found his own solution: No matter how badly he'd slept the night before, he'd go for a daily run. He also stopped sleep scheduling and lifted his self-imposed ban on evening socializing. "The less I focused on sleep, and the more I focused on the rest of my life, that was when things got better," he says. "I won't say I'm sleeping normally, but for about two years now it's been really good.""

He basically chose to live his life regardless.

Thanks for clarifying the rules.

clarifying

That's only ONE reason for insomnia, it's not the ONLY reason.

Sleep disruption =/= insomnia.

My baby crying all night keeping me awake, being obese and having sleep apnea are examples of sleep disruption, not insomnia.

All you wellness culture folks who obsess over "sleep hygiene" are the ones who stand to get burned by being so close minded here, not me.

Sometimes I really love Letsrun, but sometimes there are threads like this that are really frustrating to read. I wish we could all just agree to be supportive for her while she's going through a difficult time.

Misguided thinking often is a symptom of depression, and it really compounds the problem. People who are struggling and thinking that feeling this way must mean that they are somehow defective or inept might read Roisin's post and see things differently. By absolutely no definition is Roisin Willis defective or inept. Quite the opposite. If someone like her says that she feels worthless, people scratch their heads and say "wow, that is messed up". Maybe somewhere out there some young fan of hers is going through something similar, and when they see that someone like Roisin can have this experience when her self image is so distrorted it can make them question their own negative messages about themselves. One of the first steps to recovering from depression is to stop the internal self bashing and to start looking at yourself with kindness and compassion. I think a post like this from someone like Roisin could be enough to get someone questioning their own thinking or to seek help. When someone average struggles with depression no one bats an eye. When a superstar like Roisin struggles with depression, even in the midst of winning a national title, it really highlights the disconnect between the person's inner thinking and what the rest of us are seeing. I think this post had a lot of value, and I appreciate her even more than I already did to have the courage to share this in the hope of helping someone else.

Which is the exact reason that Willis gave in a interview as the main cause of her stress.

I've talked to a lot of college freshman and that is the number one problem they have told me that they have, which is having to deal with too many new things all at the same time. So I can understand someone calling for mandatory redshirting of all freshman.

On the other hand, Athing Mu wouldn't be Olympic champion if she hadn't competed her freshman year, so it's not that simple.

Roisin just appeared today (6/19) as an entrant in the 800 at USAs (senior race).

So, hope this is positive news she's on the rebound.