{"id":323795,"date":"2019-08-29T08:42:30","date_gmt":"2019-08-29T15:42:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/?p=323795"},"modified":"2019-08-29T08:42:30","modified_gmt":"2019-08-29T15:42:30","slug":"robert-whittaker-opens-up-on-recent-struggle-with-depression","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/robert-whittaker-opens-up-on-recent-struggle-with-depression\/","title":{"rendered":"Robert Whittaker opens up on recent struggle with depression"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Robert Whittaker was expected to defend his UFC middleweight title against Kelvin Gastelum at UFC 234 in in Melbourne, Australia back in February. Regrettably, the Australian was forced out of this fight at the last minute with a hernia and a collapsed bowel that required immediate, emergency surgery.<\/p>\n<p>Whittaker says this unfortunate twist of fate left him in a pit of depression and despair. He opened up on this struggle on a recent episode of <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/kZKzQhOXsFg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Submission Radio<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Robert Whittaker Opens Up on Depression, Israel Adesanya, Crazy UFC 243 Press Conference\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/kZKzQhOXsFg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Depression is real, and it doesn\u2019t matter who you are, you can get depressed and you can feel like you\u2019re falling down a pit of despair,&#8221; Whittaker said. &#8220;But it was hard. That camp was very hard for me. Coming back from the injury, being behind in terms of like the goal-setting that I wanted, my markers. I was very behind. Seeing my training partners performing much better than I, and it was a hard time for myself to motivate myself, to keep going, to motivate myself to feel good. I was just\u2026 I was very apathetic and didn\u2019t want to do anything. That\u2019s kind of how it is for me. But I did (get over it) and I\u2019m on top of the world now.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Luckily, with the help of the people around him, Robert Whittaker was able to emerge from these mental health struggles. He&#8217;s now set to defend his title against interim middleweight champion Israel Adesanya at UFC 243 in Melbourne this October.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;What really helped me is obviously the people that surrounded me,&#8221; Whittaker said. &#8220;You know, being supported by my wife, my kids, the support system I had around myself you know, my coaching staff, my training partners, they all cared for me. And just knowing that they\u2019re there and you can talk to them is very important. Honestly, I just reached a point where I felt that it was either do or die for me. So it was either I had to just start hitting the sessions, I had to get through it, I had to bite down on the mouthguard and just plod along \u2013 or not. And the alternative would have been to hang up the gloves, call it in. And I wasn\u2019t ready to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s not like I suddenly felt like picking up a new hobby, it\u2019s not like I suddenly felt like doing a new job, it was more of like I didn\u2019t want to do anything. I just wanted to have naps, not leave the house and just do nothing. It\u2019s hard. I was demotivated to do anything. And it wasn\u2019t specifically a sport-related thing, it was more everything. I was just tired, mate. I was just tired of it all.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>With his battle with depression in the rear-view, Robert Whittaker is looking forward to sharing the cage with Adesanya. He believes he can put his rival away quickly, especially after watching Adesanya&#8217;s war with Kelvin Gastelum.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cIf Kelvin can get in and hit him, I can. Kelvin could get in there \u2014 I think he was winning the striking exchanges early on. And I\u2019m a better striker than Kelvin. Plus, I don\u2019t drop off.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI\u2019m going in there with the goal of making sure it\u2019s short. You know, I really am.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>How do you think Robert Whittaker will look in his return to the cage at UFC 243?<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><i>This article first appeared on\u00a0<\/i><a href=\"http:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>BJPENN.COM<\/i><\/span><\/a><i>\u00a0on 8\/29\/2019. <\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Robert Whittaker was expected to defend his UFC middleweight title against Kelvin Gastelum at UFC 234 in in Melbourne, Australia back in February. Regrettably, the Australian was forced out of this fight at the last minute with a hernia and a collapsed bowel that required immediate, emergency surgery. Whittaker says this unfortunate twist of fate [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54430,"featured_media":301722,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[10582,39610],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v19.7 (Yoast SEO v19.14) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Robert Whittaker opens up on recent struggle with depression | BJPenn.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Robert Whittaker opens up on the period of depression that followed his last-minute withdrawal from the UFC 243 card in February.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/staging.tcpcharms.com\/bjpenn\/mma-news\/ufc\/robert-whittaker-opens-up-on-recent-struggle-with-depression\/\" \/>\n<meta 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