Marcus Trescothick had Depression and it Hurt him Badly

Marcus Edward Trescothick is an English Cricketer who has represented England in many International One day and Test matches. He was born on 25 December 1975 in Keynsham, Somerset, in England. He played 76 Test matches and 123 One Day Internationals and he was a left-handed opening batsman.

He debuted in first class cricket for Somerset in the year 1993 and started his one day international career after seven years in the year 2000 against Zimbabwe. The test debut was also in the same year against West Indies. He holds many international records and national records in cricket. He has most One Day International centuries of any English player. He also holds the record for fastest half-century in English Twenty20 cricket.

"Coming Back to me" from Markus

He has played the team captain role in about two test matches and close to 10 ODI's. Trescothick played brilliantly between the years 2000 to 2006 after which he started getting haunted by the stress related illness which made him stay away from the national and international cricket squad. After trying to come back in 2007, in first class cricket, he scored a double century, but remained sceptical about his international comeback. He announced his retirement in March 2008, but continued to play at the county level for Somerset. He is right now working as a commentator for County matches.

In September 2006, he withdrew himself from left over series of ODI's against Pakistan. He quoted the stress related illness the reason for the same and later it was believed that he suffered from clinical depression which has caused him to break from the series in between.

Some of the Records which Marcus holds

1. He scored 1000 runs in a calendar year thrice, in 2003, 2004 and 2005.
2. In Edgbaston, he became the First player to score a century in both innings against West Indies.
3. Played most consecutive ODIs for England: 92
4. Made most centuries in ODI cricket by an England player - 12

How Marcus overcome depression

Marcus after getting to know about his stress related illness, decided to take professional help for the illness. He went to the doctor for his clinical depression and started with the therapy. So he took two big decisions, one to go public about his illness (although depression has its own taboos) and then taking the help of doctors in curing this illness.

In Marcus words, he has hidden depression for weeks, months and years before realizing that it is not going to help me in any way. So he decided to open up and he cannot run from his inner daemons. Suicidal thoughts, sobbing, bursting into tears in the dressing room are some of the common symptoms which Trescothick remembers during his depression days.

Initially Marcus fought with the thought that how the family and friends will react if his illness became public. "I am a man and men don’t do these things”. These were his feeling and he considered it a weakness within himself.

The master class batsman is a calm man and he generally remain away from dramatic overplays or conditions. He wrote his ground breaking book on depression and opened up in the year 2008. Way to go Marcus.