MANCHESTER, NH – Ohio State Football Head Coach Ryan Day returned to his hometown in Manchester Friday morning to speak to students about the importance of mental health and what they need to do in order to stay aware and active in a digital world full of stress and anxiety.
The hour-long presentation at The Palace Theatre was filled with information, tips and personal recollections on how kids cam manage mental health issues that often arise during their everchanging teenage years.
“We want to start a conversation, bring awareness, and share some stories about the challenges we faced growing up,” Coach Ryan said following his presentation. “We grew up in this area with some of these schools, playing in some of these fields and we just want to give them some perspective. Hopefully there’s somebody in there that was listening and can get something out of it.”
With students from schools from all over the greater Manchester area packing into Palace Theatre, many were excited to hear from the highly renowned head coach, who created the The Kids Mental Health Foundation in 2019 with his wife Christina, in response to the lack of resources at young kids’ disposal today.
“When he first became the head coach of Ohio State, he was on a recruiting trip and the high school he was attending was shut down because of the amount of suicides that were happening,” Christina said. “He called me and was like, we have got to do something about this.”
Since its inception, the foundation has raised over $2.6 million toward helping kids through tough times, help that Coach Ryan himself wished he’d had back in his childhood, as he had to deal with the loss of his father to suicide when he was just 8 years old.
“I learned that you can be fine on the outside, but not fine on the inside at a very young age,” Coach Ryan said. “It’s really important for them to talk about things and look out for each other, and if they know that they’re struggling, it’s okay to ask for help.”
Also present to support the Days’ in their call for mental health awareness was retired UNH Police Chief Paul Dean, now serving as Gov. Kelly Ayotte’s Advisor on Addiction and Behavioral Health State for New Hampshire, who touched upon his struggles losing a brother to suicide; Manchester Mayor Jay P. Ruais, who detailed his struggle with alcohol addiction and finding recovery; Congressman Chris Pappas, who stressed the importance of speaking up for help.
The students were also lucky enough to receive a special video message from New England Patriots Running Back TreVeyon Henderson, who discussed how he deals with his stress that fills his everyday life as a NFL Player.
“Life is hard. Life is painful. Life comes with a lot of pressure at times,” Henderson said. “You may be tired, you might be feeling hopeless, you may be worried, but I want to encourage you, don’t give up. There’s hope for you. There’s comfort, there’s healing. You have significant value.”
The overarching theme of the presentation was that isolation doesn’t help. Kids need to be comfortable to speak up when things aren’t fine, and learn how to deal with these issues so they aren’t forced down a path of misery.
“When your circumstances might be different, the need for resilience is the same,” coach Ryan said. “When life gets loud, when the pressure hits, when disappointment shows up, when anxiety rises, when you feel like you’re carrying alone, you can prepare for adversity. You can build your tools, you can lean on people, you can ask for help. You can grow stronger. You can fight through it. Resilience isn’t just surviving the hard things, it’s becoming someone who refuses to quit.”
At the end of the presentation, four students were welcomed on stage to ask the Buckeyes coach questions they had regarding mental health, and for South Side Middle School’s own, Jeremiah, it was an unforgettable experience.
“It meant so much to me,” Jeremiah said. “He also struggles with mental health, just like us. I really learned that it’s not showing weakness to go to other people and ask them for help.”
Jeremiah, who lost a beloved family member a few years ago, struggled with the loss and found solace through Coach Ryan’s own story, helping him through the anguish and grief of losing a loved one. After the presentation, Jeremiah felt like he really knew and understood Coach Ryan, not just a coach, but as a human being.
“He’s just such a cool person,” Jeremiah said. “If I could only have one friend in the world, it would be him.”