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Speaker 1: The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.

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Speaker 1: Detective see a side of life the average person is

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Speaker 1: never exposed to. I spent thirty four years as a cop.

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Speaker 1: For twenty five of those years I was catching killers.

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Speaker 1: That's what I did for a living. I was a

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Speaker 1: homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys, staid,

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Speaker 1: I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated.

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Speaker 1: The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories

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Speaker 1: from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw

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Speaker 1: and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some

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Speaker 1: of the content and language might be confronting. That's because

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Speaker 1: no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged.

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Speaker 1: Join me now as I take you into this world.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to another episode of I Catch Killers. We all

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Speaker 1: carry our own personal demons. Sometimes you look at other

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Speaker 1: people's lives and think, because of the success they've achieved,

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Speaker 1: life must be pretty good. But sadly life can be

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Speaker 1: a bit more complicated, even for Olympic gold medalists like

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Speaker 1: today's guest Matthew Mitcham. This might be a slight deviation

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Speaker 1: from your typical eye Catch Killers. But I thought in

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Speaker 1: the Olympic spirit, it would be good to get an

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Speaker 1: Olympic athlete on I Catch Killers. In two thousand and eight,

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Speaker 1: Matt stood on the podium at the Beijing Olympics to

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Speaker 1: receive his gold medal for ten meter platform diving. He

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Speaker 1: was only twenty years old at the time, and he

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Speaker 1: was the first individual openly gay male athlete ever to

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Speaker 1: win an Olympic goal. What the public didn't realize at

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Speaker 1: the time, Matt had been dealing with his own issues,

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Speaker 1: including drug addiction. Today, Matt has agreed to come on

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Speaker 1: I Catch Killers and talk about the highs and lows

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Speaker 1: of his life. Matthew Mitcham, Welcome to I Catch Killers.

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Speaker 2: Thank you.

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Speaker 1: Is it a bit daunting the name of the podcast

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Speaker 1: I Catch Killers? And you're talking to an next homicide

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Speaker 1: detective And I know in the chats we've had before

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Speaker 1: you're thinking how do I fit into this?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, like, what do you know?

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Speaker 1: Well, that's what we're going to get to the bottom

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Speaker 1: of to get confessions out of your mat. Look, thanks

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Speaker 1: for coming on your life. In prepping for the podcast

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Speaker 1: and following your career. You know your household name at

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Speaker 1: certain times in this country over here in Australia that

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Speaker 1: you've experienced the highs and layers of life like most

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Speaker 1: of us do. But in your case it was probably

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Speaker 1: more difficult because it was such a public thing and

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Speaker 1: you're only twenty when you won Olympic gold, and in Australia,

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Speaker 1: as you know, when in Olympic gold, you've become a

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Speaker 1: household name. What was it like dealing with dealing with

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Speaker 1: that sort of attention at such a young age.

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Speaker 3: It's one of those weird things. I think, I I

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Speaker 3: kind of I think I wished it upon myself for

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Speaker 3: a very long time in that a very powerful driving

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Speaker 3: force throughout my teenage years. Like that actually kept me

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Speaker 3: in the sport for you know, many years longer than

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Speaker 3: what I probably would have otherwise.

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Speaker 2: Was the fact that you know.

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Speaker 3: I I was very driven by external motivation, like by

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Speaker 3: external validation, because I I've never been able to esteem

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Speaker 3: myself and within I've never had good self esteem.

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Speaker 2: My idea of my value has always.

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Speaker 3: Been completely dependent on you know, like feedback from other people,

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Speaker 3: like you know, validation and positive reinforcement from you know,

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Speaker 3: my mother who didn't give it freely, or you know,

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Speaker 3: from validation from other people or you know, then I

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Speaker 3: ended up finding a sport where I got feedback about

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Speaker 3: myself in the form of numbers. So if I got

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Speaker 3: an eight, they thought I was good. If I got

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Speaker 3: a nine, they thought I was great, And if I

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Speaker 3: got a ten, they thought I was perfect, which you know,

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Speaker 3: was a very It was a very powerful motivator for

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Speaker 3: me to try and be better and better in order

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Speaker 3: to feel better about myself just because of my achievements.

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Speaker 1: Right. It's interesting that your validation of yourself is from

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Speaker 1: X journal achievements, and I want to dive deeper into

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Speaker 1: that later on in the podcast, because that certainly came

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Speaker 1: out in the interviews that you've done and the way

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Speaker 1: that you talk about what drove you. I want to

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Speaker 1: ask the question. You're the first Olympic gold medalist. We've

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Speaker 1: had on Eye Catch Killers, So congratulations. We got to

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Speaker 1: bronze with Harry Garside, the boxer, we've had him on

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Speaker 1: the podcast, but we've never got to the gold. So

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Speaker 1: you're the first gold medalist. I want to ask you.

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Speaker 1: I'm trying to get a sense of what drives you,

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Speaker 1: what gives you the sense to believe that you could

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Speaker 1: be the best in the world in your chosen field. Now,

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Speaker 1: I think I'm a fairly driven person. I think, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I can achieve this, I can achieve that. But there's

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Speaker 1: different levels and what mindset do you have to think

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Speaker 1: I'm going to be the best in the world of

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Speaker 1: what I'm doing? What drives you for that?

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Speaker 3: Unfortunately, I think as a child and as a teenager,

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Speaker 3: the motivation was actually quite negative because I grew up

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Speaker 3: in you know, probably not the I guess, the healthiest

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Speaker 3: of environments. I grew up as an only child of

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Speaker 3: a single parent who had you know, she had me

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Speaker 3: extremely young, she was eighteen, and she also had undiagnosed

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Speaker 3: aspergers like autism and ADHD, and so she found it

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Speaker 3: extremely difficult to cope with well even just you know,

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Speaker 3: living life on life's terms, like dealing with her own emotions,

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Speaker 3: let alone having this you know, completely chaotic, you know, unpredictable,

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Speaker 3: you know thing running around that. You know, I think

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Speaker 3: it stressed her out a lot, and you know, so

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Speaker 3: her default reaction to everything was kind of I guess, rage,

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Speaker 3: because she didn't know how to handle her feelings at all.

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Speaker 2: That's just how they came out.

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Speaker 3: And you know, she has admitted to me in later

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Speaker 3: years that you know, she kind of you know, used

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Speaker 3: that fear that I had of her volatility as a

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Speaker 3: way to control me, to make me easier to control.

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Speaker 3: But the impact of that was that I had anxiety,

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Speaker 3: like from as early as I can remember. And and

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Speaker 3: you know, she also used to spend a lot of

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Speaker 3: time in bed, you know, with chronic fatigue, and she

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Speaker 3: would just go absolutely baalistic if I, you know, if

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Speaker 3: I made noise and woke her up, and so you know,

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Speaker 3: there was a lot of neglect there as well. And

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Speaker 3: I found out I figured out pretty early that when

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Speaker 3: I did something really good, then I got this positive

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Speaker 3: reinforcement and this validation that like that felt really good,

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Speaker 3: and that's I guess I felt like that's what I

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Speaker 3: need it.

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Speaker 2: And so then I guess my child mind kind of.

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Speaker 3: Played that forward and thought, well, if I do something

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Speaker 3: good and I get that positive reinforcement, then if I'm

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Speaker 3: the best in the world at something, then you know,

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Speaker 3: then Mum will love me and everyone will love me,

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Speaker 3: and you know, I'll feel whole, I'll feel complete. So

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Speaker 3: you know, right literally from the age of about you know, eight,

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Speaker 3: I had this really profound thought like I have to

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Speaker 3: be the best in the world at something, had no

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Speaker 3: idea what it would be. Definitely wasn't going to be

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Speaker 3: sport because I was, you know, one of those kids

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Speaker 3: that was, you know, always picked last at lunchtime for

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Speaker 3: soccer and cricket and football and all that. It was

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Speaker 3: not good at running carnival, swimming, swimming carnivals like nothing.

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Speaker 3: You know, I just got really lucky that I ended

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Speaker 3: up finding trampling and happened to be pretty good.

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Speaker 1: At it, and that led into diving. Breaking it down

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Speaker 1: even further, the psychology, the psychology of thinking, yeah, they're lucky.

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Speaker 1: Were you intimidated by watching other people what they could

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Speaker 1: do and think I can do better, Like I'm just

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Speaker 1: I'm trying to understand that mindset because I think I've

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Speaker 1: got a strong mind. But I'd get to a level

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Speaker 1: and just go I can't compete on that level. There

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Speaker 1: must have been some confidence, internal confidence that thought, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I can be the best.

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Speaker 2: I think I was just kind of blessed with.

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Speaker 3: Quite a lot of natural ability in terms of the

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Speaker 3: you know, the trampolining and then the diving.

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Speaker 2: You know, I it was more a case of.

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Speaker 3: Having to just stick it out because you know, I

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Speaker 3: saw diving as my ticket to being special. But I

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Speaker 3: hated diving from about the age of fourteen, so I've

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Speaker 3: already started to slide into a pretty profound period of

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Speaker 3: depression from fourteen and so, and I hated I hated diving,

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Speaker 3: and but I saw it as my ticket to being special.

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Speaker 3: So I kept on doing it. But because I wasn't

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Speaker 3: enjoying it, I you know, I would get to the pool,

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Speaker 3: I would do everything I needed to do as quickly

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Speaker 3: as possible, but all on autopilot, like without being mentally present,

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Speaker 3: just completely checked out and letting my body kind of

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Speaker 3: do what it needed to be done, and then leaving.

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Speaker 3: And you know, by the time I was eighteen, I

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Speaker 3: was the third best in the country in Australia, like,

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Speaker 3: you know, not just juniors but senior as well. So

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Speaker 3: I kind of knew that, you know, the longer I

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Speaker 3: held on, I would eventually be going to an Olympics.

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Speaker 2: You know, it did take. You know, I was good.

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Speaker 3: I wasn't great, but I was I was good, And

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Speaker 3: that was kind of that was that was basically just

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Speaker 3: a bit of natural ability really and repetition over time.

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Speaker 3: My biggest issue was the mental side of things in

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Speaker 3: not wanting to be there.

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Speaker 1: I suppose in a perverse sort of way that might

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Speaker 1: have might have helped. It took a little bit of

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Speaker 1: pressure off because it wasn't something this golden dream I

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Speaker 1: want to be this world champion. It was more I

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Speaker 1: need to be this world champion. So maybe it was

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Speaker 1: helpful in a perverse sort of way.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, so it was, of course, like in a way

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Speaker 3: it was in a perverse kind of way. Yeah, it

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Speaker 3: was helpful in that it just kept me in the sport,

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Speaker 3: you know, for a certain amount of time. I did

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Speaker 3: retire at eighteen with no intention of ever returning to

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Speaker 3: the sport and ended up taking a year off. And

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Speaker 3: in that year I got a message from a coach

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Speaker 3: in another city saying, look, Matt, if you ever want

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Speaker 3: to start diving again, I'll always have a place in

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Speaker 3: my squad for you. And you know, it was just

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Speaker 3: the way that that message was worded in a really nurturing,

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Speaker 3: like not pushy way. Who it kind of demonstrated to

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Speaker 3: me that he cared for my welfare as a human

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Speaker 3: being more than just me as a as a competing

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Speaker 3: athlete that's going to get them results. And and you know,

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Speaker 3: I knew this guy and I knew that he would

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Speaker 3: be kind of the right person for me, and so I,

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Speaker 3: you know, I packed up everything in Brisbane, which wasn't

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Speaker 3: that much because I was eighteen and really just you

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Speaker 3: know basically and and yeah, moved to Sydney, and that

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Speaker 3: was fifteen months before the Beijing Olympic Games. But the

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Speaker 3: you know, the environment that that coach created for me,

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Speaker 3: that really inclusive environment, that where I knew that I

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Speaker 3: was accepted for exactly who I was, meant that you know,

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Speaker 3: there weren't a lot of the issues of you know,

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Speaker 3: feeling alienated like I had before. That massive geographical had

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Speaker 3: a huge impact on you know, on my mental health,

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Speaker 3: and and that training environment actually had a huge impact

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Speaker 3: on my mental health. And that enabled me to be

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Speaker 3: very present in my training sessions for the first time

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Speaker 3: in years. And being present enabled me to be very

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Speaker 3: analytical about you know, my dives and very technical and

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Speaker 3: so I basically broke my technique down to scratch, down

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Speaker 3: to basics, and then rebuilt it up to get you know.

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Speaker 2: Closer and closer to perfection.

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Speaker 3: And you know, I was kind of I was really

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Speaker 3: only able to do all this because you know, I

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Speaker 3: guess because I was happy in my training environment and

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Speaker 3: being present that. I guess the motivation changed from you know,

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Speaker 3: being very externally focused to actually, I wanted to see

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Speaker 3: how good I could get, like how close to perfect

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Speaker 3: I could get, And so the motivation became an internal motivation.

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Speaker 3: I was now driving, you know, how hard I was working,

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Speaker 3: which then meant that I could push myself further and

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Speaker 3: further into discomfort where the growth is. And so my

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Speaker 3: progress just shot up like an absolute rocket because you know,

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Speaker 3: fifteen months isn't it really isn't a lot of time

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Speaker 3: to prepare for an Olympic Games, especially after you know,

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Speaker 3: spending a year doing very very unhealthy things with my body.

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Speaker 3: So it, yeah, the catalyst for there was, you know

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Speaker 3: that that environment that the coach created.

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Speaker 1: That makes sense. And I hear a lot and we've

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Speaker 1: had quite a few sportsmen on the podcast, but I've

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Speaker 1: heard a lot of people talk about people that have

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Speaker 1: been identified as good coaches, the Wayne Bennett types in

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Speaker 1: rugby league, Johnny Lewis in boxing, and quite often it's

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Speaker 1: about I don't want to just make them a better player,

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Speaker 1: I want to make them a better human being. And

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Speaker 1: people seem to resonate and respond to that, and it

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Speaker 1: sounds like you found a coach that adopted that same

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Speaker 1: type of mindset.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, you know, he.

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Speaker 3: I guess, and maybe it wasn't you know, this hugely

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Speaker 3: kind of remarkable special thing. But I mean, no, it is, like,

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Speaker 3: here's a remarkable guy. But I think it was such

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Speaker 3: a huge contrast because I'd only ever been with one

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Speaker 3: kind of coach, you know, from one country that is

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Speaker 3: the leading country in the sport, but it's so culturally different,

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Speaker 3: and the way that these coaches would coach was very

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Speaker 3: corrections only, like they would only ever give the corrections.

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Speaker 2: For what to do. And when you are.

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Speaker 3: When you've got this, you're hearing everything through this filter

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Speaker 3: of depression, hearing nothing but corrections only for five hours

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Speaker 3: a day, six days a week, week after week, month

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Speaker 3: after month, year after year, just over and over, it's

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Speaker 3: nothing but like what you did wrong?

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Speaker 2: It really starts to just feel like criticism.

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Speaker 3: And so you know, here I am just being criticized

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Speaker 3: for years, and you know, it took me a few

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Speaker 3: years to be like, why don't you ever tell me

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Speaker 3: what was good about it? And you know, for them

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Speaker 3: to go, well, if I say nothing, then there was

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Speaker 3: nothing wrong. With it, but you know, you don't unless

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Speaker 3: you kind of you know that that is the framework

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Speaker 3: that you're working with. And even still like it's you know,

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Speaker 3: particularly for someone with such for self esteem to never

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Speaker 3: ever get validation was just kind of it just felt

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Speaker 3: like punishment all the time, nothing but criticism.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, well, you've explained it well, and I can understand

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Speaker 1: the reason that you'd be be thinking that way. I

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Speaker 1: often look at life and I think about the way

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Speaker 1: I was brought up, and I say this, and I

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Speaker 1: tried to correct it with my kids. I went through

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Speaker 1: life competing in things through fear of failure, and that

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Speaker 1: was what was driven into me. Don't fail at this,

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Speaker 1: So the way I might play sport will be you

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Speaker 1: won't get the best out of me until I've got

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Speaker 1: my back to the wall. It's not about the joy

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Speaker 1: of success. I tried to flip that with my kids

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Speaker 1: and just encourage like the success more than the fear

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Speaker 1: of fear of failure. So I suppose it's each individual

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Speaker 1: has a different way of approaching things and what resonates

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Speaker 1: for them. The type of coach that you're talking about,

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Speaker 1: I would imagine in certain cultures that's what's needed. But

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Speaker 1: for you, it sounded like it was the wrong fit,

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Speaker 1: just the criticism of correction, correction, correction, instead of giving

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Speaker 1: you some positive feedback. So I understand where you're coming from.

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Speaker 3: I actually read a study recently about two groups of

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Speaker 3: I think it was like math students, like the students

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Speaker 3: basically who were doing math competitions or something, and one

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Speaker 3: group of students was praised for their outcome for their success,

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Speaker 3: and the other group of students was praised for their effort.

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Speaker 2: And what ended up happening.

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Speaker 3: Over time was that the students who were praised for

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Speaker 3: their effort ended up outperforming because the students who were

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Speaker 3: praised for their outcome became too stressed about having to

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Speaker 3: always be the best and be sics as for that

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Speaker 3: that ended up giving them kind of I guess in

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Speaker 3: a way like a performance anxiety or you know, you

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Speaker 3: know that perfectionism where you you know that that fear

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Speaker 3: of criticism and so you almost don't try things because

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Speaker 3: you are fear of not getting it perfect. So so

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Speaker 3: it was it was the students who are praised for

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Speaker 3: the effort who ended up progressing and outperforming the outcome focus.

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Speaker 1: That's interesting, isn't it The way to approach things. You

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Speaker 1: mentioned something when we first started speaking, and I've just

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Speaker 1: it's not a direct quote, but it's something in one

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Speaker 1: of the interviews that you've done, one of the many

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Speaker 1: interviews that you've done. It says a lot about what

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Speaker 1: you've learned about life, and it also gives me a

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Speaker 1: good insight in the type of person that you are.

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Speaker 1: And you touched on it right from the start, so

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Speaker 1: it sounds like it's consistent in the way that you

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Speaker 1: approach it. I've sort of combined the essence of what

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Speaker 1: you've been saying in your interviews. Your success does not

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Speaker 1: define you as a person or helps you with your

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Speaker 1: own self esteem. Helping others generates your self esteem more

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Speaker 1: than focusing on your own achievements. Do you want to explain,

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Speaker 1: if I've quoted you correctly, what you mean by that

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Speaker 1: that approach?

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Speaker 3: I mean, I didn't learn that until I, you know,

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Speaker 3: finally went to rehab in twenty eleven, I think when

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Speaker 3: I was twenty three years old, and that was after

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Speaker 3: you know, using drugs and alcohol as a not coping

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Speaker 3: mechanism all throughout my teenage years and then you know,

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Speaker 3: having a relapse of that after the Beijing Olympics until

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Speaker 3: it got to a point of absolute desperation when I

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Speaker 3: finally went to rehab. And you know, that's where I

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Speaker 3: learned about, you know, that I had such poor self

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Speaker 3: esteem and why I, you know, couldn't handle my feelings

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Speaker 3: and why I was so entirely dependent on.

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Speaker 2: All of these external sources of esteem.

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Speaker 3: In order to just survive, really because I just couldn't

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Speaker 3: esteem myself from within. And and it's like that thing

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Speaker 3: of what's the difference between what you can control and

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Speaker 3: what you can't control? And you know, external sources of esteem,

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Speaker 3: you can't control that because you can't control anything outside

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Speaker 3: of yourself.

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Speaker 2: You can't control other people, other places, other things.

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Speaker 3: Try as you might, but you can't guarantee that you

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Speaker 3: can actually control that. You will continue to get that

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Speaker 3: consistent source and flow of external esteem, and so, you know,

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Speaker 3: in order to generate it from within. It's like, well,

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Speaker 3: how do you build your own value as a person?

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Speaker 3: How do you feel good about yourself? And to me,

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Speaker 3: the best way, the most effective way I found to

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Speaker 3: do that was to be of service to other people,

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Speaker 3: To help other people with no expectation of receiving anything

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Speaker 3: in return. Is like the you know that's the the

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Speaker 3: crem dela cremb even you know, just help anybody else

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Speaker 3: out in any way, is you know, it makes you

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Speaker 3: feel good about yourself, and so you know, that's that's

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Speaker 3: why I you know, that's why I do stuff like

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Speaker 3: this and talk about my mental health and you know

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Speaker 3: all of this what's and all kinds of stuff that

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Speaker 3: you know, I used to be and you know, maybe

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Speaker 3: sometimes occasionally still do still feel a little bit of

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Speaker 3: shame every now and then, but I'm able to knock

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Speaker 3: it on the head.

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Speaker 2: But I share my story.

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Speaker 3: Because in the hope that it will help other people

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Speaker 3: to relate to it or you know, to help to

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Speaker 3: make change in sport for example. And I you know,

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Speaker 3: I do a lot of work with you with with charities,

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Speaker 3: you know, particularly like around drug drug charities or lgbt

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Speaker 3: Q plus charities, and I also do I guess most

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Speaker 3: of my work is you know, within diversity, equity inclusion

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Speaker 3: to try and make the world corporate spaces and particularly

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Speaker 3: sports much more inclusive places so that you know, to

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Speaker 3: to give everybody the environment for them to thrive.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. I think when people talk and people with a

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Speaker 1: profile like yourself that talk openly about strengths, weaknesses, fears, successes,

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Speaker 1: or that it has to help because we all put

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Speaker 1: ourselves in their little bubble and think you people just

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Speaker 1: don't understand, and then you have conversations like we're having

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Speaker 1: now and you go, oh, yeah, I get that. I

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Speaker 1: look at my life and talking back like I was

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Speaker 1: a homicide detective and I could be failing in every

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Speaker 1: aspect of my personal life and relationships and things like that,

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Speaker 1: but I got something from helping people when I as

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Speaker 1: a homicide detective. And when I lost that, when that

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Speaker 1: was taken away, I saw they had to look at

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Speaker 1: myself and go, well, are you really a good person

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Speaker 1: or are you just a good person because people said

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Speaker 1: you were because you were helping victims. And I realized

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Speaker 1: that how much I got from that, how much I

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Speaker 1: got from helping others, and it made me feel good

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Speaker 1: about myself, no matter how bad my personal life or

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Speaker 1: other aspects of my life was. Well within I was

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Speaker 1: telling myself, well, I'm a good person because I'm helping

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Speaker 1: other people. So it helped me through through stages like that.

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Speaker 1: You touched briefly on your childhood. Where did you grow up?

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Speaker 1: And you're a single child with single mother, and as

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Speaker 1: you explained, that had certain issues that she was dealing with.

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Speaker 1: How would you describe your childhood when you look back.

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Speaker 3: I grew up in Brisbane and it was a pretty

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Speaker 3: lonely childhood. I'm not gonna lie. I you know, I

397
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Speaker 3: spent a lot of time it was very I had

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Speaker 3: to be very quiet a lot of the time, so

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Speaker 3: I you know, any kind of silent, silent thing I

400
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Speaker 3: could do, I would do. So I was either outside

401
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Speaker 3: jumping on the trampoline, or I was kind of reading

402
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Speaker 3: the encyclopedia because I just loved I mean it was

403
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Speaker 3: it was escapism basically, like you know, learning reading the encyclopedia.

404
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Speaker 3: But I just I loved it. I just loved loved reading.

405
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Speaker 3: But never fiction, always nonfiction. And yeah, it was a

406
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Speaker 3: very anxious childhood. You know. I just remember constantly being

407
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Speaker 3: afraid that I was going to be you.

408
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Speaker 2: Know, screamed at.

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Speaker 3: You know that kind of blood curdling scream that just

410
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Speaker 3: like that goes all the way to the core of

411
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Speaker 3: you and just rattles your bones and just and then

412
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Speaker 3: that that that feeling of dread just kind of then

413
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Speaker 3: radiates out from your body and you just feel ill.

414
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Speaker 3: That was the kind of you know that was that

415
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Speaker 3: was a pretty common occurrence. But I think, you know,

416
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Speaker 3: there's there's something about being screamed at that that really

417
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Speaker 3: just does something to your self esteem. Like, yes, I

418
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Speaker 3: don't know, for some reason, I'm particularly affected by words

419
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Speaker 3: more so than you know, like words affect me more

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Speaker 3: than being hit does, which is just so weird. But

421
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Speaker 3: you know, that's that's just how I made and you know,

422
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Speaker 3: and when I'm aware of it, you know, I can

423
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Speaker 3: try and do put in measures to stop that. But yeah,

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Speaker 3: it's for some reason, you know, bones, bones, heel, but words.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, let's stay with you.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I understand that, And it's the type of person

427
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Speaker 1: person you are. I can understand how it would affect

428
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Speaker 1: you deeply. Did you have any role models, anyone that

429
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Speaker 1: you looked up to, aspired to, or people that you

430
00:24:45,080 --> 00:24:48,520
Speaker 1: thought were ah good influences in your life in those

431
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Speaker 1: early years.

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Speaker 2: Not really, I think I don't know.

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Speaker 3: I feel like I was just kind of in survival

434
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Speaker 3: mode and I was very like kind of yeah, I

435
00:25:00,480 --> 00:25:06,439
Speaker 3: was always looking very inwards, very you know, introspective, very reflective,

436
00:25:08,160 --> 00:25:11,280
Speaker 3: you know, just very very trapped up here rather than

437
00:25:11,320 --> 00:25:14,719
Speaker 3: looking to the outside world for you know, for guidance

438
00:25:14,880 --> 00:25:18,040
Speaker 3: or of support or anything like that.

439
00:25:18,280 --> 00:25:21,119
Speaker 1: Okay, you look back at that, and I think every

440
00:25:21,880 --> 00:25:26,439
Speaker 1: child deserves that safe space. And that's thoughts with you

441
00:25:26,520 --> 00:25:28,880
Speaker 1: growing up in that environment. That's good if you've got

442
00:25:28,920 --> 00:25:33,320
Speaker 1: someone that can support you and build that confidence. You're

443
00:25:33,359 --> 00:25:36,040
Speaker 1: also dealing at an early age we've come in to

444
00:25:36,119 --> 00:25:40,800
Speaker 1: terms with your sexuality. When did you discover your sexuality

445
00:25:40,920 --> 00:25:43,480
Speaker 1: and when did you try to suppress it? Because that

446
00:25:43,560 --> 00:25:44,560
Speaker 1: must have been hard to.

447
00:25:47,119 --> 00:25:50,320
Speaker 2: I had a Okay, I.

448
00:25:50,400 --> 00:25:53,320
Speaker 3: Just quite a little kind of little shame thing going on,

449
00:25:54,760 --> 00:25:56,080
Speaker 3: like I was going to filter myself.

450
00:25:56,080 --> 00:25:58,000
Speaker 2: But at the end of the day, it's like, I mean,

451
00:25:58,040 --> 00:26:00,199
Speaker 2: it is what it is. It.

452
00:26:00,240 --> 00:26:04,199
Speaker 3: I had a sexual experience. You know, I think I

453
00:26:04,240 --> 00:26:06,879
Speaker 3: was about five or six and he was probably twelve

454
00:26:06,960 --> 00:26:10,440
Speaker 3: or thirteen, and.

455
00:26:11,720 --> 00:26:13,920
Speaker 2: You know that ended up Yeah.

456
00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:17,280
Speaker 3: So that I guess that was probably the first sexual experience.

457
00:26:19,320 --> 00:26:21,520
Speaker 3: And but I knew, I guess I kind of knew

458
00:26:21,520 --> 00:26:25,240
Speaker 3: that I liked boys, you.

459
00:26:25,200 --> 00:26:27,800
Speaker 2: Know, around then or you know, and beyond then. I

460
00:26:27,880 --> 00:26:28,679
Speaker 2: went to a.

461
00:26:30,560 --> 00:26:35,240
Speaker 3: Very religious primary school because it was kind of local

462
00:26:35,400 --> 00:26:39,720
Speaker 3: and and you know, the there was kind of the

463
00:26:39,760 --> 00:26:41,800
Speaker 3: assumption that because as a private school, you're going to

464
00:26:41,800 --> 00:26:45,159
Speaker 3: get like a better educational you know, those religious schools

465
00:26:45,200 --> 00:26:47,239
Speaker 3: because they had this sort of semi private you're going

466
00:26:47,280 --> 00:26:50,360
Speaker 3: to get a better education than at a state school.

467
00:26:50,640 --> 00:26:53,320
Speaker 3: So but so I went to a quite a religious

468
00:26:53,800 --> 00:26:55,720
Speaker 3: primary school that had like a church on the grounds

469
00:26:55,760 --> 00:26:58,199
Speaker 3: and everything, and you know, there was a lot of

470
00:26:58,240 --> 00:27:02,800
Speaker 3: religious education. There were like a little old little tabernacle

471
00:27:02,920 --> 00:27:07,040
Speaker 3: kind of thing in the in every room, and you know,

472
00:27:07,119 --> 00:27:08,160
Speaker 3: lots of Bible.

473
00:27:07,840 --> 00:27:09,560
Speaker 2: Reading throughout the week.

474
00:27:10,720 --> 00:27:13,240
Speaker 3: And it was you know, kind of around the eight

475
00:27:13,359 --> 00:27:17,760
Speaker 3: or nine mark where I started. You know, nobody, I

476
00:27:17,760 --> 00:27:20,720
Speaker 3: don't think anybody ever said it to me explicitly, but

477
00:27:21,440 --> 00:27:25,480
Speaker 3: you know, I think through all of that and and

478
00:27:25,560 --> 00:27:28,880
Speaker 3: you know, probably messages that I was absorbing from society

479
00:27:28,920 --> 00:27:32,000
Speaker 3: as well growing up in the nineties. You know, I

480
00:27:32,080 --> 00:27:35,800
Speaker 3: just I basically kind of got the idea that gay

481
00:27:35,920 --> 00:27:37,199
Speaker 3: was not as good as straight, and I knew that

482
00:27:37,240 --> 00:27:41,639
Speaker 3: I liked boys, and and I guess the shaming of that,

483
00:27:42,800 --> 00:27:47,720
Speaker 3: you know, started around that age. And and so I

484
00:27:47,720 --> 00:27:50,560
Speaker 3: put a rubber band around my risk because I, you know,

485
00:27:50,840 --> 00:27:52,800
Speaker 3: having a shame around you know, how I was feeling.

486
00:27:52,960 --> 00:27:55,560
Speaker 3: I'd put a rubber band around my wrist and every

487
00:27:55,560 --> 00:27:57,600
Speaker 3: time I had a gay thought. I would kind of

488
00:27:57,640 --> 00:28:00,240
Speaker 3: snap the rubber band against my wrist as heart as

489
00:28:00,240 --> 00:28:04,119
Speaker 3: I could to try and like train myself have Loovian

490
00:28:04,200 --> 00:28:06,439
Speaker 3: style out of out of being gay, you know, to

491
00:28:06,440 --> 00:28:09,280
Speaker 3: try and associate pain with these gay thoughts. I'm hoping

492
00:28:09,280 --> 00:28:11,680
Speaker 3: that that would kind of train me out of it.

493
00:28:12,240 --> 00:28:15,240
Speaker 3: And yeah, so I.

494
00:28:15,320 --> 00:28:18,200
Speaker 1: Just want to say, on that matter, what a horrible

495
00:28:18,240 --> 00:28:22,240
Speaker 1: way to go through your life trying to suppress your feelings,

496
00:28:22,240 --> 00:28:26,679
Speaker 1: like feelings like, yeah, they're strong, it's to suppress them.

497
00:28:26,760 --> 00:28:29,000
Speaker 1: You're lying to yourself and you've taken it to the

498
00:28:29,040 --> 00:28:33,560
Speaker 1: next level. Have loov Dog style that you inflicting pain

499
00:28:33,640 --> 00:28:37,400
Speaker 1: when you when you have a thought, yeah about your desires.

500
00:28:37,640 --> 00:28:39,600
Speaker 1: It must have it must have stuffed you up in

501
00:28:39,640 --> 00:28:41,640
Speaker 1: the in the mind. That must have really confused you

502
00:28:41,800 --> 00:28:42,800
Speaker 1: as a young guy.

503
00:28:43,200 --> 00:28:48,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know there's not only is there kind

504
00:28:48,440 --> 00:28:53,400
Speaker 3: of this fear, but then there's then there's even more

505
00:28:53,440 --> 00:28:56,880
Speaker 3: shame put onto it because it's like this isn't working,

506
00:28:57,200 --> 00:29:02,120
Speaker 3: like I can't, like I'm failing it there, like you know,

507
00:29:02,680 --> 00:29:05,240
Speaker 3: so there's a far out man.

508
00:29:05,320 --> 00:29:07,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's.

509
00:29:08,400 --> 00:29:11,280
Speaker 3: It is pretty upsetting to think about, Like you know,

510
00:29:12,120 --> 00:29:16,040
Speaker 3: I did eventually kind of figure out that it wasn't

511
00:29:16,080 --> 00:29:18,560
Speaker 3: working and just kind of let it go.

512
00:29:19,880 --> 00:29:23,160
Speaker 2: And you know, I think I just had to stop

513
00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:25,120
Speaker 2: thinking about it for a while.

514
00:29:27,480 --> 00:29:30,000
Speaker 3: Yeah, because I don't remember kind of thinking about it

515
00:29:30,040 --> 00:29:32,400
Speaker 3: anymore for a couple of years, and so I think

516
00:29:32,400 --> 00:29:35,520
Speaker 3: it was just stop stopping thinking about it, basically suppressing it.

517
00:29:36,040 --> 00:29:38,360
Speaker 2: Just stop thinking about it, it'll go away, ignoring it.

518
00:29:38,600 --> 00:29:42,280
Speaker 1: When did you come out and acknowledge, like we'll talk

519
00:29:42,320 --> 00:29:45,200
Speaker 1: about your time when in the media interview before before

520
00:29:45,240 --> 00:29:47,720
Speaker 1: the Olympics, but in your personal life, when did you

521
00:29:47,760 --> 00:29:50,560
Speaker 1: come out and just acknowledge it and accept Well, that's

522
00:29:50,640 --> 00:29:53,240
Speaker 1: that's who I am.

523
00:29:53,760 --> 00:29:56,160
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess I was. I guess I was

524
00:29:56,200 --> 00:29:58,320
Speaker 2: getting more comfortable with it.

525
00:30:01,040 --> 00:30:01,240
Speaker 1: See.

526
00:30:01,320 --> 00:30:01,520
Speaker 2: Yeah.

527
00:30:01,560 --> 00:30:05,920
Speaker 3: The thing is like, yeah, probably around sort of thirteen fourteen,

528
00:30:06,600 --> 00:30:11,600
Speaker 3: you know, like I had a close girlfriend who knew,

529
00:30:11,720 --> 00:30:20,080
Speaker 3: and then I guess I started finding a few more friends.

530
00:30:21,720 --> 00:30:24,720
Speaker 3: But yeah, it was only like people who are kind

531
00:30:24,760 --> 00:30:30,280
Speaker 3: of very close to me. And because I'd started diving

532
00:30:30,280 --> 00:30:32,920
Speaker 3: with the AIS from the age of eleven, which is

533
00:30:33,320 --> 00:30:35,880
Speaker 3: way too young to be confident enough in your sexual

534
00:30:35,920 --> 00:30:39,840
Speaker 3: identity to be telling anybody. By the time I was

535
00:30:40,120 --> 00:30:43,160
Speaker 3: kind of comfortable enough to start telling people I'd already

536
00:30:43,200 --> 00:30:45,720
Speaker 3: been training with these people for five hours a day,

537
00:30:45,760 --> 00:30:50,480
Speaker 3: six days a week for several years, and so I

538
00:30:50,520 --> 00:30:55,280
Speaker 3: then consequently felt very stuck in and not being able

539
00:30:55,360 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 3: to really to talk to anybody within my training environment

540
00:31:00,200 --> 00:31:02,080
Speaker 3: and open up to them, because I felt like that

541
00:31:02,120 --> 00:31:05,040
Speaker 3: would be admitting that I had been lying to them.

542
00:31:05,080 --> 00:31:07,080
Speaker 2: I've been deceiving years.

543
00:31:07,280 --> 00:31:10,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can understand that. It makes it makes it

544
00:31:10,880 --> 00:31:12,160
Speaker 1: a little bit difficult, doesn't it.

545
00:31:12,680 --> 00:31:16,000
Speaker 3: Yeah, So that left me feeling stuck in that training

546
00:31:16,040 --> 00:31:18,920
Speaker 3: environment for a couple of years, which consequently left me

547
00:31:18,920 --> 00:31:22,080
Speaker 3: feeling quite alienated. And that didn't That really didn't help

548
00:31:22,160 --> 00:31:26,280
Speaker 3: with you know, how happy I was within the training environment.

549
00:31:26,880 --> 00:31:29,960
Speaker 1: With the training environment, when did you you start off

550
00:31:30,000 --> 00:31:32,960
Speaker 1: doing trampoline and you reached the high level in that?

551
00:31:33,520 --> 00:31:35,600
Speaker 1: Talk us through that, how you how you got into that,

552
00:31:35,640 --> 00:31:38,560
Speaker 1: and what level you reached, and then how you diverted

553
00:31:38,600 --> 00:31:40,120
Speaker 1: your interests in diving.

554
00:31:41,760 --> 00:31:46,120
Speaker 3: I started trampolining when I was nine. I because I

555
00:31:46,160 --> 00:31:49,920
Speaker 3: got given a backyard trampoline by my brand dad's girlfriend

556
00:31:50,000 --> 00:31:54,160
Speaker 3: at the time, just a super functional family going generations back.

557
00:31:56,080 --> 00:31:59,400
Speaker 3: But her son didn't need the trampoline anymore, he'd grown

558
00:31:59,440 --> 00:32:01,920
Speaker 3: out of it. So I got given the trampoline and

559
00:32:02,760 --> 00:32:06,400
Speaker 3: I just absolutely loved it, and so went to trampling

560
00:32:07,000 --> 00:32:10,080
Speaker 3: lessons from the age of nine, and you just absolutely

561
00:32:10,080 --> 00:32:14,440
Speaker 3: loved flipping and being acrobatic and performing. And you know,

562
00:32:14,520 --> 00:32:18,480
Speaker 3: probably the you know, the pretty leotards didn't hurt either,

563
00:32:19,240 --> 00:32:20,600
Speaker 3: but you know there was something.

564
00:32:20,240 --> 00:32:23,160
Speaker 2: About in your boxes, yeah, exactly.

565
00:32:23,440 --> 00:32:26,840
Speaker 3: There was something about, you know, the idea of the

566
00:32:27,120 --> 00:32:30,920
Speaker 3: aim is to be kind of prettier, all better than

567
00:32:31,040 --> 00:32:33,400
Speaker 3: everybody else that you know, that kind of resonated me

568
00:32:33,680 --> 00:32:36,400
Speaker 3: on a very deep level, you know, because I'd never

569
00:32:36,440 --> 00:32:42,120
Speaker 3: be competitive at anything before. So I, you know, I

570
00:32:42,120 --> 00:32:44,440
Speaker 3: was doing trampoline. I went to my first World Junior

571
00:32:44,520 --> 00:32:48,920
Speaker 3: Championships at eleven, and then you know, and then started

572
00:32:49,120 --> 00:32:54,240
Speaker 3: diving not long after that because I you know, in

573
00:32:54,280 --> 00:32:58,520
Speaker 3: the summer holidays, yeah, mom just used to use the

574
00:32:59,040 --> 00:33:02,959
Speaker 3: local pool as like a babysit all day daycare. Basically,

575
00:33:02,960 --> 00:33:04,479
Speaker 3: they dropped off at nine o'clock in the morning, pick

576
00:33:04,520 --> 00:33:06,400
Speaker 3: me up at five or six o'clock in the evening.

577
00:33:06,960 --> 00:33:09,959
Speaker 3: And my local pool just happened to be the Slimen

578
00:33:10,320 --> 00:33:14,720
Speaker 3: Aquatic Center, which is the national training center for diving.

579
00:33:14,960 --> 00:33:19,040
Speaker 2: Okay, and you know, back in the nineties, they used to.

580
00:33:20,640 --> 00:33:23,000
Speaker 3: They used to have the boards open to the public,

581
00:33:24,320 --> 00:33:26,600
Speaker 3: you know, for like an hour or two, like every

582
00:33:26,720 --> 00:33:29,760
Speaker 3: every day before I reaches shut all that dawn.

583
00:33:30,360 --> 00:33:33,400
Speaker 1: I remember those days. It just sounds ridiculous jump off

584
00:33:33,400 --> 00:33:37,720
Speaker 1: the ten minutes. Okay, well have you ever done it before? Man? Can?

585
00:33:37,920 --> 00:33:40,840
Speaker 1: I just can't imagine that these days. But yeah, I

586
00:33:40,920 --> 00:33:43,680
Speaker 1: know it was a different different times. Wasn't a different times?

587
00:33:43,720 --> 00:33:47,120
Speaker 3: It was, you know, so everybody was kind of doing

588
00:33:47,280 --> 00:33:50,360
Speaker 3: bomb dives and I was showing off doing double flips

589
00:33:50,360 --> 00:33:52,160
Speaker 3: into bomb dives because I was a show pony. And

590
00:33:53,920 --> 00:33:56,960
Speaker 3: one of the national coaches just happened to be walking

591
00:33:56,960 --> 00:33:59,880
Speaker 3: out along pool deck and saw me, and I was like, Hey,

592
00:34:00,240 --> 00:34:01,080
Speaker 3: how do you know how to do that?

593
00:34:01,120 --> 00:34:02,400
Speaker 2: Do you do? You want to try diving?

594
00:34:02,400 --> 00:34:04,800
Speaker 3: And so I started diving the next week and I

595
00:34:04,840 --> 00:34:08,560
Speaker 3: was doing both sports for a couple of years. Went

596
00:34:08,600 --> 00:34:13,759
Speaker 3: to my second World Junior Trampoline Championships at thirteen, won

597
00:34:13,760 --> 00:34:19,359
Speaker 3: a gold medal, and I was progressing through up through

598
00:34:19,360 --> 00:34:22,120
Speaker 3: diving very very quickly because I already had all the skills,

599
00:34:22,360 --> 00:34:27,560
Speaker 3: and you know, trampling was just a demonstration sport in

600
00:34:28,560 --> 00:34:30,920
Speaker 3: the Olympics at the time. And so there was not

601
00:34:31,000 --> 00:34:33,759
Speaker 3: even a one guaranteed spot for Australia to compete, and

602
00:34:33,760 --> 00:34:36,320
Speaker 3: I was a fourteen year old competing against twenty six

603
00:34:36,719 --> 00:34:41,719
Speaker 3: seven year olds. You know, it just wasn't It was

604
00:34:41,760 --> 00:34:43,920
Speaker 3: a more logical decision for me to go to diving,

605
00:34:43,920 --> 00:34:46,040
Speaker 3: which you know, it was much better funded, had a

606
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:50,080
Speaker 3: lot more opportunities for international travel and to go to

607
00:34:50,120 --> 00:34:52,520
Speaker 3: the Olympics, a lot more more opportunities to go to

608
00:34:52,560 --> 00:34:56,319
Speaker 3: the Olympics. So I ended up making the switch full

609
00:34:56,360 --> 00:34:58,760
Speaker 3: time to diving at you know, thirteen, fourteen.

610
00:34:59,120 --> 00:35:01,680
Speaker 1: And you hang on to that for quite a few years,

611
00:35:01,680 --> 00:35:03,880
Speaker 1: but then you said you fell out of love with

612
00:35:03,960 --> 00:35:07,879
Speaker 1: diving and your life went off the track before you

613
00:35:08,360 --> 00:35:11,239
Speaker 1: decided to straighten out and go for the Olympics. What

614
00:35:11,600 --> 00:35:13,880
Speaker 1: was that period of life? Like what happened there?

615
00:35:14,080 --> 00:35:18,040
Speaker 3: I just from about the age of fourteen, I started

616
00:35:18,120 --> 00:35:25,080
Speaker 3: to just sink into this this depression which I can't

617
00:35:25,360 --> 00:35:30,080
Speaker 3: there was no one triggering traumatic event. I think it

618
00:35:30,120 --> 00:35:34,440
Speaker 3: was just you know, just the hormonal goat rodeo you know,

619
00:35:34,520 --> 00:35:37,920
Speaker 3: of being a teenager, and also quite a lot of

620
00:35:38,200 --> 00:35:43,360
Speaker 3: genetic predisposition, I'd say as well. But yeah, so from fourteen,

621
00:35:44,000 --> 00:35:47,600
Speaker 3: you know, I was having these very big feelings that

622
00:35:47,680 --> 00:35:56,799
Speaker 3: I couldn't handle, and I discovered, I mean that at

623
00:35:56,840 --> 00:36:00,760
Speaker 3: some stage in my childhood I had made a promise

624
00:36:00,800 --> 00:36:03,879
Speaker 3: to myself that I was never going to act out

625
00:36:03,880 --> 00:36:07,200
Speaker 3: my anger on another person because of you know, because

626
00:36:07,600 --> 00:36:10,239
Speaker 3: that's how it had made me feel, and I never

627
00:36:10,280 --> 00:36:15,600
Speaker 3: wanted to make another person feel that way. Unfortunately, I

628
00:36:15,640 --> 00:36:23,280
Speaker 3: did have very extreme, like uncontainable anger, but I acted

629
00:36:23,320 --> 00:36:28,640
Speaker 3: it out on myself in with self harm, and you know,

630
00:36:28,719 --> 00:36:34,640
Speaker 3: I ended up having to like I was, I was

631
00:36:34,640 --> 00:36:36,720
Speaker 3: self harming. I was, I was, I was cutting myself

632
00:36:36,800 --> 00:36:41,080
Speaker 3: and and I ended up having to pull my grandma

633
00:36:41,120 --> 00:36:44,200
Speaker 3: one time to pick me up from where I was

634
00:36:44,280 --> 00:36:46,040
Speaker 3: and take me to the hospital to get some stitches.

635
00:36:46,120 --> 00:36:50,240
Speaker 3: And and you know that's and and the the worry

636
00:36:50,440 --> 00:36:56,040
Speaker 3: that I caused in her from that made me realize

637
00:36:56,040 --> 00:36:58,080
Speaker 3: that that's not an acceptable way, that's not an appropriate

638
00:36:58,080 --> 00:36:59,799
Speaker 3: way for me to deal with my feelings. But rather

639
00:36:59,840 --> 00:37:02,200
Speaker 3: than actually find an appropriate way to do with my feelings,

640
00:37:02,800 --> 00:37:06,520
Speaker 3: I was just like binge drinking on the weekends because

641
00:37:07,400 --> 00:37:11,680
Speaker 3: you know, I had this wonderful, wonderful effect of making

642
00:37:11,680 --> 00:37:15,080
Speaker 3: me throw up and pass out, which was kind of

643
00:37:15,400 --> 00:37:17,760
Speaker 3: like a mental break for me. It was a break

644
00:37:17,800 --> 00:37:21,080
Speaker 3: from my head and a break from my feelings. And

645
00:37:21,200 --> 00:37:24,520
Speaker 3: so I was literally just sculling, like blocking my nose

646
00:37:24,520 --> 00:37:30,080
Speaker 3: and sculling pure spirits like every weekend. And then that

647
00:37:30,160 --> 00:37:34,239
Speaker 3: you know, progressed to you know, weed and LSD and

648
00:37:34,280 --> 00:37:38,760
Speaker 3: other drugs, and yeah, by the time I was eighteen,

649
00:37:40,040 --> 00:37:41,040
Speaker 3: it just wasn't enough for me.

650
00:37:41,120 --> 00:37:42,920
Speaker 2: Like, you know, diving was good in that.

651
00:37:43,480 --> 00:37:47,760
Speaker 3: I guess it probably did provide some sort of like control.

652
00:37:48,239 --> 00:37:51,120
Speaker 3: It controlled it in a way because I wasn't seldom

653
00:37:51,360 --> 00:37:53,520
Speaker 3: sometimes it was, but I was seldom drinking during the

654
00:37:53,520 --> 00:37:56,720
Speaker 3: week because I had to keep on showing up for diving.

655
00:37:58,360 --> 00:38:02,400
Speaker 3: So in some ways, you know, diving was really good

656
00:38:02,600 --> 00:38:05,400
Speaker 3: at that. But then you know, by the time I

657
00:38:05,400 --> 00:38:10,279
Speaker 3: was eighteen, that that ticket to being special was not

658
00:38:10,520 --> 00:38:15,879
Speaker 3: enough to outweigh how much I was hating it.

659
00:38:16,280 --> 00:38:20,560
Speaker 1: It sounds like self loathing, and it's you weren't drinking

660
00:38:20,600 --> 00:38:22,239
Speaker 1: for the fun of it. Hey, we're going to get

661
00:38:22,239 --> 00:38:26,040
Speaker 1: wild and enjoy ourselves. You were drinking the mask the pain,

662
00:38:27,040 --> 00:38:29,040
Speaker 1: literally knock yourself, knock yourself out.

663
00:38:29,200 --> 00:38:31,360
Speaker 2: And yeah, it was escapism for sure.

664
00:38:31,640 --> 00:38:33,879
Speaker 1: And I would imagine after you come down from that

665
00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:36,920
Speaker 1: and also when you've gone down the path of the

666
00:38:37,000 --> 00:38:41,960
Speaker 1: drugs that you'd wake up feeling worse about yourself, just

667
00:38:41,960 --> 00:38:42,840
Speaker 1: just be spiraling.

668
00:38:43,200 --> 00:38:51,799
Speaker 3: Yeah, particularly the you know, once I turned eighteen, it

669
00:38:51,920 --> 00:38:54,520
Speaker 3: was it was all like it was the party drugs

670
00:38:54,560 --> 00:38:56,439
Speaker 3: as well, like it was the stimulants. It had never

671
00:38:56,480 --> 00:39:00,880
Speaker 3: been the stimulants before, but when I eighteen, it was

672
00:39:01,200 --> 00:39:06,000
Speaker 3: it was everything, and the stimulants had more of that

673
00:39:05,719 --> 00:39:09,960
Speaker 3: had that effect of like making me feel worse afterwards.

674
00:39:09,400 --> 00:39:12,640
Speaker 2: Then you come down front high and exactly.

675
00:39:13,280 --> 00:39:16,560
Speaker 3: So then you know, then that kind of reinforces the

676
00:39:16,560 --> 00:39:19,839
Speaker 3: cycle of like, you know, feeling even worse. So oh,

677
00:39:19,880 --> 00:39:21,560
Speaker 3: I know, I know what's going to make me feel better.

678
00:39:21,600 --> 00:39:23,439
Speaker 3: So you know, you take your pick me up again

679
00:39:23,480 --> 00:39:25,840
Speaker 3: and then you know, temporarily you do feel better, and

680
00:39:25,880 --> 00:39:29,280
Speaker 3: then you feel worse again, and you know, and that's

681
00:39:29,360 --> 00:39:32,680
Speaker 3: you know, so horrible, that feeling is so so horrible

682
00:39:32,719 --> 00:39:35,040
Speaker 3: that you you know, you know, okay, I know how

683
00:39:35,040 --> 00:39:37,080
Speaker 3: to fix this very quickly, and so that's how it

684
00:39:37,160 --> 00:39:39,920
Speaker 3: perpetuates and it reinforces the cycle.

685
00:39:40,200 --> 00:39:42,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, for that, Like I hear a lot of people

686
00:39:43,080 --> 00:39:46,319
Speaker 1: have come on my catch killers and they've been at

687
00:39:46,320 --> 00:39:48,800
Speaker 1: that point in their life and then their life goes

688
00:39:48,920 --> 00:39:52,040
Speaker 1: left and that means you know, twenty years in jail

689
00:39:52,200 --> 00:39:55,040
Speaker 1: or all sorts of things. They hit some layers. How

690
00:39:55,080 --> 00:39:58,640
Speaker 1: did you at that age turn it round to say, okay,

691
00:39:58,719 --> 00:40:00,440
Speaker 1: I'm going to clean up my act and going to

692
00:40:00,480 --> 00:40:03,000
Speaker 1: the Olympics. What was was there one thing that pointed

693
00:40:03,000 --> 00:40:05,359
Speaker 1: you back in the direction or how did you how

694
00:40:05,360 --> 00:40:07,960
Speaker 1: did you turn your life from the obvious direction that

695
00:40:08,040 --> 00:40:11,600
Speaker 1: was heading at that stage to the success that you

696
00:40:11,680 --> 00:40:15,600
Speaker 1: achieved at the Olympics and the dedication and the focus.

697
00:40:17,800 --> 00:40:22,439
Speaker 3: It was literally that text message from that coach, you know, saying, look,

698
00:40:22,440 --> 00:40:24,479
Speaker 3: if you ever want to start diving again, I'll always

699
00:40:24,520 --> 00:40:27,319
Speaker 3: have a place in my squad for you. And you

700
00:40:27,360 --> 00:40:31,080
Speaker 3: know that's I knew that it would be different to

701
00:40:31,160 --> 00:40:34,759
Speaker 3: how it had always been, like to what I was

702
00:40:34,840 --> 00:40:38,160
Speaker 3: used to in terms of, you know, the dynamic within

703
00:40:38,200 --> 00:40:43,120
Speaker 3: a training environment, the dynamic between myself and a coach,

704
00:40:43,800 --> 00:40:46,920
Speaker 3: and you know, I felt it was a shame to

705
00:40:47,320 --> 00:40:49,319
Speaker 3: you know, to quit and to never actually go to

706
00:40:49,360 --> 00:40:52,600
Speaker 3: an Olympic Games. Yes, so you know I knew that

707
00:40:52,640 --> 00:40:56,560
Speaker 3: this was was, you know, my best chance and and

708
00:40:56,600 --> 00:41:02,480
Speaker 3: you know it being only fifteen months on Beijing, I

709
00:41:02,520 --> 00:41:06,399
Speaker 3: didn't want anything to jeopardize my chance of making it

710
00:41:06,440 --> 00:41:10,480
Speaker 3: to that Olympics. So I went cold turkey off absolutely everything,

711
00:41:11,800 --> 00:41:15,360
Speaker 3: you know, drugs, alcohol, junk food, like, you know everything.

712
00:41:15,360 --> 00:41:18,120
Speaker 3: I didn't want anything to jeopardize my chants. And you

713
00:41:18,160 --> 00:41:22,600
Speaker 3: know it, it was a lot of like catching trains

714
00:41:22,680 --> 00:41:26,120
Speaker 3: because I couldn't afford you know, to pay car insurance.

715
00:41:27,239 --> 00:41:29,239
Speaker 3: But it was also a lot of like you know,

716
00:41:29,360 --> 00:41:32,399
Speaker 3: checking the tracks of the seats and of the car

717
00:41:32,440 --> 00:41:34,759
Speaker 3: seats for you know, trapnell that's fallen down there, and

718
00:41:35,719 --> 00:41:41,239
Speaker 3: looking under couch cushions for for train fares. But but it,

719
00:41:41,520 --> 00:41:44,120
Speaker 3: you know, I was catching trains a lot. And you know,

720
00:41:44,239 --> 00:41:48,280
Speaker 3: at I was living in Sydney. So at Lidcombe Station

721
00:41:48,560 --> 00:41:51,880
Speaker 3: there's you know, there's the the bit that's kind of

722
00:41:51,920 --> 00:41:54,600
Speaker 3: separate from the rest of the platforms that goes over

723
00:41:54,680 --> 00:41:59,440
Speaker 3: to Olympic Park and there's this graffiti there that says,

724
00:42:00,280 --> 00:42:01,879
Speaker 3: or there was, I don't know if they've painted over

725
00:42:01,920 --> 00:42:04,200
Speaker 3: it yet, but it says like you know ice age,

726
00:42:04,719 --> 00:42:07,880
Speaker 3: like the movie in that that that type of font.

727
00:42:08,239 --> 00:42:10,200
Speaker 3: But then it says underneath like the crackdown and then

728
00:42:10,200 --> 00:42:14,080
Speaker 3: there's like a crack pipe and a syringe there, and

729
00:42:14,280 --> 00:42:17,959
Speaker 3: so obviously it's a it's a reference to crack or math.

730
00:42:18,040 --> 00:42:20,600
Speaker 3: And you know, it took me six months for me

731
00:42:20,640 --> 00:42:26,160
Speaker 3: because I'd already suspected suspected, I already.

732
00:42:25,920 --> 00:42:28,760
Speaker 2: Knew that I was an addict. At that stage.

733
00:42:28,760 --> 00:42:31,440
Speaker 3: I wouldn't have used that terminology, but I already knew

734
00:42:31,440 --> 00:42:32,680
Speaker 3: that I was struggling with addiction.

735
00:42:32,960 --> 00:42:35,880
Speaker 1: Okay, So I just hold that point there for a

736
00:42:35,920 --> 00:42:38,040
Speaker 1: sec like when you get to that point when you

737
00:42:38,120 --> 00:42:40,799
Speaker 1: realize you're an addict, Like we've all had addictions to

738
00:42:41,080 --> 00:42:43,680
Speaker 1: certain things, and you can delude yourself and go, I

739
00:42:43,680 --> 00:42:45,879
Speaker 1: could give up that anytime I wanted to. But then

740
00:42:45,920 --> 00:42:49,680
Speaker 1: you realize that you're making that excuse time and time again.

741
00:42:50,640 --> 00:42:53,640
Speaker 1: You came to terms of the fact that you're, Yeah,

742
00:42:53,760 --> 00:42:56,000
Speaker 1: and you hate to say it, I'm a drug addict.

743
00:42:56,080 --> 00:42:58,359
Speaker 3: Yeah, I would never have said it. I would never

744
00:42:58,360 --> 00:43:01,040
Speaker 3: have said it then, Yeah, that I was struggling with addiction.

745
00:43:01,160 --> 00:43:04,560
Speaker 2: I had. I had been to a GP.

746
00:43:05,840 --> 00:43:10,040
Speaker 3: And said, you know, like I'm struggling with you know,

747
00:43:10,120 --> 00:43:12,759
Speaker 3: with with Matthews and not being and not being able

748
00:43:12,800 --> 00:43:17,200
Speaker 3: to stop using crystal meth. But he didn't really provide

749
00:43:17,239 --> 00:43:21,120
Speaker 3: me any solutions, and so I just kept on partying,

750
00:43:21,160 --> 00:43:24,880
Speaker 3: but like knowing that I.

751
00:43:23,680 --> 00:43:25,880
Speaker 2: That I was really struggling to stop.

752
00:43:25,920 --> 00:43:28,919
Speaker 3: But then when I got this opportunity, that was enough

753
00:43:29,000 --> 00:43:31,360
Speaker 3: of an impetus for me to be like, you know,

754
00:43:31,440 --> 00:43:34,359
Speaker 3: cold turkey off everything. But it took me, I was

755
00:43:34,760 --> 00:43:38,080
Speaker 3: it took me six months of like and I had

756
00:43:38,120 --> 00:43:40,200
Speaker 3: to stop listening to dance music like it was all,

757
00:43:40,440 --> 00:43:42,799
Speaker 3: you know, I just got into super into acoustic music,

758
00:43:42,800 --> 00:43:45,839
Speaker 3: folk music, and you know, then and catching the train

759
00:43:45,960 --> 00:43:50,319
Speaker 3: to Olympic Park everywhere and going past this you know, this,

760
00:43:50,320 --> 00:43:54,120
Speaker 3: this graffiti it. You know, it took me six months

761
00:43:54,120 --> 00:43:57,759
Speaker 3: to stop thinking about meth every single day. But I

762
00:43:58,120 --> 00:44:02,200
Speaker 3: you know, but luckily I had had such a powerful

763
00:44:02,920 --> 00:44:05,920
Speaker 3: goal that was pushing me in a certain direction that

764
00:44:06,320 --> 00:44:10,760
Speaker 3: I managed to stay like you know, completely cold turkey,

765
00:44:10,800 --> 00:44:12,840
Speaker 3: clean and sober for the you know that whole time.

766
00:44:13,000 --> 00:44:16,160
Speaker 1: Well, full credit to you, because I know I've spoken

767
00:44:16,200 --> 00:44:19,520
Speaker 1: to people that get that high from the meth, and

768
00:44:19,840 --> 00:44:22,319
Speaker 1: it's just once I've had the taste of it, they

769
00:44:22,360 --> 00:44:24,680
Speaker 1: fight it for the rest of their lives. It sounds

770
00:44:24,719 --> 00:44:27,680
Speaker 1: like you break away from the lifestyle like the dance music.

771
00:44:28,080 --> 00:44:29,960
Speaker 1: I'm sure you had to break away from a circle

772
00:44:29,960 --> 00:44:33,279
Speaker 1: of friends and just focus on what you were doing.

773
00:44:33,840 --> 00:44:36,759
Speaker 1: So what what sort of commitment we've got, you know,

774
00:44:36,800 --> 00:44:40,080
Speaker 1: the Paris Olympics. What type of dedication and commitment do

775
00:44:40,160 --> 00:44:42,560
Speaker 1: you have to have to get to the elite level

776
00:44:42,560 --> 00:44:44,799
Speaker 1: of your sport just to get to the Olympics. We'll

777
00:44:44,800 --> 00:44:47,520
Speaker 1: talk about winning the gold medal later, but just to

778
00:44:47,880 --> 00:44:50,520
Speaker 1: make it to the Australian team. Is it all consuming?

779
00:44:50,560 --> 00:44:52,400
Speaker 1: Do you have to just that has to be your

780
00:44:52,440 --> 00:44:53,200
Speaker 1: only focus?

781
00:44:56,640 --> 00:44:58,760
Speaker 2: I think to win it? It does?

782
00:45:00,600 --> 00:45:00,799
Speaker 1: You know?

783
00:45:00,880 --> 00:45:03,399
Speaker 3: I think maybe not necessarily, like just to make it.

784
00:45:03,800 --> 00:45:07,839
Speaker 3: I think some sports are more competitive than others. And

785
00:45:08,000 --> 00:45:11,400
Speaker 3: you know, and and a lot of athletes, you know,

786
00:45:11,480 --> 00:45:15,600
Speaker 3: will a lot of athletes have to work, you know,

787
00:45:15,960 --> 00:45:18,719
Speaker 3: whilst doing their sport or they won't be able to

788
00:45:18,719 --> 00:45:21,399
Speaker 3: support themselves because you know, so many athletes don't get

789
00:45:21,520 --> 00:45:23,280
Speaker 3: funding to be able to support yourself.

790
00:45:23,280 --> 00:45:26,680
Speaker 2: And I didn't. I had to work luckily.

791
00:45:26,360 --> 00:45:29,880
Speaker 3: I you know, there was a woman who like a

792
00:45:30,000 --> 00:45:32,440
Speaker 3: dive mum basically, who had her own company and so

793
00:45:32,480 --> 00:45:36,200
Speaker 3: I worked as an adminissistant for the five hours in

794
00:45:36,280 --> 00:45:38,520
Speaker 3: between training sessions. So I worked five hours a day,

795
00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:40,040
Speaker 3: five days a week as an admin assistant.

796
00:45:40,120 --> 00:45:43,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's pay through What about the physical thing.

797
00:45:43,320 --> 00:45:45,880
Speaker 1: And I've got to ask, and I've always I always

798
00:45:45,880 --> 00:45:49,759
Speaker 1: wanted to ask divers, is you guys and girls look

799
00:45:49,840 --> 00:45:54,000
Speaker 1: like the most fifth fifthest athletes? And I'm thinking, okay,

800
00:45:54,160 --> 00:45:57,239
Speaker 1: I'm only seeing them dive off. What other exercise and

801
00:45:57,280 --> 00:45:59,799
Speaker 1: training do you have to do other than walking up

802
00:45:59,239 --> 00:46:02,359
Speaker 1: the platforms, climbing the ladder or the stairs all the time?

803
00:46:02,360 --> 00:46:05,799
Speaker 1: But why is it such like I'm looking at it

804
00:46:05,880 --> 00:46:10,680
Speaker 1: and you look like extreme fit athletes in diving? It's

805
00:46:10,800 --> 00:46:13,720
Speaker 1: just the nature of the sport. What is a physical

806
00:46:13,760 --> 00:46:16,320
Speaker 1: training you have to achieve to get to that level?

807
00:46:17,120 --> 00:46:19,200
Speaker 3: I mean, you have to be super strong to deal

808
00:46:19,239 --> 00:46:22,880
Speaker 3: with the g forces that you're putting your body through,

809
00:46:23,160 --> 00:46:25,960
Speaker 3: Like as you're you know, you're kind of not only

810
00:46:26,200 --> 00:46:30,000
Speaker 3: falling at like sixty kilometers an hour, but you're also

811
00:46:30,280 --> 00:46:32,759
Speaker 3: rotating so fast that you know, if you if you

812
00:46:33,600 --> 00:46:36,200
Speaker 3: have a look at a photo of a diver kind

813
00:46:36,239 --> 00:46:39,520
Speaker 3: of mid flight, you'll see like, you know, their skin

814
00:46:39,640 --> 00:46:44,279
Speaker 3: kind of trailing behind their skull. You know, So you

815
00:46:44,320 --> 00:46:46,440
Speaker 3: have to be strong enough to actually hold those positions,

816
00:46:46,960 --> 00:46:50,400
Speaker 3: and so you know there'll be every diver will do

817
00:46:51,239 --> 00:46:53,880
Speaker 3: two sessions a day, so between ten and eleven sessions

818
00:46:53,920 --> 00:46:57,440
Speaker 3: a week, and it's usually all the morning sessions will

819
00:46:57,480 --> 00:47:01,560
Speaker 3: be dry sessions, so in the drilling center, like you know,

820
00:47:01,680 --> 00:47:04,520
Speaker 3: doing all the acrobatic stuff into foam pits or onto mats,

821
00:47:05,600 --> 00:47:08,800
Speaker 3: as well as a lot of core exercises. And divers

822
00:47:08,800 --> 00:47:11,360
Speaker 3: will also have you know, at least two but normally

823
00:47:11,440 --> 00:47:17,480
Speaker 3: three purely strength based right sessions a week. You know,

824
00:47:17,560 --> 00:47:21,120
Speaker 3: to build not only your strength but your power. So

825
00:47:21,320 --> 00:47:23,120
Speaker 3: that's strength plus speed.

826
00:47:27,160 --> 00:47:31,120
Speaker 1: Now, your event that you went into the Olympics had

827
00:47:31,160 --> 00:47:34,479
Speaker 1: three disciplines or three levels that you were diving at,

828
00:47:34,800 --> 00:47:38,880
Speaker 1: so you've got that. The ten meter platform which you

829
00:47:38,960 --> 00:47:40,840
Speaker 1: won the goal. I won't give away. People know you

830
00:47:40,880 --> 00:47:43,200
Speaker 1: won the goal, so we're not giving away the story.

831
00:47:43,960 --> 00:47:48,279
Speaker 1: People know that. But ten meters. I've jumped off ten

832
00:47:48,320 --> 00:47:51,239
Speaker 1: meters and if you don't land properly, and I won't

833
00:47:51,239 --> 00:47:53,000
Speaker 1: say I dived. I'd like to say a dive, but

834
00:47:53,040 --> 00:47:55,320
Speaker 1: I've never had the carriage. I always went feet first,

835
00:47:55,320 --> 00:47:58,640
Speaker 1: and sometimes if you didn't land properly, you felt it.

836
00:47:58,680 --> 00:48:02,600
Speaker 1: The impact that you're receiving each time with the dives.

837
00:48:02,960 --> 00:48:05,480
Speaker 1: Talk us through that, because I've been fascinated by it

838
00:48:05,520 --> 00:48:07,440
Speaker 1: doing it time and time again. There must have been

839
00:48:07,480 --> 00:48:10,400
Speaker 1: times when you feel like oop, that didn't land properly.

840
00:48:10,719 --> 00:48:12,880
Speaker 1: So it's like hitting hitting concrete.

841
00:48:13,640 --> 00:48:17,080
Speaker 3: Yeah, it is, because you do you know that you

842
00:48:17,120 --> 00:48:19,359
Speaker 3: do hit the water at sixty kilometers an hour from

843
00:48:19,480 --> 00:48:23,080
Speaker 3: the ten meter and you know that. So you'll see

844
00:48:23,080 --> 00:48:26,480
Speaker 3: that every diver has got at least their wrists strapped

845
00:48:27,239 --> 00:48:30,040
Speaker 3: to try and I guess provide a bit of reinforcement

846
00:48:30,480 --> 00:48:33,680
Speaker 3: because your wrists are what is taking all of that

847
00:48:33,840 --> 00:48:36,520
Speaker 3: hit for that you know, that fraction of a second,

848
00:48:37,920 --> 00:48:41,800
Speaker 3: and that's the goal is for only your your hands

849
00:48:41,840 --> 00:48:44,839
Speaker 3: to be taking that hit. And I guess the more

850
00:48:45,120 --> 00:48:47,799
Speaker 3: either either side of vertical that you go, the more

851
00:48:47,840 --> 00:48:49,400
Speaker 3: of your body is taking more of the hit. And

852
00:48:49,440 --> 00:48:52,640
Speaker 3: so obviously you know when you land flat, your whole

853
00:48:52,640 --> 00:48:54,960
Speaker 3: body is taking all that force all at once, and

854
00:48:55,040 --> 00:48:58,440
Speaker 3: so you'll get you'll get all this bruising, you know

855
00:48:58,600 --> 00:49:01,400
Speaker 3: if you if you do land flat and you know

856
00:49:01,480 --> 00:49:02,719
Speaker 3: it's it's happened a couple of times.

857
00:49:02,800 --> 00:49:03,440
Speaker 2: It does happen.

858
00:49:04,520 --> 00:49:05,960
Speaker 3: It's one of those things where you just have to

859
00:49:06,000 --> 00:49:09,680
Speaker 3: get straight back up on the horse, you know, to

860
00:49:10,160 --> 00:49:12,880
Speaker 3: make sure that you don't then get the ips or

861
00:49:12,920 --> 00:49:17,520
Speaker 3: the twisties or you know whatever your your profession's version

862
00:49:17,600 --> 00:49:18,360
Speaker 3: of that.

863
00:49:19,880 --> 00:49:20,680
Speaker 2: In your mind.

864
00:49:21,040 --> 00:49:25,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, what about the you're breaking the water with

865
00:49:25,320 --> 00:49:29,200
Speaker 1: your hands, I'm talking to ten meter with the impact

866
00:49:29,239 --> 00:49:32,400
Speaker 1: on the head, Any concussions or is there anything like that?

867
00:49:32,520 --> 00:49:34,840
Speaker 1: The shop that you get from going in the water.

868
00:49:35,400 --> 00:49:38,680
Speaker 3: Only if you land sort of flat on your back

869
00:49:38,760 --> 00:49:42,120
Speaker 3: or your stomach right, or if you hit your head

870
00:49:42,480 --> 00:49:44,960
Speaker 3: on the platform or the springboard. Yeah, which is you

871
00:49:45,000 --> 00:49:46,720
Speaker 3: know it happens.

872
00:49:46,760 --> 00:49:49,800
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think we've all seen it on tiktop

873
00:49:49,840 --> 00:49:54,480
Speaker 1: where a diver's gone bad. Okay, you're training, you're putting

874
00:49:54,520 --> 00:49:57,879
Speaker 1: in those hours hours a day, you're working. When did

875
00:49:57,880 --> 00:50:00,160
Speaker 1: you find out that you made the Olympic team and

876
00:50:00,480 --> 00:50:02,400
Speaker 1: talk us through that, because that must be a special

877
00:50:02,400 --> 00:50:04,320
Speaker 1: moment in anyone's life, I would imagine.

878
00:50:04,880 --> 00:50:05,760
Speaker 2: Yeah.

879
00:50:05,239 --> 00:50:09,520
Speaker 3: I guess I probably wasn't that surprised, to be fair,

880
00:50:11,080 --> 00:50:15,799
Speaker 3: just because I my progress was going really well, my

881
00:50:15,840 --> 00:50:20,839
Speaker 3: diving was going really well. That the National Championships, you know,

882
00:50:20,880 --> 00:50:24,000
Speaker 3: there are many there are many competitions.

883
00:50:23,480 --> 00:50:24,480
Speaker 2: You have to qualify at.

884
00:50:24,640 --> 00:50:26,399
Speaker 3: You know, you have to call her for the next rip,

885
00:50:26,840 --> 00:50:29,760
Speaker 3: competition for the next So I guess the first stage

886
00:50:29,800 --> 00:50:35,920
Speaker 3: of that was the Australian National Championships. And I I

887
00:50:36,040 --> 00:50:39,279
Speaker 3: won every event one meter, three meter, three meters and

888
00:50:39,280 --> 00:50:42,120
Speaker 3: crew ten meter, like you know that there was so

889
00:50:42,239 --> 00:50:44,799
Speaker 3: you know, I kind of you know, and then as

890
00:50:44,880 --> 00:50:48,080
Speaker 3: things progressed, like you know, it was clear to me

891
00:50:48,239 --> 00:50:49,960
Speaker 3: that you know. And then I went to the World

892
00:50:50,600 --> 00:50:53,960
Speaker 3: World Cup and I qualified Australia's spots for Australia to.

893
00:50:53,880 --> 00:50:54,800
Speaker 2: Dive in the Olympics.

894
00:50:55,880 --> 00:50:58,640
Speaker 3: And then and then I went to the Olympic trials

895
00:50:58,800 --> 00:51:01,920
Speaker 3: and I qualified my spot to fill the spots that

896
00:51:01,960 --> 00:51:03,640
Speaker 3: I had already qualified for Australia.

897
00:51:03,760 --> 00:51:07,680
Speaker 2: So you know, like I knew that I was going.

898
00:51:07,880 --> 00:51:12,040
Speaker 3: Yeah, and so when I did actually get announced on

899
00:51:12,080 --> 00:51:16,439
Speaker 3: the team, it wasn't a surprise, but it was. Yeah,

900
00:51:16,480 --> 00:51:19,440
Speaker 3: it was I don't remember feeling any kind of I

901
00:51:19,440 --> 00:51:20,640
Speaker 3: guess it was kind of expected.

902
00:51:20,840 --> 00:51:25,720
Speaker 2: But you know, then when then when the this journalist.

903
00:51:25,280 --> 00:51:28,520
Speaker 3: Came out to profile me and a couple of my

904
00:51:28,560 --> 00:51:35,040
Speaker 3: teammates who had also qualified, Yeah, it was just this

905
00:51:35,200 --> 00:51:37,400
Speaker 3: journalist was just asking me all the you know, the

906
00:51:37,480 --> 00:51:40,600
Speaker 3: usual questions, you know, how old I am, where I live,

907
00:51:41,040 --> 00:51:45,600
Speaker 3: who I live with, and and because I had spent

908
00:51:45,640 --> 00:51:49,239
Speaker 3: the last year I mean even even actually when I

909
00:51:49,239 --> 00:51:51,879
Speaker 3: retired from diving, I made a promised to myself when

910
00:51:51,920 --> 00:51:54,160
Speaker 3: I was eighteen, I made have promised myself that I

911
00:51:54,239 --> 00:51:57,200
Speaker 3: was going to be one hundred percent upfront and honest

912
00:51:57,239 --> 00:52:00,040
Speaker 3: with everyone I met from that point forwards, because it

913
00:52:00,120 --> 00:52:02,239
Speaker 3: was you know, it was just a.

914
00:52:02,160 --> 00:52:06,320
Speaker 1: Horrible live a lie or the deception.

915
00:52:06,680 --> 00:52:11,080
Speaker 3: Exactly, and and you know, and my coach had created

916
00:52:11,920 --> 00:52:14,560
Speaker 3: such a wonderfully inclusive environment that I had just gotten

917
00:52:14,640 --> 00:52:19,000
Speaker 3: so used to just to being you know, myself, my

918
00:52:19,000 --> 00:52:21,480
Speaker 3: authentic self, and so you know, I just I just

919
00:52:21,480 --> 00:52:24,600
Speaker 3: say I live with my boyfriend. And this journalist was

920
00:52:24,680 --> 00:52:28,600
Speaker 3: so excited by that. You know, she thought it was

921
00:52:28,600 --> 00:52:32,000
Speaker 3: absolutely wonderful, and she thought that you know that Australia

922
00:52:32,040 --> 00:52:34,400
Speaker 3: would really sort of you know, get behind me. But

923
00:52:34,480 --> 00:52:36,040
Speaker 3: she did actually give me the option of whether I

924
00:52:36,080 --> 00:52:39,960
Speaker 3: wanted that to go into the story, because yeah, I guess, well.

925
00:52:39,800 --> 00:52:42,759
Speaker 1: That was decent of her, because it's you know, it

926
00:52:42,800 --> 00:52:45,439
Speaker 1: wasn't the intent of I'm sure she didn't sit down

927
00:52:45,560 --> 00:52:47,640
Speaker 1: going out. I'm going to get this as a scoop,

928
00:52:47,680 --> 00:52:51,239
Speaker 1: but it's nice that she asks you. There's things that

929
00:52:51,280 --> 00:52:54,400
Speaker 1: you've been quoted about saying about that that when you

930
00:52:54,760 --> 00:52:57,719
Speaker 1: did come out, and one of the things, and I

931
00:52:57,760 --> 00:52:59,560
Speaker 1: think you've just touched on it, but I just read

932
00:52:59,600 --> 00:53:01,840
Speaker 1: this quite there. I was so scared of it that

933
00:53:01,880 --> 00:53:05,080
Speaker 1: it would actually tie a rubber band. We've talked about that,

934
00:53:05,280 --> 00:53:08,000
Speaker 1: so this is the fear that you've had in childhood.

935
00:53:08,600 --> 00:53:11,600
Speaker 1: And then when you did come out, I was scared

936
00:53:11,600 --> 00:53:14,160
Speaker 1: about the response. But going into the Olympics, I didn't

937
00:53:14,160 --> 00:53:16,399
Speaker 1: want the Australian public to think of me one way

938
00:53:16,440 --> 00:53:18,920
Speaker 1: as straight and then have to come out afterwards feeling

939
00:53:18,960 --> 00:53:21,680
Speaker 1: like I lied to them. So I can understand that,

940
00:53:21,800 --> 00:53:25,680
Speaker 1: because with the Olympics comes the focus, the attention, and

941
00:53:25,840 --> 00:53:29,520
Speaker 1: you've gone in there and you'd feel I won't say hypocrite,

942
00:53:29,560 --> 00:53:32,400
Speaker 1: because it's personal and people can talk about their private

943
00:53:32,440 --> 00:53:34,839
Speaker 1: life if they want or don't want. But I can

944
00:53:34,960 --> 00:53:37,399
Speaker 1: understand where you felt like it was a weight off

945
00:53:37,440 --> 00:53:40,120
Speaker 1: your shoulders by actually coming out and saying, hey, this

946
00:53:40,280 --> 00:53:42,400
Speaker 1: is who I am. Accept me or don't accept me.

947
00:53:43,239 --> 00:53:45,480
Speaker 1: Did it it feel like it was liberating for you?

948
00:53:45,560 --> 00:53:50,120
Speaker 3: I mean, everybody who was around me you But you know,

949
00:53:50,400 --> 00:53:53,399
Speaker 3: I guess I you know, I think I just won

950
00:53:53,440 --> 00:53:57,239
Speaker 3: the last international event before the Olympic Games, so I

951
00:53:57,320 --> 00:53:59,880
Speaker 3: knew that I was doing quite well and that there

952
00:53:59,880 --> 00:54:02,520
Speaker 3: were a chance that I could do quite well in

953
00:54:02,560 --> 00:54:05,560
Speaker 3: the Olympics, and so I kind of wanted to save

954
00:54:05,680 --> 00:54:10,000
Speaker 3: myself a very very awkward like you know, oh by

955
00:54:10,040 --> 00:54:14,919
Speaker 3: the way, you know, because and you know, the other

956
00:54:14,960 --> 00:54:20,360
Speaker 3: thing was there was nothing that could happen to me

957
00:54:21,600 --> 00:54:23,480
Speaker 3: that I felt like, you know, you know when you

958
00:54:23,480 --> 00:54:25,960
Speaker 3: you know you're scared of something because you do the

959
00:54:26,000 --> 00:54:31,239
Speaker 3: worst case scenario all the time, and queer people do it.

960
00:54:31,760 --> 00:54:35,440
Speaker 3: You know, it's it's basically it's quite it's a universal experience,

961
00:54:36,400 --> 00:54:38,560
Speaker 3: you know, before coming out. It's you know, the worst

962
00:54:38,560 --> 00:54:40,440
Speaker 3: case scenario thing, and that I think that stops people

963
00:54:40,480 --> 00:54:43,480
Speaker 3: coming out a lot of the time. But there was

964
00:54:43,880 --> 00:54:48,600
Speaker 3: nothing that could happen to me that would be worse

965
00:54:48,880 --> 00:54:52,920
Speaker 3: than going back into the closet for me, And so,

966
00:54:53,520 --> 00:54:55,759
Speaker 3: you know, I feel like that's that's kind of a

967
00:54:55,840 --> 00:54:59,759
Speaker 3: really good that that's a testament to kind of what

968
00:55:00,880 --> 00:55:03,360
Speaker 3: how I guess soul destroying it is to to actually,

969
00:55:03,760 --> 00:55:05,760
Speaker 3: you know, to not be able to be your authentic

970
00:55:05,800 --> 00:55:07,480
Speaker 3: self and to be in the closet. Is you know

971
00:55:07,520 --> 00:55:09,880
Speaker 3: that literally nothing in the world could happen to me

972
00:55:09,920 --> 00:55:12,600
Speaker 3: that would be worse than that. And so you know,

973
00:55:12,640 --> 00:55:16,000
Speaker 3: and you know, all of those fears that I had.

974
00:55:17,480 --> 00:55:19,960
Speaker 3: I didn't care if nobody supported me, you know, it

975
00:55:20,000 --> 00:55:22,600
Speaker 3: was it was still more important for me to you know,

976
00:55:22,760 --> 00:55:26,400
Speaker 3: to just to come out to the world before the Olympics,

977
00:55:26,440 --> 00:55:29,560
Speaker 3: and you know, and none of those fears came to pass.

978
00:55:29,640 --> 00:55:31,520
Speaker 3: Like my coming out to the world was front page

979
00:55:31,560 --> 00:55:35,680
Speaker 3: news of the biggest newspaper in Australia and I loved

980
00:55:35,680 --> 00:55:40,320
Speaker 3: abs so extra it's you know, it felt kind of

981
00:55:40,360 --> 00:55:43,960
Speaker 3: appropriate actually, but you know, none of those fears came

982
00:55:44,000 --> 00:55:46,760
Speaker 3: to pass. It was ninety nine point nine nine percent

983
00:55:46,880 --> 00:55:50,640
Speaker 3: overwhelmingly positive and supportive from you know, from the public,

984
00:55:50,680 --> 00:55:53,120
Speaker 3: from the media, from everyone in sport. Like it was

985
00:55:53,320 --> 00:55:57,759
Speaker 3: just it was such an incredibly wonderful positive experience.

986
00:55:57,920 --> 00:56:00,840
Speaker 1: Isn't that great? And it's all my pluck and irony.

987
00:56:00,840 --> 00:56:02,439
Speaker 1: I don't now if I any he's the right word

988
00:56:02,480 --> 00:56:04,160
Speaker 1: for it, but the fact that this is something you

989
00:56:04,280 --> 00:56:07,439
Speaker 1: feared for so long and then you've done it and

990
00:56:08,200 --> 00:56:11,080
Speaker 1: it's all positive. It's I think we hold a lot

991
00:56:11,120 --> 00:56:13,960
Speaker 1: of a lot of concerns that perhaps if we were

992
00:56:14,000 --> 00:56:16,680
Speaker 1: just open about it, that might might be as bad

993
00:56:16,719 --> 00:56:17,920
Speaker 1: as the perception of it.

994
00:56:18,760 --> 00:56:22,960
Speaker 3: Yes, and no, I think you know, historically I had

995
00:56:23,040 --> 00:56:25,600
Speaker 3: there was a lot of fear because I had no one,

996
00:56:26,080 --> 00:56:28,880
Speaker 3: There was no precedent for me, you know that any

997
00:56:29,120 --> 00:56:32,160
Speaker 3: other gay sporting people I knew were kind of Greg

998
00:56:32,200 --> 00:56:34,600
Speaker 3: Lar Gainus in eighty eight, and you know, but he

999
00:56:34,719 --> 00:56:36,320
Speaker 3: wasn't out when he dived.

1000
00:56:36,480 --> 00:56:37,560
Speaker 2: You know, he didn't come out.

1001
00:56:37,480 --> 00:56:41,920
Speaker 3: Until afterwards, so you know, that almost doesn't really count.

1002
00:56:42,560 --> 00:56:45,120
Speaker 3: And also there was a lot of controversy around, you know,

1003
00:56:45,160 --> 00:56:46,960
Speaker 3: when he did come out, because he also had to

1004
00:56:46,960 --> 00:56:48,480
Speaker 3: come out about his HIV status.

1005
00:56:49,520 --> 00:56:55,160
Speaker 2: There was Ian Roberts in the nineties who you know,

1006
00:56:55,600 --> 00:56:56,800
Speaker 2: didn't didn't have the best.

1007
00:56:56,680 --> 00:56:59,440
Speaker 3: Time, Like it wasn't it wasn't a super positive experience,

1008
00:56:59,520 --> 00:57:03,560
Speaker 3: you know, how he was treated. And justin fashion U

1009
00:57:03,680 --> 00:57:07,960
Speaker 3: the English footballer in the nineties who you know, the

1010
00:57:08,000 --> 00:57:10,560
Speaker 3: first black player to get a million pound transfer fee,

1011
00:57:10,920 --> 00:57:14,200
Speaker 3: but he came out and was just bullied mercilessly and

1012
00:57:14,320 --> 00:57:16,680
Speaker 3: ultimately ended up taking his life. And you know, so

1013
00:57:16,720 --> 00:57:19,520
Speaker 3: I didn't have any good positive role models to show

1014
00:57:19,560 --> 00:57:22,160
Speaker 3: me that it would be okay. So you know, in

1015
00:57:22,200 --> 00:57:25,200
Speaker 3: some ways, like it's you know, you can kind of

1016
00:57:25,240 --> 00:57:25,960
Speaker 3: be like, you.

1017
00:57:26,000 --> 00:57:29,600
Speaker 2: Know, isn't it funny that you know you fear the worst?

1018
00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:32,600
Speaker 3: But I didn't have any evidence to kind of to

1019
00:57:32,960 --> 00:57:36,120
Speaker 3: contradict that, and you know, and you think, okay, well,

1020
00:57:36,160 --> 00:57:42,120
Speaker 3: society's progressing, that's wonderful. But just this year the Olympics

1021
00:57:42,160 --> 00:57:48,760
Speaker 3: Instagram posted an Australian rock climber who qualified for the

1022
00:57:48,800 --> 00:57:52,360
Speaker 3: Paris Games and they posted about him him kissing his

1023
00:57:52,640 --> 00:57:58,880
Speaker 3: partner and his male partner, And the amount of hate

1024
00:57:59,360 --> 00:58:04,640
Speaker 3: that that post has generated is just like more hate

1025
00:58:04,720 --> 00:58:07,000
Speaker 3: than I got in my entire career, just in that

1026
00:58:07,040 --> 00:58:07,720
Speaker 3: one post.

1027
00:58:08,760 --> 00:58:10,360
Speaker 2: So you know, you.

1028
00:58:10,360 --> 00:58:12,520
Speaker 3: Feel like society is progressing, but actually I feel like

1029
00:58:12,560 --> 00:58:14,120
Speaker 3: at the moment, if for the last couple of years,

1030
00:58:14,120 --> 00:58:17,360
Speaker 3: there's been a bit of a swing backwards, like in

1031
00:58:17,600 --> 00:58:20,080
Speaker 3: more conservative values, a bit of a like an anti

1032
00:58:20,120 --> 00:58:26,280
Speaker 3: woke kind of sentiment where it's people are really really

1033
00:58:26,320 --> 00:58:30,760
Speaker 3: pushing back in quite a quite a horrible way.

1034
00:58:31,120 --> 00:58:35,320
Speaker 1: That shocks me. I didn't realize and I wouldn't have

1035
00:58:35,360 --> 00:58:37,760
Speaker 1: anticipated that. I thought it would have just been a

1036
00:58:37,760 --> 00:58:40,480
Speaker 1: blase a thing and it's accepted. But when you talk

1037
00:58:40,520 --> 00:58:44,040
Speaker 1: about woke, I know, when extreme views at one side,

1038
00:58:44,280 --> 00:58:47,600
Speaker 1: then the other views become just as extreme and they

1039
00:58:47,720 --> 00:58:51,680
Speaker 1: keep they play off each other. So maybe that's part

1040
00:58:51,680 --> 00:58:54,720
Speaker 1: of it. But you make a valid point and also

1041
00:58:55,000 --> 00:58:59,400
Speaker 1: the sportsman that you did mention. I can understand then

1042
00:58:59,720 --> 00:59:02,760
Speaker 1: what you're saying that, Okay, it did work out well,

1043
00:59:02,760 --> 00:59:04,680
Speaker 1: but it could have gone either way for you when

1044
00:59:04,920 --> 00:59:09,200
Speaker 1: you came out. Yeah, and perhaps even costs your sponsorships

1045
00:59:09,520 --> 00:59:09,920
Speaker 1: or whatever.

1046
00:59:10,120 --> 00:59:14,520
Speaker 3: I suppose God exactly, that's absolutely a fear. And you

1047
00:59:14,520 --> 00:59:16,560
Speaker 3: know that was a fear at the time. Well actually,

1048
00:59:16,640 --> 00:59:18,400
Speaker 3: you know that was It was certainly a thought that

1049
00:59:18,440 --> 00:59:20,040
Speaker 3: I'd had at the time, but it was something that

1050
00:59:20,080 --> 00:59:22,000
Speaker 3: I ended up saying, you know what, that's just not

1051
00:59:22,360 --> 00:59:28,760
Speaker 3: that important. But you know, this, this this boy, Campbell Harrison,

1052
00:59:28,880 --> 00:59:33,040
Speaker 3: he's he's he's quite affected by you know, he puts

1053
00:59:33,080 --> 00:59:35,080
Speaker 3: on a very brief face, but you know I've been

1054
00:59:35,120 --> 00:59:38,000
Speaker 3: talking to him privately, you know, because I've reached out

1055
00:59:38,080 --> 00:59:40,360
Speaker 3: and have been supporting him, and you know, he's quite

1056
00:59:40,600 --> 00:59:43,200
Speaker 3: he's quite affected by it, you know, which is such

1057
00:59:43,240 --> 00:59:45,720
Speaker 3: a shame. We were about to go into your first Olympics.

1058
00:59:45,720 --> 00:59:48,400
Speaker 3: He didn't, you know, it was just it was something

1059
00:59:48,440 --> 00:59:51,920
Speaker 3: that you know, the Olympics posted that's gotten you know,

1060
00:59:52,000 --> 00:59:55,640
Speaker 3: all of this this huge just this hatred and you know,

1061
00:59:55,960 --> 01:00:00,560
Speaker 3: it would take a very very strong person to not

1062
01:00:00,760 --> 01:00:04,240
Speaker 3: take it personally at all, which you know it's not

1063
01:00:04,280 --> 01:00:07,320
Speaker 3: about him at all, obviously, but you know it would

1064
01:00:07,360 --> 01:00:10,560
Speaker 3: take a very strong person to not internalize any of it.

1065
01:00:11,160 --> 01:00:14,480
Speaker 1: Most definitely, And you're quite right and identifying as a shame,

1066
01:00:14,560 --> 01:00:16,960
Speaker 1: like he's going to something that should be highlighted to

1067
01:00:17,000 --> 01:00:20,360
Speaker 1: get negative feedback from that over something that, Yeah, I

1068
01:00:20,400 --> 01:00:23,840
Speaker 1: really thought we had passed that point. We might take

1069
01:00:23,880 --> 01:00:26,600
Speaker 1: a break now for part one, and then we're going

1070
01:00:26,640 --> 01:00:30,560
Speaker 1: to get into the excitement of going to the Olympic Village.

1071
01:00:30,640 --> 01:00:36,080
Speaker 1: And I got to experience the Olympic Village during Sydney Olympics,

1072
01:00:36,120 --> 01:00:39,720
Speaker 1: and not as an athlete, sadly, but a close personal

1073
01:00:39,760 --> 01:00:43,480
Speaker 1: protection looking after dignitaries going into the Olympics at the

1074
01:00:43,520 --> 01:00:46,720
Speaker 1: Sydney Olympics. And I got to say, I've been to

1075
01:00:46,760 --> 01:00:48,800
Speaker 1: a lot of places in my time, but going into

1076
01:00:48,880 --> 01:00:52,280
Speaker 1: the Olympic Village just had a buzz of excitement about it,

1077
01:00:52,960 --> 01:00:55,680
Speaker 1: and I'd love to hear from someone that actually experienced

1078
01:00:55,680 --> 01:00:58,600
Speaker 1: it as an athlete and the excitement of going in

1079
01:00:58,640 --> 01:01:01,760
Speaker 1: there and competing against the of the best. So we'll

1080
01:01:01,800 --> 01:01:03,440
Speaker 1: take a short break and when we come back to

1081
01:01:03,480 --> 01:01:06,200
Speaker 1: part two, we'll go into that and talk about more

1082
01:01:06,240 --> 01:01:09,080
Speaker 1: of your highs and lows and everything else has happened

1083
01:01:09,080 --> 01:01:11,919
Speaker 1: in Matt's life, so we'll have you back soon.

1084
01:01:12,280 --> 01:01:14,080
Speaker 2: That's good. Cheers,