"It's just so hard to understand how bad it is" - Former American pro Mardy Fish opens up on the severity of mental health struggles in tennis
ATPWednesday, 30 April 2025 at 04:30
The topic of mental health awareness has been a sensitive one, especially in the world of sports. However, former World No.7 Mardy Fish took some time to share his thoughts on the issue, having dealt with a few struggles himself.
The Minnesota native enjoyed a successful career on the ATP Tour, winning six singles titles. Furthermore, Fish won the silver medal at the 2004 Olympic Games, before eventually retiring in 2015 after dealing with bouts of anxiety during his career.
Fish gets candid on the topic of mental health
In an appearance on the Served podcast with Andy Roddick, the 43-year old gave a powerful message to his listeners. Fish stressed the importance of acknowledging you are not okay, and urged people to get educated on the topic of mental health in order to avoid treating it as a stigma.
"The education of having people understand that the most important things are being vulnerable with loved ones, having a support system and then somehow figuring out a way" began Fish. "For me it was medication or to try to develop a tool to trick your mind to go into different places.
"It's a lonely thing because you sort of feel like, no one can see it and I'm not limping around or you can't see that I have a broken arm. It's in my mind or it's in my brain, so it's just so hard to understand how bad it is."
"It's a lonely thing because you sort of feel like, no one can see it and I'm not limping around or you can't see that I have a broken arm. It's in my mind or it's in my brain, so it's just so hard to understand how bad it is."
Growing up in a household where soccer was king, my earliest memories are filled with chants from packed stadiums and the rhythm of a ball being passed across neighborhood streets. But somewhere along the way, the quiet elegance and raw emotion of tennis pulled me in. What began as a curiosity became a lifelong passion; not just for the sport itself, but for the stories it tells: of grit, of heartbreak, of improbable comebacks and human resilience.
As a tennis writer, I bring the observational lens of someone who didn’t grow up in the sport, but fell in love with it as an outsider; a perspective that lets me see both its technical beauty and its emotional depth. Over the years working with TennisUpToDate, I’ve had the privilege of reaching more than 3.5 million readers worldwide, with one of my features ranking among the site’s top three articles.
With a background in storytelling and a creative mind always searching for meaning beyond the scoreboard, I aim to craft narratives that go deeper than results and rankings. Whether it’s a rising star breaking through or a veteran fighting off Father Time, I try to capture the heartbeat behind the headlines.
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