Rick Rypien

I knew him playing on my hockey team, the Vancouver Canucks. He was our fighter, a player that showed up on the ice and stood up for team mates while always creating action and physical drama. He had his controversies by getting into a fight with a spectator as well as his physicality within each game. His name was probably the best of any others in all time to describe who he was as a player. Ripen it in heart and soul.

In Regina he was the captain as well as the MVP before he became a Canuck. During the last season he took time off for depression and the team and fans were supportive.

This past Monday he was found dead in his Alberta home, at the age of 27. The police and media are not giving any incite of how or why but suspicions are related to his mental health.


It isn't a secret that he battled depression and that is the likely cause of death. This may be another victim that mental illness takes from us.

There are not a lot of famous athletes who suffer from mental illnesses like depression because of the screening and help given along the way to become a athletic star. This is impart why his death impacts us so much and gives light to a mental illness like depression showing the serious concisenesses of it not being managed before it gets to a fatal point.

For people who suffer, they need to find answers and a peace within themselves and their lives no matter the consequences to career and lives. To be able to live within a life that is healthy may mean to give up a life they have been accustomed to. The result is finding a new way of living, a new life that is more complete and gives a greater happiness than imagined.

I know for myself this is true. I would have never imagined my life to be so fulfilled by rejecting things that seemed natural to me at the time, instead learning about myself and my illness, changing my thoughts and actions. It was all about learning more about why I felt and reacted certain ways and discovering new ways of thinking that made my life better.