Ben Cousins has shared how his need to ‘escape’ from his high pressure football career led to a downward spiral that saw him struggling with addiction.
The AFL legend said what started as blowing off some steam on the weekends soon became something far darker.
‘It can happen so easily’ the 46-year-old tells Ball Magnets podcast.
‘Early in my career, I really embraced that concept of hard work and throwing myself into footy. I think there were some things about my personality or my nature that predisposed me to feeling like I needed an escape or to get away’ he continued.
‘For me, I did that in ways that, maybe not in the beginning, eventually became problematic. In the beginning it was the odd night out drinking with whoever, but pretty quickly for me that did not quite hit the spot and it was taking something.’
Ben explained, ‘You know, everyone’s path is different, but for me it (addiction) didn’t happen overnight.
‘But there was a bigger picture and then eventually everything unravelled.’
Cousins has been rebuilding his life in recent years after a fall from grace, but he says there is ‘no quick fix’ and he is willing to pay his dues.
Ben Cousins has shared how his need to ‘escape’ from his high pressure football career led to a downward spiral that saw him struggling with addiction. Pictured at the Brownlow this month with his sister Melanie
‘It is certainly not lost on me, or forgotten, the hard work and commitment that it has taken to get back to where I am’ he explained earlier this year.
‘It is the long game… You don’t just do something and then all of a sudden it changes overnight.’
Ben won the Brownlow Medal in 2005 and captained the West Coast Eagles from 2001 to 2005, securing the club’s best and fairest awards four out of those season.
He played 238 games and booted 205 goals for the West Coast Eagles, where he won a premiership with the club in 2006.
The AFL legend said what started as blowing off some steam on the weekends soon became something far darker. ‘It can happen so easily’ the 46-year-old tells Ball Magnets podcast. Pictured in 2006
His dramatic fall from grace was well documented from 2007 as he publicly battled a drug addiction and coped with his failed relationship with Maylea Tinecheff.
He was later sacked and copped a one year ban from the AFL for repeated infringements.
In 2021, Susan Backshell, who has acted as a mentor for Cousins since his last stint on jail, told Daily Mail Australia that he remains solely focused on his kids.
Sitting in a cold, cramped jail cell for the sixth time in 13 years, Cousins decided enough was enough after seven months behind bars in 2020.
Ben has made a TV comeback, appearing on Dancing With The Stars earlier this year. Pictured with dance partner Siobhan Power
He told her he wanted to make amends and clean up his life and Backshell gave him an ultimatum: ‘Give it his all, or forget it entirely’.
Since Cousins was released from custody back in December 2020, Backshell said she’s never once questioned his commitment to sobriety and bettering his community.
Last year, cousins announce hat he will partake in several speaking engagements on his Such Is Life Tour, which kicked off in July.
Promising to tell untold tales from his football career, the tour marked a kind of catharsis for the controversial Brownlow Medallist.
He has also made a TV comeback, appearing on Dancing With The Stars earlier this year.