‘My life is hell’: Bomber Thompson reveals depth of his struggles
MARK “Bomber” Thompson has opened up on his two broken marriages and his battle with mental health in a frank and emotional interview, saying he has been left lonely and sad by the destruction of his life.
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MARK “Bomber” Thompson says he has been left lonely and sad by the destruction of his life.
In an emotional interview with the Herald Sun, the 54-year-old said he had lost total interest in the sport that made him a footy legend.
Opening up on his two broken marriages and battle with mental health, Thompson confessed he had been to dark places.
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“I’m just sad. I’m just disappointed. I lost my friendships, I’ve lost my social life,” he said.
“All the people I’ve grown up with are around footy, and I don’t like footy any more. I don’t want to talk about footy, I haven’t seen footy.”
Thompson said he was not able to answer questions about the raid on his Port Melbourne home in January or the serious drugs charges he faces after his arrest in May.
But in a raw outpouring, the two-time flag-winning coach and 1993 premiership captain gave an insight into his personal torment since the Essendon supplements saga erupted six years ago.
He has been diagnosed with depression and severe post-traumatic stress disorder.
Asked if he had been to dark places, Thompson said: “Yes. Not dark, dark like all the lights are out, but just feeling sorry for myself and for my family and kids, everyone really. Supporters. You feel stupid”
He admitted becoming obsessed with his fight to reveal the truth behind footy’s greatest crisis.
“What I was reading about what we had done to our players was just nothing like what I had seen — and I couldn’t handle that,” he said.
“I’d get up at 1am and read the next days’ news and what was going to be on talkback radio that day — and it just affected my sleep, it affected my personal life.
“I was married for the second time and I totally wrecked that. And I did it, I wrecked it.
“I’m seeing some people to try help me understand why I’ve turned out the way I have.
“I was surprised at how emotional I was when I started talking.
“I remember the first one, it was pretty tough to get through, but I went home and I just slept like a bomb because it had never been out. I’d bottled it up for years.”
Thompson was questioned by detectives in January, but he was not charged with any offences until May 1.
He was released on bail despite police believing he was a flight risk because he had access to a yacht and money.
He agreed to pay a $20,000 surety and notify authorities if he needed to travel interstate.
Strict bail conditions have required Thompson to report to police three times a week.
He has also been banned from contacting Thomas Windsor, Katia Drcec and Karl Holt, who were charged following the raid.
Thompson is facing seven drug-related offences, including trafficking and possession.
Methamphetamine, ecstasy, LSD and MDMA were found in plastic bags during a raid of his home on January 5, police allege.
Some of the drugs were found in a small room protected by a keypad that investigators allege only Thompson could open.
Geelong memorabilia was also allegedly found in the room.
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WARNER: How did you end up where you are?
THOMPSON: “At the end of it, I don’t really know how I got here.
“You grow up loving something and openly promote it for nearly your whole life, and you take kids on board, off their parents and you say, ‘We’re going to look after your boy — just leave it with us, he’ll turn out a better man for the experience of being involved with our football club’.
“And when you start not liking what you are doing, not liking the people that run the game and the way the game is run … and are being treated really poorly, by the AFL and your own club, well that hurt me more than anything, the way our own club (treated us) and what we found out the longer we went. They took the AFL’s side and it should have been Essendon fighting the AFL rather than Essendon and the AFL fighting us.
“There’s been a lot of stress in my life. I haven’t been able to do anything really easily. Everything seems to be very public.
“My exit from Geelong wasn’t great, the exit from my first wife wasn’t great.
“I was trying to think — was 2006 harder than 2013 and 2014? I split from my first wife and hung on to my job. God, that was a hard year for me — to get through that, but it wasn’t anywhere near as hard as anything I had to go through at Essendon.
“It (2006) was the first time I really felt pressure. Some people don’t handle being a public person that well, I think I’m OK with it but it was the first time I didn’t want to be in public, and the first time the pressure had really got to me and my whole life. When you are playing you don’t get that much personal criticism, but when you are the coach it sort of seems to be angled at you a bit.
“So I left Geelong, I thought I left for the right reasons but it wasn’t portrayed that way. That was tough.
“I don’t reckon men are that well equipped to deal with these sorts of things. We sort of just go in a cave, we don’t talk to anyone and we think it’s going to go away — and it doesn’t go away — it gets progressively worse actually.
“I went to Essendon but the job wasn’t what it was meant to be — and then the second year the supplement thing took place. I had mixed feelings about whether we should do it. I didn’t really like it that much — didn’t really think we needed it — and my God, the year after that …
“What I was reading about what we had done to our players was just nothing like what I had seen — and I couldn’t handle that.
“I’d get up at 1am and read the next day’s news and what was going to be on talkback radio that day — and it just affected my sleep, it affected my personal life. I was married for the second time and I totally wrecked that. And I did it, I wrecked it.”
You became obsessed by the saga?
“Yeah”.
Were you diagnosed with something?
“I have now. I’m seeing some people to try to help me understand why I’ve turned out the way I have. I was surprised at how emotional I was when I started talking.
I remember the first one, it was pretty tough to get through, but I went home and I just slept like a bomb because it had never been out. I’d bottled it up for years.
“I’m just sad. I’m just disappointed. I lost my friendships, I’ve lost my social life. All the people I’ve grown up with are around footy, and I don’t like footy any more. I don’t want to talk about footy, I haven’t seen footy.
“I’ve never met too many people in footy that leave football and just go on and have a good life where they don’t have too many problems. It’s the breakaway. So much of your life just goes missing and you’re on your own.
“So I went and worked in the media but I just felt like I was defending myself and the club and the players.
“I felt like it didn’t matter what I said, people weren’t going to agree with me, but I still had to say it, because that’s what I believed in and that wore me down. In the end, it made me unhappy because you’re trying to deal with it and you’re talking about it all the time and it didn’t make me feel any better. It made me feel worse.
“So I ended up getting away from football altogether, which became even lonelier.
I was home by myself doing the cryptocurrencies, which I loved because it’s competitive, and it’s wins and losses and there’s chaos and decision making.
If you make bad decisions, you can get hurt quickly. It was very similar to coaching, but you are doing it on your own. I actually liked being alone, because I was learning so much about the world and the future of the world.
“It was inspiring to me, but also very lonely.”
How is the pain now?
“It’s probably the worst I’ve been, recently. The whole going to court thing — it’s embarrassing, it’s intimidating.”
Have you had dark moments?
“Yes. Not dark, dark like all the lights are out, but just feeling sorry for myself and
for my family and kids, everyone really. Supporters. You feel stupid.”
Can you see a way out?
“Yeah. I can.”
The email to David Evans, was it a call for help?
“I was as shocked as anyone when I heard about Hirdy. I thought that he was the rock.
“He had been under that much pressure and he looked like he’d got through every day, but I wasn’t with him at home. I wasn’t with him when he was by himself.
“But when it got to the point where someone was prepared to take their own life because of the program and the investigation … it was just a joke. All we had set out to do was to find the truth. That’s all the players want … they just wanted to know what went in their bodies, and we haven’t been able to tell them.
“People played the game, both sides of the fence, trying to get around avoiding telling the truth. But someone knows.”
Were you ever a conventional person?
“Yeah I was.”
So it totally consumed you?
“Yeah. I had to put on an act when I went outside because I wasn’t feeling that great.”
But you’re not acting now are you?
“No. But there’s still a fair bit of work to do. It’s good to get help actually. I feel better doing it.”
What about your family?
“I’ve been estranged from the family, but they’ve reached out and they’ve been good. I got some amazing messages from my son, which I just didn’t expect.”
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