Braith Anasta breaks down discussing his dad’s shock death

NRL great and media identity Braith Anasta has broken down as he spoke about the shock day his dad didn’t come home from work.

Braith Anasta in tears discussing his dad’s death. Photos: Instagram

NRL great Braith Anasta has broken down recalling the tragic death of his father.

Anasta, 42, grew up in Sydney and was a keen golfer before devoting himself to rugby league.

He also looked up to his dad, Peter.

“My dad was Australian-born Greek,” Anasta said on The Stick Up podcast with Russell Manser.

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“Hard worker, he was just a panel beater who ended up being quite successful at that. Just worked hard.

“Came from nothing … and he just aspired to be better and worked hard and did well, he built a house in Malabar.”

Anasta made his NRL debut as an 18-year-old with the Bulldogs and won a premiership with Canterbury in 2004 before stints with the Roosters and Wests Tigers.

He had actually quit league for a year when he was 15 to focus his energy on golf, but a chance phone call to help out a junior team changed everything as he went on to win the SG Ball competition with Souths.

Braith Anasta has opened up about the tragic death of his father. (Photo by Brendon Thorne/Getty Images for GQ Australia)

The rest is history in a career that included representing NSW and Australia.

Anasta spoke about the strong motivating force he carried through his career, his father’s suicide.

“Every Sunday he’d go and do the books,” Anasta tells Manser of his dad. “I was pretty young, I was 15, and we’d go to Bondi for dinner every Sunday.

“Me, mum and dad. And he didn’t come home from the workshop (that day).

“It’s horrific, I still have nightmares about it. I still remember the moment.

“My brother went with my uncle and then they came back and told us and mum was pretty much howling on the phone to them.

“Yeah, I still get a bit emotional. I’ve never really spoken about that.”

Anasta with his late father's relatives after the Bulldogs defeated the Roosters in the 2004 NRL Grand Final.

The house where Anasta grew up was around 500 metres from Long Bay prison and he recalls seeing men breaking out of jail “a few times”.

His father’s death had a profound influence on him and instead of potentially slipping through the cracks himself, Anasta buried himself in sports.

He also concedes it took him years to deal with the tragic event.

“Yeah it’s just a moment that … I don’t talk about that (the suicide), but it impacts me greatly and it will forever, you know,” he said.

“In saying that, like my reaction after that original moment of madness and just (being) distraught, it was a week of not sleeping and family at your house and everyone was shattered because no one saw it coming.

“But I actually went the opposite way, like I thought I wanted to do him proud so I didn’t quite let it all out at the time, which is why it still impacts me now I think.

“I just went ‘f**k this, what’s next?’

“My brother found him, so that was just terrible, and my mum was his only girlfriend too. They met when they were teenagers.

Braith Anasta's dad Peter. Photo: Instagram

Braith Anasta (left) with his dad and brother. Photo: Instagram

“At least I had golf and rugby league and sport to focus on.

“It hit me later in life. In my 20s when I started going through some tough times with footy and getting criticism, which comes with being a professional athlete, I didn’t have my dad there. Even financial advice, just everything you lean on your dad for.

“I had to get some help and see counsellors and got to a point where I was quite comfortable in my 20s. (But) talking about the actual moment hurts and will haunt me forever.”

Anasta also discussed how the impression of mental health issues has changed over the years.

“Back then it was a stigma,” he said.

“If you killed yourself back then, you were a disgrace.

“That’s how you were looked at.”

He was angry with his dad, who didn’t leave a letter or give any reasoning behind what he was going through.

But Anasta is more at peace with it these days.

“At the time I was angry. I used to think ‘how the f**k could you do that to us’,” he said

“That’s not a man, that’s not looking after your family, what about mum, what about me and my brother.

“But the older and wiser you get, the more you learn about mental health … and how someone could get to that point.”

Originally published as Braith Anasta breaks down discussing his dad’s shock death