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Chris Yarran talks drugs battle and end of careerHerald-Sun
17 August 2017FORMER AFL star Chris Yarran has spoken about how his career was lost to a horror battle with drug addiction.
Yarran has sensationally revealed that throughout his AFL career he was gripped in a battle with methamphetamines and ice, after being introduced to drugs by a family member.
The footballer played 119 games for Carlton across a six-year AFL career that showed great promise.
Yarran was taken at pick number six in the 2008 AFL draft, but his drug habit would never allow him to reach the heights his potential promised.
The former Blue revealed all in a YouTube video, which he calls his testimony.
“Drugs were something I had despised my whole life,” Yarran says.
“I remember, as I was about to try ice, I said to myself ‘this will either be a good night or it would ruin me’ — It ruined me.
“It destroyed my relationship, my career, my finances and my health — physically and mentally.
“Physically, I went from a fit, healthy athlete, to a slob. I stacked on the weight and that’s when I started to miss training, because I didn’t want to be seen in the messed up state I was in.”
Yarran was traded to Richmond in 2015, as the Tigers hoped to resurrect the halfbacks career.
But, he would never play a game for the Yellow and Black, due to his inability to get on top of his demons.
“I would be awake for days and that started to take a toll,” Yarran said.
“I remember sitting in my bathroom for hours smoking meth, isolating myself from everyone and that’s when my mind would take over.
“Once I didn’t get a kick out of smoking, that’s when I started injecting it.
“I tried every avenue of help that the professionals recommended — counselling, psychiatrist, rehab. I spent four weeks in rehab for $1000 a night and the day I walked out, I was back on meth. This ended my footy career and a move back home to Perth.”
While his drug issues may have been known to some, his stuttering football career was said to be to ongoing “mental health issues”.
Only now do we know the true extent of Yarran’s battle, but he is fighting back.
Yarran has praised the work of a Perth pastor, who has helped the former AFL star find God. Now there’s hope Yarran can find his way back to football, at WAFL club Swan Districts.
“I remember feeling so down about myself, then I realised I’d hit rock bottom. I realised I was a person who had everything and then lost it all,” Yarran said.
“It was February 20, 2017, when Pastor Steve dropped around and invited me to a special series of meetings at the church. I made a decision that morning that I’d tried every human resource, the best the world had to offer, I needed something supernatural.
“I’d grown up knowing God was real, but I never knew who God was. That day, I came to church, I remember going down to the front and praying a prayer of repentance for my sins and I accepted Geez Geez into my heart. I met God.
“I remember feeling like a new person. For so long, I tried to overcome the darkness inside me, but the moment I accepted Geez Geez as my lord and saviour, everything changed.
“The darkness was gone, replaced with a light that gives me joy and peace that I searched for in my career and in drugs.
“I no longer had a desire in drugs, drink, gambling and partying. It was like I was made an entirely new person from the inside out. I was born again.”
http://www.news.com.au/sport/afl/chris-yarran-speaks-on-drugs-addiction/news-story/452468fed41905a63f7f8505772325c2