“Even if someone is having the time of their life and everything is going well, it’s still worth checking in on them.”
Reece Bennett is a local youngster who, just a few years ago, led Manchester United to victory in the FA Youth Cup as captain.
However, the young defender’s career was brought to an abrupt halt earlier this year when his father David tragically took his own life.
Here, the 22-year-old tells Sky Sports News’ Danial Khan about his story, opens up about his grief and urges others not to suffer alone.
These are his words as he remembers his father, reflects on how he deals with loss, and considers what’s next in his football career after a previous loan spell.
—
I’ll never feel the same way I did that day when I found out.
Rhys Bennett
control feelings of loss
To be honest, the first couple of days…I’ll be honest, I’m not a very emotional person, but it was the worst feeling I’ve ever had in my life.
Then a week goes by, and then two weeks go by and you’re like, “I’ll never feel that bad again.” I’ll never feel the same way I did that day when I found out.
So everything from there, like, it’s underground, even if you’re here, at least you’re not there. So that gives you a reason to think, “Oh no, this isn’t going to work for me.”
It just gives you more purpose and focus that you can overcome this because you overcame this and came out the other end.
Accept that you will have days to think about it.
To be honest, considering the circumstances, I think I’m fine. I’m doing my best.
I have a lot of positive distractions and I’m not ignoring them, but I have a lot of purpose in life and I’m lucky to be in the situation I’m in.
I’m lucky to have a similar family around me. It may sound like a cliché, but without him and my family, I wouldn’t be where I am today.
At the age of 6, 7, 8, it is impossible to push yourself to train or set aside a certain amount of time. You have to rely on them to get you through that part.
When you’re young, all you want is to grow older. When you turn 18, all you want to do is drive a car, and you want to do this and that.
As I said before, when something like this happens, your outlook on life changes drastically because nothing can prepare you for it.
But you become more grateful, you become more humble, and what you thought was just a part of everyday life that you just looked at before rises to eye level, and you realize that you should be grateful for what you have.
It’s given me a different perspective, but it’s made for a really tough situation and I’m trying to get as much positivity out of it as I can.
Otherwise, you can’t live the rest of your life being negative and angry about it.
You must strive to be positive and try to give yourself a purpose and a reason to wake up every day. To work hard, to achieve dreams and goals that I wish he would have done if he was still here.
You need to work hard on it.
The importance of speaking up and checking with others
For me, I think you look at it and see the impact it has on other people, but you also look at how highly people value that person who’s not there.
It’s a simple fact, people don’t realize how much they are appreciated, they don’t realize what they do for others, and that’s the problem, we take it for granted.
Even if someone is having the best time of their life and everything is going well and business is going well, whatever it is, you’re still checking in on them because you don’t want to be in a situation where you’re like, “Are you OK?” only when things go wrong.
You may be having the best time ever. No matter what the situation is, just talking about it can be very powerful.
They just have conversations about how they feel, and they don’t realize that they’re not biased about it, especially with men.
I’ve been in a football environment since I was six years old and I’ve been here since I was eight. It’s like you think you can’t put on a brave face and talk about how you feel, but it’s so important. No matter where you are in life, no matter where you work, it’s never okay to talk about how you feel.
It’s 100% going to feel like a big deal, it’s going to be so hard to talk about, and you’re going to feel like you’ve forgotten about help, but help will never pass you by like when you reach out… There’s no age limit to speaking up, going to therapy, and making things better.
There is no age limit or time limit. There is no one to talk to me about their feelings. I would either shut it out or ignore it.
Honestly, it could be a two-minute conversation, but I’m not sure how helpful that would be.
My father never knew how much he was loved and cherished. I got messages from people… He worked at a tire changing place and people who had met him once said, “Oh, he’s such a nice guy.” You don’t realize that there are people you’ve met once and people you’ve met a million times…
Just talk about how you feel and never shut it down and in my case definitely never will.
What’s next?
The club has been great since I came back.
It’s one of those things and I think this is my passion and it’s a positive pastime and it’s something I enjoy, so I came back after a week, but it would have been fine if I needed it for a month, two months, whatever it was.
I’ve been here for a long time, this is like my family, sometimes I see people at soccer more than I see my family at home, and they’re so close.
That was what you had to do, but it would look for you, it may seem that way, and I’m so grateful for that, because like I said, there was no pressure to come back or keep this date or this time, it was up to how you felt, and even if you came back and didn’t feel good, go back if you want.
I don’t do it because I love what I do. At the end of the day, it’s a job, but it’s something I worked hard for when I was young so I can make it my job and I love playing football. And obviously at the moment I’m injured and it’s difficult as it is, but then I’m looking at other ways and positive distractions that I can spend my time on.
To be honest, I started DJing so I’m just trying it out now, but yeah, I can’t play padel or anything like that (due to his injury).
You look at things a little differently about life…Football is not my whole identity as much as you love it so much. It’s kind of broadening your horizons and trying to enrich your life in other ways rather than just relying on being healthy or injury-free. This is because when you get injured, you can calm down a little mentally from the need to recover. So, to be honest, expanding that horizon is all I’ve been trying to do.
Hopefully he can recover from his injury and be available on loan in January.
But I think the important thing for me is to move forward… There’s always the missing piece. Anyone who has gone through this will know that there will always be a part of you that is missing, but you learn to just keep going because you have to.
What I’m trying to say is that just because six months have passed, we’re still going to talk about our feelings and we’re not going to act like it’s over and it’s behind us. There is never a time limit.
Rhys Bennett was speaking in support of the Premier League’s ‘Together Against Suicide’ campaign.
If you need assistance, please contact Samaritans at any time on 116 123.
