Homosexuality in sport remains a taboo subject and many athletes choose to hide it for fear of the reactions of their environment and fans. In recent hours, Dan Palmer, a former Australian rugby team player – known as Wallabies – surprised with a text in which he tells his story to serve as an example. In an extensive letter published in The Sydney Morning Herald, the former player recounted the difficult moments he went through in his youth by concealing his homosexuality.” I fantasized about disappearing, changing my name and starting my life again. It’s no exaggeration to say that my own death felt preferable to the fact that someone found out I was gay,” said super rugby with Brumbies and Waratahs.
Photo: Alex Ellinghausen, The Sydney Morning Herald
Palmer recounted that at the time he cried to sleep after consuming an opioid cocktail. “I was incredibly frustrated, angry and desperately sad. I despised myself and the life I was living,” he said. Problems with drugs grew to the point where the former pillar, when he was 25, overdosed. At the time, he made the decision to stop playing rugby. “My passion for rugby had diminished for a few years at this point and I had great remorse for wasting the best years of my life pretending to be something I wasn’t,” he argued.” It makes me sick to know that in 2020 there are still people who torture the the other like me, both inside and outside the sport; we have to be better. If this piece can drive a conversation, make room for people to feel more comfortable being themselves, or it can help someone better understand what a loved one may be going through, it will have been a success,” Palmer said at the close of the letter.
