Grant Leadbitter's Grief (Athletic article)

Big_Nothing

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I subscribe to The Athletic and this article was on there. Behind a pay wall which is an effin pain so thought I'd copy over for anyone interested.

Grant Leadbitter's Grief:

Scene one: mid-1990s Wearside, on the tight streets near Roker Park. A young boy, Grant Leadbitter, is with his father Brian outside the bungalow where they always park when Sunderland are at home. “The old lady kept us the space,” Grant says, smiling. Next stop will be the sweet shop — “Sarsaparilla tablets, can you remember them?” he asks. “Kola cubes, stuff like that.” Then father and son will go together to the Fulwell End to see Peter Reid’s latest team do their bit.
Brian Leadbitter was a home-and-away man, “a fanatic”, says his son. Grant was in Sunderland’s school of excellence by the time he turned seven and at 14, he was selected for England’s under-16s. Brian was a proud dad as well as a proud fan.
It was all before them. Who’s having that last kola cube?
Scene two: New Year’s Eve 2019, Blackpool. Grant Leadbitter is almost 34. Half a lifetime on from his Sunderland debut, Leadbitter is back at the club of his heart via a decade away at Ipswich Town and Middlesbrough. It has been no sweet homecoming, though, and in the Blackpool hotel bed the night before a League One game at Fleetwood Town, he can’t sleep. Past midnight, he gets up, leaves and starts pacing the streets.
Blackpool is illuminated, welcoming 2020, but Leadbitter’s glow has dimmed. Insomnia has crept up on him lately. There are hours, days, when he feels slow, like he is lost in a fog. All the while, his mind is racing with grief. The comfort of Brian is long gone and 2019 has taken Grant’s mother, Susan. Brian’s dying wish was to have his ashes buried beneath the pitch at Sunderland’s Stadium of Light; Susan’s was to join her husband there. Those wishes have been met but this is where their son plays and now he is roaming around strange streets in unfamiliar towns at all hours.
Scene three: last Monday, Park View School, Chester-le-Street. Leadbitter is on a low stage, socially distanced from three lines of County Durham 12- and 13-year-olds. He was once one of them. He is being quizzed on the best player he faced (“Paul Scholes”); his favourite grounds (“Old Trafford, Anfield, Goodison Park, I like the old-school stadiums”); and if he is verified on Instagram (“is that a thing?”).
Leadbitter speaks of determination and resilience and when asked if he has ever cried after a match, he replies that he has lost three Wembley finals. At the end, headmaster Andy Finley thanks Grant and reminds his pupils that in an age of instant judgment they should remember, famous or not, Beneath everybody, there is a human being”. Signed photographs are handed out. The picture is of Leadbitter scoring against Peterborough United a fortnight ago. What it doesn’t show is Leadbitter running to his parents’ ashes after he scored to touch the turf. What it doesn’t show is Leadbitter sitting in his car after the match, crying.
“How was it?” Leadbitter asks when the school session is over. Despite spending 17 years in a very public profession, he has always tried to remain private. In the workplace — a club’s training ground — colleagues will know Leadbitter as boisterous and opinionated, and one of them. But publicly, he has, to use a phrase he employed on Monday, “shied away”. He is anxious about this interview, how it might be interpreted or misinterpreted. He wants to explain the past; he is positive about the future.
In front of the children, his ease grew. His tone remained understated, like his advice — “less is more at times” — and when a boy asked what Leadbitter considers his most significant success, his answer was: “Being here today, still playing, not taking anything for granted.”
There were times as 2019 became 2020 when, mentally and physically, Leadbitter had been unsure about that. He refers to himself then as “a hindrance” and 30 days after sloping around Blackpool, he took leave from Sunderland, from football. The club announced their captain was stepping away, saying it was a personal decision. That was correct. Leadbitter had been engulfed by grief and guilt to the point of standstill. He had reached the stage where he was, “Hoping to wake up one day and feel normal”.
He had sought help. For around a year, Leadbitter has been speaking to someone outside the game. And it has helped. So, unintentionally, did COVID-19 — “It bought me time” — and when he returned for pre-season in July, he felt sharp again. Leadbitter’s figures proved it. He has started and finished Sunderland’s last three league games — seven points, no goals conceded. He feels part of things again.
“I want to show people that you can come through it,” he says. “I get letters — from older people as well as younger ones — and I understand. I know what it’s like.”
The “it” is grief. In mid-February, a fortnight into his break, on Leadbitter’s verified Instagram account he posted the quotation: “Grief is like an earthquake.” It spoke of “aftershocks”. Unfortunately for Leadbitter, it is a subject he now knows intimately.
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Leadbitter posted this picture of a family holiday when speaking of his grief
There are many grounds around the globe where fans’ ashes have been brought. Bill Shankly talked of the caskets in the Anfield goalmouth; Jackie Milburn’s ashes were scattered at the Gallowgate End at St James’ Park. These are part of the mythology of football.
Not for Leadbitter. It is his reality. Every time he plays at the Stadium of Light, he is on a pitch where his parents’ ashes are buried in two small urns on the touchline. That may seem sentimental to some, a sign of football’s deep meaning on Wearside. But to others, it can look heavy, claustrophobic. It could bring pressure, even stress.
“It’s where I work, where I play my football,” Leadbitter says. “Not many players… that’s why I left. I never wanted to be a victim. I didn’t want to be known as that.”
Grant Leadbitter made his Sunderland debut in a League Cup tie against Huddersfield Town in September 2003, a second-half substitute for John Oster. Mick McCarthy was the manager. Sunderland lost 4-2.
“You think you’ve made it, don’t you, 17 and playing for Sunderland?” Leadbitter says. But it would be two years before his debut in league football, during a short loan spell at Rotherham United.
Leadbitter returned to make his Premier League debut one month before his 20th birthday. It was 2005-06 and Sunderland were bound for another relegation, finishing on a mere 15 points. Leadbitter played in 11 of the last 14 matches. “I thought I did well in a struggling team. I was concentrating on having a good start to my career, I know you can be a talked-about 16-year-old with potential and by 19, no one’s talking about you.”
That summer of 2006 saw Sunderland sold to the Drumaville group led by former striker Niall Quinn. Roy Keane joined as manager five games into the season and Sunderland went boom. “Roy transformed the football club,” Leadbitter says, “I remember how excited my dad was.”
Sunderland soared from bottom of the Championship to top. Leadbitter played in 44 of 46 games and scored two precious winners late on to seal promotion. They stayed in the Premier League the following season and Leadbitter was in the England Under-21 team alongside the likes of Mark Noble and James Milner. A happy Leadbitter headed to Mallorca on holiday with his mates. Then his phone rang. His father was in the hospital.
“He’d had an accident and was in hospital but they didn’t want to tell me about the severity of it all. We all got the next flight. My sisters were worse than me, my mam was obviously in shock.”
Aged 50, Brian Leadbitter died. It was May 25, 2008. A man who had been to Wembley in 1973 to see Sunderland beat almighty Leeds to win the FA Cup, who then saw his son pull on his beloved red-and-white stripes, was gone. It was sudden, no goodbyes.
“Then you’ve to organise a service,” Leadbitter says. “Not that long before, my dad had said he’d want his ashes at Sunderland Football Club. We had the ceremony at Sunderland crematorium. I was in a fortunate position of being able to get in touch with some of my dad’s heroes who’d played for Sunderland. Five of them agreed to carry my dad’s coffin alongside me. It was a privilege to meet them.
“We’d a reception a few days later at the stadium to do my dad’s ashes. That was quite a tough day. I was in shock, but I didn’t think it really hit me. Selfishly, all I was thinking about was my career. Selfish. I’ll always remember my mam telling me: ‘You’re the man of the house now’. And I’m thinking, ‘I’m 22, I’ve got a career’. And Jemma, my wife, was pregnant.”
Was there any hesitation from him or the family about the ashes?
“Of course it crossed my mind that I’d be playing on this pitch,” he says. “Of course it did. But did it affect me back then? No. I knew it was what my dad wanted. And I was really young. You think you’re old at 22, you forget how young you are.
“And I did well on the pitch, so it can’t have affected me. Roy (Keane) helped me, he didn’t single me out, which is what I needed. He treated me as normal, demanded the same application each day. He was right. It got me through.”
Leadbitter was on the bench as season 2008-09 dawned and was again a substitute when Arsenal were the visitors to Wearside. The score was 0-0 when, in the 84th minute, Keane signalled that Leadbitter should replace Dwight Yorke.
Three minutes later, Leadbitter turned away from Alex Song and drilled a shot from 20 yards past Manuel Almunia. The stadium erupted and so did Leadbitter, who swerved away from team-mates to run to the touchline and his father’s ashes. Until that moment, few knew what had happened to the Leadbitter family.
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After scoring against Arsenal, Leadbitter drops to his knees at the point on the touchline where his father’s ashes are buried (Photo: Mike Egerton/PA Images via Getty Images)
As a posse, we gathered as reporters to hear from him afterwards. “People close to me know why I went down on the floor like I did,” he said, quietly. “I just want to leave it at that.” There were a couple more sentences but we would not hear again from a reserved young man for a long time.
Now he says of the Arsenal goal: “My plan was always to dedicate my first goal to my dad. I think it’s only right. My mam struggled to go back to the stadium after he died but she was there that day.”
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Leadbitter, whose mother was watching that day, is mobbed by team-mates and staff (Photo: Anna Gowthorpe – PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)
This was October. By December Keane had left Sunderland, in January a rival Premier League club made an offer for Leadbitter and in April Keane was appointed manager of Ipswich. In September 2009 Leadbitter joined Ipswich. Was he beginning to feel the aftershocks of his father’s death?
“No, they were delayed, they came years after. I’m proud of my parents, I just didn’t want to get sucked into grieving. I didn’t want everyone knowing my business. I knew in my gut I had to move — for myself, my wife, our one-year-old girl. I wanted to go away and find myself.
“And Roy knew me inside out. Ipswich was brilliant for me and my family. I loved it there. I grew up. The only downside was I didn’t see my mam as much and that’s something I regret. Our relationship was good, strong, but I don’t think I realised how bad she coped because I wasn’t there. When I look back, you can say it’s selfish. But I knew I’d done the right thing. Who’s to say I’d still be playing if I’d stayed? I really don’t know.”

Leadbitter had three seasons at Portman Road. Then Middlesbrough gave him a route back to the north east. Not that geography was foremost in his mind: “I didn’t come back for the north east, I came back because I bought into Middlesbrough, Tony Mowbray and Steve Gibson. I had a good feeling about Middlesbrough and it was a good fit for me.”
He was 26 and says: “Others might not think so, but within myself, I was calmer.”
Was his mother pleased he was closer? “Yeah, she was pleased, but I was still thinking about my career. I put my career before everything.”
Leadbitter was the club’s player of the season in his first year and in 2015, with Aitor Karanka in charge, Middlesbrough reached the Championship play-offs. They beat Brentford to face Norwich City at Wembley. Leadbitter looked at the date: May 25th. “It was my dad’s seventh anniversary. I thought, ‘This is meant to be’.
“But it wasn’t. It’s one of my biggest regrets in football, that day. Yeah, we got beat in the final, which hurt me. But the meaning behind it, I was thinking: ‘This could make up for a lot of hard years’. My family came down to Wembley and after the game, it really hit home. There’s a picture of me on the pitch in my own little world thinking: ‘Life’s ****’.
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Leadbitter stands alone on the pitch at Wembley after defeat in the 2015 play-off final (Photo: Tom Dulat/Getty Images)
“But then on the bus back, Aitor got me in a headlock and said: ‘Don’t worry, next season I’ll bring in the goals we need’. So you go back into your zone. I went on holiday and put it all in the back of my head. It’s something I was quite good at. Later on in life, you find it’s not so good.”
Karanka was half-right. The next season Middlesbrough scored fewer goals but won promotion. The last day was a 1-1 draw at home to Brighton. Leadbitter was carried off singing a Boro anthem. As team-mate and friend Jonathan Woodgate informed him: “You’ll be the only F***ing Mackem carried off by Middlesbrough fans.”
“He’s right,” says Leadbitter. “I didn’t realise until I left that Middlesbrough fans hold me in quite high esteem. As a Sunderland season-ticket holder and mad Sunderland fan, I’m pretty proud of that.”
 
Middlesbrough’s promotion was followed by relegation, Karanka was followed by Garry Monk and then Tony Pulis. By January 2019 Leadbitter was reaching his 33rd birthday and he was again thinking of Sunderland and his mother. A couple of months earlier she had been diagnosed with cancer. And Jack Ross, Sunderland manager, was interested in Leadbitter. A deal was done.
“My wife questioned me going back. But I didn’t want to have that regret for the rest of my life of not going back. I’m quite intense, I didn’t want to have that regret,” he says. “Middlesbrough were brilliant over it. They helped it happen. I didn’t tell my mam until it was done. She was pleased. But she wasn’t well.”
On February 2, 2019, 10 and a half years after his last Sunderland appearance, Leadbitter played at the Stadium of Light against AFC Wimbledon. Sunderland won 1-0 and he touched the grass on his way off. His mother had summoned the strength to go to the game with Grant’s sisters, Kimberley and Sarah-Jane.
“My mam was in the stands and I thought that was probably going to be the last time she’d watch me. She wasn’t well. People knew about my dad and that was in the background, but no one knew about my mam. It was a few weeks after I signed when it got serious and by March, things were getting worse.
“I was trying to build up my relationship again with her, having spent so many years away. I’d go from training to my mam’s in Fence Houses, sitting there every afternoon. She was stubborn, didn’t want to go to hospital. I went a bit quiet. For six or seven weeks, it carried on.”
Meanwhile, Sunderland pushed for promotion, only to finish fifth. As Susan Leadbitter was taken into hospital, Sunderland defeated Portsmouth 1-0 at home in the first leg of the play-offs. Leadbitter was not selected but Ross had told him that he would be playing in the second leg at Fratton Park on Thursday.
“I went to see my mam in hospital on the Tuesday. I came away knowing in myself that was the last time I’d see her. I was going to Portsmouth on the Wednesday and wouldn’t be back until Friday. I got up on Wednesday, left early to go to the hospital. I got there 15 minutes late. My mam had been moved to a different room; I was stopped and pulled aside. They explained.
“I came out of the hospital, rang my wife and sisters, my agent. They all asked if I was going to play. I drove to training. I didn’t get changed. I went to see Jack. I think he was a bit shocked. No one knew. I should have told people but I didn’t want people to think this was happening again, that I was a victim. I didn’t want that. I suppose the men we are…
“He asked me if I wanted to play and I said: ‘Yeah, but I don’t want anyone to know. This is me and you, Jack’. He was brilliant. No one knew.”
Sunderland flew south. Leadbitter told only one other person, captain George Honeyman. Leadbitter roomed on his own and “at 6, 6.30 in the morning, I was out for a walk. I must have been out for two hours, walking around. I’m grateful no one knew. Everything normal”.
The second leg ended 0-0, with Sunderland in a Wembley play-off final and Leadbitter on his knees in anguished celebration. Then the news filtered out, to Leadbitter’s team-mates as well as to fans.
“I took myself out of the dressing room, I didn’t want to be the focus. I went out onto the pitch. Catts (Lee Cattermole) came out and said some nice words. It was the right thing to do, the club got through.”
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Leadbitter celebrates an emotional play-off semi-final triumph (Photo: Adam Davy/PA Images via Getty Images)
Now there was a play-off final to consider and another funeral to arrange. Then there was the date. Sunderland versus Charlton at Wembley was on May 26th. It meant Sunderland would travel down on the 25th and at 7 o’clock that morning, unseen, Leadbitter was alone on the pitch at the Stadium of Light marking the anniversary of his father’s death.
“Obviously things go through your head,” he says. “And again I thought: ‘This is going to happen’. OK, it didn’t happen last time, but now I’m back home, back at the club I love, I’ve lost both parents, I’m going to Wembley. You think: ‘Yeah, it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen’.”
Sunderland were beaten 2-1, with the winner scored in the fourth minute of added time. It didn’t happen. Did Leadbitter feel beaten?
“Oh, yeah. I was rock bottom… the feeling I had was: ‘Maybe me and Sunderland aren’t meant to be’. Yeah, it took a hell of a lot out of me, more than I thought. More than I ever thought.”
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Sunderland’s kit man John Cooke attempts to console a disconsolate Leadbitter after the 2019 play-off defeat (Photo: Ian Horrocks/Sunderland AFC via Getty Images)
Leadbitter spoke at his mother’s funeral, as he had at his father’s. A few days later, the ashes were placed together at the stadium.
“I think I was numb, really. The kids didn’t come to the funeral. I didn’t want them to see us burying the ashes. I went with my sisters and family and you try to hold it together. It was tough, but then I’d seen the final weeks with my mam and she was suffering. She’s with my dad.”
The enormity of it all should have led Leadbitter to take time away. Instead, after the summer break, Sunderland resumed life in League One with Leadbitter the new captain. Ross was removed in October, replaced by Phil Parkinson. Another new manager to impress. Leadbitter tried, but it didn’t work.
“It wasn’t happening. It all got on top of me. I was drained, I had no energy. Going home one day, I crashed my car because I was tired. I just couldn’t do it. I had to be honest with myself. I always knew my dad’s death would catch up with me because it was always in the back of my mind. But when you lose your mam… I think I got two earthquakes in one. You don’t know what’s going through your body because you’ve never experienced this before and you have this foggy feeling in your head — you can’t concentrate.
“Being a hindrance… I don’t know if anyone else feels a hindrance when you’re not doing anything right and you’re distant? You feel you’re letting your team-mates down, you’re cheating. I have two sisters who are struggling, and you have times when you think about parents and stuff you should have done. I’ve had that many emotions in me in the last 12 months.”
But Leadbitter is back, playing, scoring and, crucially, speaking. “Today, talking about things is a lot easier for me. That’s down to learning — about life. There’s more to life than football and I’d never seen it that way.”
Leadbitter knows he has been overwhelmed. But he is still standing. He has nine months left on his contract and there is much to do. It’s about resilience.
“I came back fit and mentally that helped me. You set steps and you win each day. Whatever I’m doing, I’m doing right because I’m back training well, playing well. I can focus — I went through that time when I couldn’t.
“I’ve done the time away, which I needed. I’m proud of myself. I just want others to know the same. You can do it.”
  • Samaritans provides emotional support for anyone who is struggling to cope, who needs someone to listen without judgment or pressure. Their phone line is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Call them free, any time, on 116 123
 
Thanks for posting that. It took real guts for Leadbitter to go so public - especially as he is always a man of so few words, a very private man. Very moving isn't it, looking behind the player and into the man.
 
Yeah, it's a tough read. Grief is a bitch and when you can't shake it, you can't shake it, life is played out on mute, feelings jump from outright grief, to just feeling numb, nothing, zip. I hope he is starting to come to terms, and find his equilibrium, he's one of the good guys and deserves to find his happy place again. Losing family is painful, but with support he can get through it and I'm sure all Boro fans are routing for him to do so.
 
He is an inspiration to me. I've just returned from walking England's three tallest mountains Scarfell, Helvellyn and Skidaw in honour of my dad who died in April. The final one this morning Skidaw I walked with him when I was 7 or 8 and it nearly broke me, I cried all the way back down. The grief has only started to hit me in the last couple of weeks. It's hard to get your head around and comes out of nowhere.
That interview was a really good read and couldn't have come at a better time for me. UTB.
 
Excellent article. Lost my Mother in January 2019 and didn't realise how hard the grief would hit or when it would. I had counselling from Cruse, they were great but even now from time to time the grief pops up and grabs me.
Grant was an exemplary professional and captain for us, only Sir Tony of Mowbray is held in higher esteem by me !
 
I feel ckoked reading that - and it takes something believe me.
What a wonderful young man - such caring and compassion.
Compared to all the bad things in the world he is a lovely bloke.
No wonder players would bust a ball for him as Captain.
Hope he stays well and comes back to the Boro to see us now and again(y)
 
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