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Hello everyone and welcome back to On the Mend and if you're new to On the Mend, a very big hello.

My name is Matt Willis and this is a podcast about addiction, recovery and resilience with my guest sharing their expertise, experiences and hard-earned

wisdom. This week's guest is Andy Ramage. He's a football player who became a commodities broker,

then went back to university, got a master's in psychology, and turned his talents to coaching.

I've been very much looking forward to talking to Andy. I've seen a lot about him. I've watched a lot of podcasts with him, and he's a really, really great guy. Andy has also been alcohol-free for a decade now. Although he never described himself as physically dependent on alcohol, he realised how much it impacted how he felt and his ability to get things done. So he set his sights on a 90-days booze-free challenge and has never looked back. If you need a bit of motivation in your life right now, whatever challenge you want to take on, then Andy is definitely the man for this occasion. Let's do this. So how are you today, mate? Flying along, flying from. I love when I hear that. I feel really good today. Yeah. I've been on it alive.

Alcohol free and living it.

I love it.

Yeah.

That's so great. So how long have you been alcohol free? Ten years. Ten years in March. Ten years of consistency and energy and vibrancy. I love it. It's the greatest gift. That's so amazing, man. That's so amazing. So if we can, let's transport you back to the why.

So what was your life like 10 years ago or leading up to those 10 years ago?

Yeah, the real whistle stop is, I was a professional footballer, left school, 16, to follow that dream, got injured, traveled the world, ended up in the world of Broking. Right. Age 27, the guys in the bright jackets that scream and shout at one another. Yeah. So you're a professional, professional footballer. Yeah. You play for Leighton Orient, Gillian, yeah, that's kind of clubs. And then that kind of ended. When did that end? When I was about 19, 20, unfortunately, I got injured, just as it was getting exciting. Yeah. To be fair, I absolutely loved it. And that was a real loss of meaning and purpose. You can imagine. Just gone, taken away from you. Because that's your life, right? That's like what you've grown up wanting to do and you're doing it. From 10, I signed with a professional club when I was 10 years old. So that was all I ever wanted to do. That was all my dreams bundled up. And then one day it's gone.

My God. Which is devastating. But in hindsight, when you look back, I think it made me the person I am today. Yeah. Became much more resilient through that process. And then when I went into the world of broking, all of those skills were transferable. because, you know, that teamwork, that, you know, resilience, that discipline, the ability to get shouted at and bounce back. Right. So it really served me in that environment beautifully, I must admit, I feel very fortunate. You hear a lot of people from sports are transcending to business and kind of like do well in that kind of environment. I think because it lends itself. So actually a lot of the work I do now, I'm back with the Professional Footballers Association in their business school. Right. So I actually coach and train some of the best athletes on the planet right now, Premiship Footballers, and getting their life ready for after they retire from football. That's incredible. Yeah, it's really beautiful.

That's amazing.

They're in the same place as you, but further down the line with shitloads of cash and not

knowing what to do with their life or just suddenly being kind of steamrolled into a life they

never really wanted to live.

Yeah.

And then we see depression, addiction, divorce, bankruptcy,

at really elevated rates for our athletes

because they obviously reached that place early in their life, not all of them,

that their meaning and purpose gone.

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