Latest / The R4R Podcast: Road to Zero / Crusade for Connor: We wanted to honour our mate

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Crusade for Connor: We wanted to honour our mate · The R4R Podcast: Road to Zero

0:00
Luke Harry Christian, thanks for coming in fellas from the
0:04
crusade for Connor. We'll focus on the crusade
0:07
later, but we'll I would like to linger a little bit on the man
0:12
behind the mission, Connor. And like I said, we did a bit of
0:17
research on you guys beforehand. We came across an ABC interview
0:20
and your words looped together amongst a few questions.
0:25
Connor was diagnosed with schizophrenia, depression and
0:28
anxiety in 2019 and in December 2022 he tragically took his
0:34
life. In that interview, Luke, you
0:37
said Connor was an amazing person, a close mate to so many
0:41
of us. He had a great passion for
0:43
nature, he loves sport, music, and he was exceptionally good at
0:48
all of those things. Yeah, he just, I've met very few
0:55
people like him where he's just everyone liked him and he wasn't
0:58
trying to either, which was the amazing part.
1:01
Like I think for all of us, he connected with us in different
1:04
ways, like, you know, footy with these boys and made through
1:07
music and and playing sport in primary school and that sort of
1:10
thing. And I think there was just he
1:15
fit him into every crowd for a different reason.
1:17
And he wasn't trying to be the cool guy or the popular guy
1:20
who's just trying to be mates with everyone.
1:21
And that's something that people resonated with and that's why
1:24
that Christopher Connor has been such a big event and, and
1:27
mission because like, it's a support for us, but also just so
1:31
many people loved Connor. I just wanted to get around him.
1:33
So I think the fact that we've had so many people come out to
1:37
our walks and support us and donate is a really good sign of
1:40
of the kind of person Connor was and really what started this
1:45
whole campaign as well. Yeah, who was it to you, Harry?
1:51
Yeah, as, as Luke said, I think in discussions over the years, a
1:55
good way it's being put was that sort of every bloke wanted to be
1:58
his, his friend and every girl wanted to be his girlfriend sort
2:01
of thing. Like he just had that aura about
2:03
him. But yeah, very, very, very close
2:05
mate through junior 40 and as he was to, you know, a best friend
2:09
to sort of everyone in our friend group really all through
2:12
high school. And then, you know, the the
2:14
years after that when, you know, mental illness and sort of had
2:18
his struggles, you know, stuff got got hard for him.
2:21
It was sort of hard to see what happened.
2:23
But you know, deep down he he was never, you know, he was
2:27
always really sweet natured, always, always nice to everyone
2:31
right up right up to the end, despite, you know, anything that
2:34
he was struggling with do. You guys remember the moment he
2:40
was, I guess, diagnosed with schizophrenia and the other
2:44
mental conditions? I, I didn't find it until he
2:48
told me probably a couple years after and just came up and we
2:52
were playing basketball and he just told me in the car.
2:56
But we saw the signs. So the year 12, so we're about
2:59
1718, just little things like, you know, started to grow his
3:03
hair out, just started to, he'd leave parties early and do that
3:07
sort of stuff. So we, we noticed signs early,
3:11
but I didn't think he really felt confident to tell people.
3:14
At least he didn't tell me for a little while.
3:18
So yeah, again, there's a tricky part of it is we're just seeing
3:21
him change and not knowing if it was just us being teenagers or
3:25
whatever it was. But then as soon as we had that
3:28
less structured contact point with high school, going into
3:31
adult world when we couldn't see him as often, there was often
3:36
like big changes between every time you saw him.
3:39
And yeah, it wasn't until he was confident or confident reaching
3:43
out to us and saying what was going on that we sort of found
3:45
out. And how did that discussion go
3:48
when you're at basketball? It was, it was good.
3:52
I mean, it didn't come as a surprise necessarily.
3:55
Like I said, we sort of expected something was happening.
3:59
But I mean, we, we finished up when you're sitting in the car
4:01
and we spoke for about an hour and a half about it.
4:03
I just like, I had no idea what schizophrenia was.
4:05
And he just told me what, what he was experiencing.
4:08
And yet if they opened my eyes up a little bit of of what it
4:12
could mean and then what he was experiencing.
4:14
Like we just see the outside of what we are told from him and
4:19
our interactions. But it was interesting and
4:23
heartbreaking to hear. But it's like on the inside for
4:26
him, he was just, he was struggling.
4:29
What was it like for him? What?
4:32
How did he describe it? The key things I remember him
4:35
telling me about where the hallucination side of things,
4:39
especially the the auditory, remember him saying that he
4:44
would hear a lot of his close mates asked, you know, do you
4:48
hear me telling you anything he said?
4:50
Yeah, like I, I hear you in my head telling me that I'm not a
4:53
good person and I've, I've done things wrong.
4:56
And yeah, so just, it really made me feel like I didn't know
5:01
what to do because I could tell him something to his face, but
5:04
then he might think I've said something different behind
5:06
closed doors. So those are the big things
5:09
where, yeah, more the the auditory hallucinations.
5:12
Yeah, it's probably worth just zooming out a tiny bit and
5:20
define schizophrenia a bit. It's a mental disorder
5:23
characterised by a disconnection from reality which effects how a
5:27
person thinks, feels and behaves.
5:30
It emerges in adolescence, young adulthood, and effects
5:33
approximately 1 in 100 people. When I was doing a bit of
5:38
research for this, I came across a few videos of people with
5:42
lived experience of schizophrenia and it was like, I
5:51
don't know the word hard slash touching to see how it humbled
5:58
people, how it like it was quite a intimidating thing for people
6:06
to face. Yeah, definitely.
6:11
I think it took the life out of him.
6:15
He was, he was really like, he was such a passionate person and
6:20
so upbeat and happy and always laughing and making jokes.
6:24
And then after uni or like after high school going into uni days,
6:30
I mean, every time I saw him, it was like, this is kind of
6:34
boring. I don't know what to talk to him
6:35
about. Just it wasn't passionate
6:37
anymore. He'd given up music, he'd
6:39
stopped playing footy. He wouldn't go out to the
6:42
parties or to Hangouts anymore. And it was just like, I didn't
6:46
know what to talk to him about. And I don't think he had
6:50
anything he really wanted to, you know, be a part of.
6:53
It sort of isolated himself quite a lot from everything.
6:57
So yeah, the biggest thing from my perspective is just the
7:01
character shift, just because he was such a positive person and
7:05
he was still very kind and generous to people, but not to
7:09
himself. And that was the really tough
7:11
thing to watch. It's it's the next part because
7:23
yeah, the over the underlying theme with this is it such a
7:29
tough disease to live with that almost pushes you into yourself.
7:33
That's what I gathered from these interviews I saw.
7:37
And what you're describing me is it's, it just would be such a
7:41
relentless force that these people have to deal with and it
7:45
would just be so tiring and it would push you within yourself.
7:49
And then unfortunately, people with schizophrenia, I think it's
7:55
10 times more likely or something like that, 10% of the
7:59
deaths of people with schizophrenia are from suicide.
8:03
When did you guys find out about Connor?
8:09
Yeah, myself personally, I remember it was, yeah, start of
8:13
December in 2022, I actually had the day off, day off work at an
8:17
RTO and I'd had a pretty big weekend at a music festival and
8:22
stuff over the weekend. So I was happy to have the have
8:24
the day off when I was, yeah, just asleep in bed.
8:28
And yeah, it was sort of 2022, both my parents were working
8:31
from home with, with COVID. I remember being sort of asleep
8:35
and I where my mum's like set up her little home offices, It's in
8:39
the room next to mine. And I think I sort of half woke
8:42
up when her phone rang and she was in like a meeting and didn't
8:46
answer it. And it was, yeah, one of our
8:48
friend's mums was, was calling her.
8:50
And then when she announced she'd call my dad straight away,
8:53
I remember like sort of hearing this happened, but I was sort of
8:56
half asleep. And then I remember outside my
8:58
door, like my mum was saying to my dad, like something happened.
9:02
And then, yeah, when they opened the door, sorry, when I opened
9:09
the door, like my mum was already bawling her eyes out
9:11
crying. So I knew like something pretty
9:13
bad had happened, but I didn't know what.
9:16
And then, yeah. And my dad had sort of said to
9:18
me, like, are you awake, mate? And I said, yeah, yeah.
9:20
And he said, OK, are you, are you properly awake?
9:22
Because talk to you about something.
9:24
And yeah, he said, you know, we've just had a phone call.
9:29
This is, and this was, this is what happened last night.
9:33
And yeah, my dad said to me, yeah, Connor, Connor, Hogan's
9:37
gone. And yeah, they just came, sort
9:40
of sat on the bed and I was sort of sitting up and yeah, sort of
9:45
didn't really know how to process it.
9:46
And then I remember my mom sort of gave me a, gave me a cuddle.
9:49
And that was when it sort of all, all hit me.
9:52
And yeah, the waterworks came on, came on from there.
9:56
And then, yeah, sort of took it upon myself to call sort of, you
10:02
know, other close mates just to throughout the day.
10:05
So they sort of found out, you know, you know, the best sort of
10:09
way you can. So sort of called a few few of
10:12
my out or our good, good friends and my brother and stuff.
10:15
And yeah, just sort of repeated that process to them and sort of
10:18
said to you somewhere you can have a chat.
10:20
And yeah, just sort of said some pretty bad news.
10:24
And this is what it is. And was a pretty, pretty
10:28
probably the worst day of my life going through that.
10:30
But it was good for me. I sort of found to do that with
10:34
a fair few of the boys. So we sort of had pretty quick
10:39
breakdowns of how we were feeling with different people.
10:42
And we were talking, you know, each one of those phone calls
10:44
went for half an hour to an hour each and sharing, sharing
10:48
stories and all that sort of stuff.
10:51
But yeah, it was a pretty, a pretty rough day.
10:54
And yeah, you boys obviously had a pretty different experience
10:56
with how you guys found out. Luke, Elliot and myself,
11:01
Elliot's another member of our Crusade for Connor crew that
11:04
went to Carabar and did all those like things with us
11:07
growing up. We were actually overseas.
11:09
We're in I think Vietnam at the time, somewhere in Southeast
11:13
Asia, and I think it was maybe Elliot's dad that.
11:18
He was Elliot's. Mom, Elliot's mom called him and
11:22
yeah, we were just all sitting around in the bedroom and he
11:24
came back with the news and he was pretty.
11:28
There wasn't a lot of words that was said for a long time after
11:31
that. It was pretty quiet in there and
11:33
just a few quiet tears, I'm sure.
11:36
And then I think we, we all kind of shared a bit of a hug after a
11:41
while and then a lot of stories for a long time at least, like a
11:46
night or two. We we were going out to
11:49
different places and just sitting there sharing a drink
11:53
and just thinking about Connor. And I think one of the biggest
11:58
reasons why it was really hitting home is, you know,
12:02
Elliott, Luke, Connor and myself was so close in school and he
12:08
was that kind of larrikin and, and, and the energetic person
12:14
that was so fun to be around that he would have been overseas
12:17
with us on that trip if he was still, you know, the same Connor
12:21
that he was in year 11. So, yeah, it was, it was, it was
12:27
pretty hard to be over there, get that news.
12:31
Obviously that's hard in the 1st place.
12:33
But just knowing that, you know, he would have been there sharing
12:37
those memories with us and having a great time if the
12:40
mental illness hadn't kicked in. So yeah.
12:44
He must have been a really great person.
12:50
I mean, you've described him as such, but the emotion that you
12:54
guys still have in your eyes as you're discussing this,
12:58
something that happened near on four years ago, it's still with
13:04
you. Yeah, like, I don't think any of
13:08
us have a bad word to say about him.
13:10
Like, he was so bubbly, so energetic, so happy, so fun.
13:14
The larrikin, like making everyone laugh all the time,
13:18
only ever had good intentions. Like, he was an amazing human
13:22
being. And yeah, it's a shame.
13:28
It's a shame that he's not here, you know, getting to getting to
13:32
experience life and share memories with us for another 80
13:36
years, you know? Yeah, I think as well even stuff
13:40
like what we are doing with Crusade for Connor, like the
13:43
stuff that we do with the walk and getting together and you
13:48
know, that's, that's sort of the Connor that we remember and
13:49
that's that's what he would have absolutely loved to have done.
13:52
You know, the different challenges we did the first
13:54
year, yeah, whatever we're doing and getting out in nature, like
13:57
the boys going up, man, because you Oscar on people running and
14:00
playing sport and playing music, all that sort of stuff.
14:02
Like that's what we chose those charges.
14:05
But you know, had life going differently and Connor was still
14:08
here. He would have been the first
14:09
bloke to sign up to any of those things and say absolutely, boys,
14:12
I'll, I'll help out. And he would have brought the
14:14
vibes up. And that was just sort of who he
14:17
was and what he did. Yeah, I want to get to the
14:21
crusade and all that you guys are doing, but I think just from
14:25
hearing you guys speak it, it seems quite, maybe it's not
14:30
remarkable, but it seems quite special, the connection you and
14:34
your friends have and how you processed it immediately,
14:39
especially you, Harry, ringing everyone in the immediate
14:43
aftermath. Yeah, yeah, it was a it was a
14:46
funny day when my first call was to my younger sister to try and
14:49
see if I could get through it without, without crying.
14:51
And I don't think I got through a single one after that anyway.
14:56
But yeah, it was, yeah, it was, it was special.
15:01
Yeah, obviously a not a good thing to have to do and yeah,
15:06
definitely wouldn't have chosen it that way.
15:08
But in some way also was grateful to share that
15:12
experience with, with those people.
15:15
And yeah, obviously tried to be very courteous to the people
15:19
that I told and put it as delicately as you sort of can.
15:24
And yeah, it was a yeah, like I said, it was, it was good in the
15:29
sense that probably did help me process it a little bit more
15:32
because obviously I was, I talked about it a lot pretty
15:34
quickly. And yeah, it was good to, you
15:39
know, every every different one of our mates that I spoke to had
15:42
a different, different good story or funny story or, you
15:45
know, sort of went when it speaks to Connor's character
15:48
that across if everyone you spoke to could have a a new
15:52
positive thing to say about him. Yeah, and it pretty quickly
15:56
shifted to you guys wanting to honour his legacy in a sense.
16:04
Yeah, it did. I think maybe we even had the
16:09
thought while we're still overseas that we wanted to do
16:11
something. I think it's pretty shocking to
16:14
us that like we pretty much had no awareness of schizophrenia,
16:19
especially in young people. I don't know why, but in my head
16:21
it was this thing that, you know, it's more of like an old
16:24
person thing or, or something that people have from birth and
16:28
not the fact that it actually kicks in in adolescence, so 18
16:32
to 26 year olds. And like kind of just seeing the
16:38
effect that it could completely change, you know, someone's life
16:42
from being the bubblest person to being someone who just had no
16:46
more of the same passions and didn't really want to be around
16:49
the same group of friends in like a click of a finger.
16:53
Like it was it was it was very shocking and seeing that happen
16:57
to someone and not being aware that that was even a thing.
17:03
I think that kind of kick started us and we had a lot of
17:06
chats while we're still away that we want to do something
17:10
that, you know, helps either raise some money that can go
17:14
towards finding out more about treatment or diagnosis and stuff
17:19
like that, or spreading awareness so that more people
17:23
are aware of schizophrenia and the fact that it does kick in to
17:27
young people and what to look out for and that sort of thing.
17:31
So while we were away, yeah, I think that's when we kind of
17:37
dreamed out the idea that let's do a few different events that
17:41
reflect who Connor was as a person and what his interests
17:43
and passions were and see if we can rally a bit of support
17:46
around it. Yeah.
17:49
Do you want to expand on that? Yeah, I think for, I suppose in
17:53
particular overseas, like we, we weren't there for the funeral.
17:56
We were on a rooftop of a hostel watching over a video call and
18:02
very, very kindly, Connor's mom shattered us out in her her
18:08
speech. It made us feel like we're part
18:10
of the day, but we felt so distant from it all.
18:14
We just have to do something to to make it up to him.
18:19
And it like the really cool thing about the origin of Chris
18:22
F Connor was that we all wanted to do something separately.
18:26
Like the reason why it started off with ten of us boys doing a
18:29
big challenge week was because we came home.
18:32
We're like, we've got to do something.
18:34
And then spoke to Harry and spoke to Dan and spoke to all
18:37
the other boys as well. And I'm like, yeah, we're going
18:39
to do a fundraiser as well. So it wasn't like we all came
18:42
together and said, what do you reckon, boys?
18:44
What should we do? We're all going to do something
18:46
anyways. And we're just like, oh, might
18:48
as well just combine them. So it was, it was really awesome
18:53
to to all be on the same page of like, we just have to do
18:56
something because this, this sucks.
18:58
We can't let it happen again to to someone else.
19:02
And for us it was a massive part of the agreement process as
19:05
well. Yeah.
19:06
It was definitely helpful, yeah. Like we just, we, we didn't know
19:11
what to do. I think, you know, seeing
19:14
Connors decline, you know, we were there for him.
19:16
We're supportive, but we're not Tim.
19:17
We're trying to hang out with him.
19:19
But I don't think we really knew how to go about it.
19:22
We've never really experienced that at all.
19:26
So being able to feel like we could do something afterwards,
19:29
as much as it felt too late, it was like, OK, this is something
19:33
that we can do to to at least help his family, help us and
19:37
hopefully help other people going through a similar
19:39
situation. Yeah, It would have felt wrong
19:41
for someone who had the impact that Connor had on us to just
19:46
his memory and legacy, to just golf with a whimper.
19:48
So yeah, we're so driven to just be like, you know, it can't just
19:53
be the end. Yeah.
19:56
That's a good. It's a credit to you guys.
19:59
It's credit to Connor as well. I think there's there's, we've
20:05
heard about in the previous podcast, there's a tragedy of
20:08
suicide in that with hindsight, it's so preventable.
20:14
If we had, if we knew what we knew, then it could have been
20:19
different. And in in some ways, you got to
20:22
be kind to yourself because you gotta like, you can't, you can't
20:27
change like you got to give respect to yourself.
20:30
At the time, you only knew what you knew.
20:33
But what you guys are doing, you're honouring Connor, but
20:37
you're also helping somebody down the line.
20:42
Yeah, it's definitely a big, a big part of, you know, what we,
20:45
what we hope we're doing is because obviously there's a lot
20:48
of guilt that that you feel internally when something like
20:51
that happens to someone you love and you're really close to.
20:54
And you think about all the things you could have done
20:55
differently. And there's a million things you
20:57
could have done. But yeah, as, as we've touched
21:00
on, like, yeah, we just didn't really know what what we were
21:03
dealing with. So hopefully a big part of
21:07
Crusade for Connor is, yeah, raising awareness to what
21:11
schizophrenia actually is and how common it is.
21:14
And you know, that it's not this crazy person, highly stigmatised
21:19
disease, that it is a thing that lots of people have and lots of
21:22
people in society are dealing with it.
21:24
And this is maybe how we can as a community deal with it
21:27
together. I remember speaking sort of
21:30
with, with Connor about, you know, his schizophrenia and
21:35
stuff. And, yeah, he was very sheepish
21:38
to, to sort of tell people and didn't want too many people
21:41
knowing. Because I remember he'd sort of
21:43
said to me about, you know, he'd told people and whether it was
21:47
just the schizophrenia or whether this was this was how he
21:50
interpreted it, that when he would tell people he had
21:53
schizophrenia, they would sort of be a bit standoffish and sort
21:57
of I think he's a bit crazy. And which obviously, if you're
22:00
already a little bit unsure of yourself, you know, people
22:03
reacting like that to you is, are they going to send you
22:05
further further down a spiral? So yeah, big part of what we're
22:09
doing I guess is hoping that, you know, when people do tell
22:13
people they have schizophrenia, people aren't as shocked by it
22:17
or I understand offers you a bit more, I guess equipped to to
22:21
deal with it and certainly what what we were.
22:24
And I think also another part of that is like we're hoping that
22:31
whatever we can contribute in some way can help work towards
22:34
like understanding the causes of schizophrenia and like hopefully
22:39
in the future having better treatment of schizophrenia.
22:43
Speaking to Neuron, just from our experiences with Connor,
22:46
like if he wasn't taking medication, then he was getting
22:50
the voices or he was like getting the hallucinations, but
22:53
if he was taking medication, the medication was just dampening
22:56
all of these like emotions. His, his passion would go like a
23:01
lot of the reason that he kind of went inside himself and
23:04
isolated himself was actually the medication that he was
23:06
taking. And at the moment, that's kind
23:09
of all that there is to try and help someone like that.
23:11
And the hope is, and speaking to Neuroscience Research Australia,
23:15
like they have, they have a small understanding of what's
23:18
happening, but they want to expand that.
23:20
And they're hoping that like by understanding more, they can
23:24
have better treatments and, and maybe future medication that
23:28
doesn't do the same, doesn't, doesn't have the same side
23:30
effects that are currently seen. So.
23:37
I think we're going to we're going to get to that sort of
23:41
things later on in this conversation.
23:43
But there's, there's one similarity with what you guys
23:47
are doing. And after all, there's more than
23:49
one but one similar it's jumped to my mind is the, the taboo or
23:54
the stigma, or I've used the word before, the the
23:58
intimidating nature of schizophrenia.
24:02
When people hear it, they do they, they go back because they
24:06
have this idea of it that isn't what it is.
24:10
You know, through all the stuff I looked at, it was clear that
24:13
the people who had lived through it felt it was misrepresented
24:17
even in AGP setting. They thought when they got a
24:21
diagnosis, the GPS would say, well, that's, that's it, you
24:26
know, this is that and the other.
24:27
But then as they got through it, it turns out that I think it was
24:33
anywhere from 25 to the 75% could be mildly or asymptomatic
24:39
with the right treatment. But like you're saying, the
24:43
treatment also needs a little bit of progress so that it it
24:47
doesn't cost so much for. The person to be fair, I am
24:52
coming at this from, I have one experience.
24:55
I'm not someone who's seen multiple people go through
24:57
schizophrenia and multiple people have the same medication.
25:00
And obviously medication can affect people in different ways.
25:04
I don't pretend to be an expert. I'm really I'm just speaking
25:08
from my singular experience. And that's, that's how the
25:13
conversation around any type of stigma changes as people bring
25:19
forward their experience. And they say, this is what I
25:23
saw. And I think what you guys have
25:25
found and this and this will lead us straight into how the
25:29
crusade has grown is when you speak your experience, when you
25:34
share what you've been through, there's so many people that come
25:38
out of the woodwork and either want to support or they say,
25:41
mate, exactly the same thing. We, we experience the same
25:45
thing. We just didn't know anyone else
25:47
was going through it. 100% that that's something that I've found
25:51
in like a way that we've connected to people in the
25:54
community that we didn't necessarily have connections to
25:58
before. I've had random people come up
26:00
to me because I've put posters and Flyers up at my office in
26:04
the public service and they come up to me and say, oh, how can I
26:08
get involved with this? I have a relative who goes
26:11
through skit who has schizophrenia and is going
26:12
through the same thing. I'd love to support your cause,
26:15
like being able to, you know, have a, a common way that people
26:20
can connect, provide that outlet for people to, you know,
26:25
contribute or donate or help spread awareness.
26:30
Like we'd love being able to provide that platform.
26:34
So let's get to it. Crusade for Connor.
26:38
It started 2023, yes. Yeah.
26:42
May 2023. Yeah.
26:44
And how, how did it look in the first year because it looks a
26:48
little different now, but how did it look in that first year
26:53
when you guys got it going? So first year, like we sort of
26:57
talked about before is everyone wanted to do their own thing,
26:59
combine it together and our our big goal was, I think on the
27:05
more the legacy piece of Connor, like we wanted to represent who
27:07
Connor was throughout our tasks. So Harry, Aaron and and Dan did
27:14
the David Goggins run? So ran was it 4 miles every four
27:17
hours for 48 hours? Yeah, carrying the boats.
27:20
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. With, with just quite a few 10K
27:22
runs there as well. Just Oh yeah.
27:25
David is it, if you listen. Christian, Braden and Finley did
27:30
the Mount Kosciusko hike. I played tennis for 24 hours
27:35
straight, and then we had Lucky did busking for for 12 hours
27:40
straight. Yeah.
27:43
And then Elliot and Gus Angus were doing a triathlon every day
27:47
for a week. So we wanted to make it where it
27:49
was things that we thought represented Connor, like why we
27:53
enjoyed hanging out with him, and then also just take it to
27:57
the extreme of making it. We wanted to make it a big
28:00
mental challenge. I think like physical challenges
28:02
was one part of it, but I think we wanted the cognitive side of
28:06
things to be really challenging, to try and put ourselves in his
28:10
shoe a tiny bit and push ourselves as well in honour of
28:13
him. So yeah, the first year we just
28:16
had the first week of May, we scheduled it out.
28:19
So we all did our tasks at different stages and some of us
28:22
carried over. Like the boys did their run
28:24
while I was playing tennis and Elliot finished his triathlon
28:29
for the day and came and had to hit the tennis afterwards.
28:31
And yeah, so it was a big, big week.
28:34
We had a trivia 9 as well with like our old high school mates
28:37
and that sort of stuff too. And you were fundraising at the
28:42
start? Yeah.
28:44
And you tried to aim for 10,000 bucks?
28:48
10 grand was, was the big goal. I don't know, boy, that's a,
28:51
that's a lot of money. I don't think people are going
28:53
to give us that much. And then we, we posted it.
28:55
I remember being at work, I put my phone on the on the, on the
28:59
desk and it didn't stop vibrating for like 3 hours
29:02
straight. I was like, what is going on?
29:04
And we got 10 grand in, in four days just straight away off the
29:08
bat. And then we're like, OK, I guess
29:11
we're gonna change the goal a little bit.
29:13
It's like, oh, what do you reckon?
29:15
Like 20 grand, Like, surely. Nuts.
29:18
It's nuts. Yeah, we were talking about a
29:19
thing like, oh, we don't want to be too.
29:20
You don't. Want to be greedy?
29:21
We don't. Want to get it out of ourselves?
29:22
Exactly, that could be everyone that was going to Dad's got.
29:24
Onto it. Yeah, that's right.
29:27
Thank God that in two weeks and then it was like crap, OK, can't
29:31
change it. Like more than two more times
29:33
they didn't make it the next goal or something.
29:34
It's going to be challenging to get, but we can't hopefully get
29:38
it. OK, 20 grand in two weeks, like
29:41
maybe try and push for for 40. So we set that as the goal and
29:45
then, yeah, ended up raising 67,000 that first year.
29:53
So. Disgusting, but yeah, so.
29:57
Those listening Christian just regardless with bit of pop
30:00
culture. Yeah, so.
30:11
Yeah, 67 grand that first year, just like it blew us away.
30:15
And again, like here's that, that piece of the support that
30:18
we we knew was there, but just didn't realise to what extent.
30:23
And it was just, yeah, that first year was a bit of a
30:25
whirlwind. And I think since then you've
30:27
gone on, is it 100 and 10111 now is what it's sitting at, yeah,
30:31
which is massive. You spoke a little bit about
30:35
what the money's going towards. Is it newer?
30:38
What? What's the name?
30:39
Neuroscience. Research.
30:40
Neuroscience Research Australia and we'll put the put the link
30:44
in the bio, but they're trying to understand the how it
30:48
happens, the underlying causes, but then also how to manage it.
30:53
And I think the money that you guys are raising will hopefully
30:56
make that impact. But the awareness you guys are
31:00
creating and the sense of community around schizophrenia
31:05
and making people feel like it's it's achievable to live with or
31:11
overcome or or get through is what speaks to me the most.
31:18
You continued from that first year into the second year.
31:22
How did that look? So we after that first we
31:28
visited Nura from the start. Nura was selected because
31:32
Carolyn Connor's mum chose Nura. We put her in charge of that and
31:36
said like where do you want the money to go to?
31:38
And as a particular schizophrenia research lab that
31:42
we wanted to directly put the funds to because doctor
31:46
Professor Cindy Wycott, her brother has schizophrenia and
31:49
went through the same sort of story and currently resonated
31:51
with that. So I think after we visited
31:53
newer, we sort of understood a bit more of the impacts we had
31:58
that first year and, and how much the, the funds were so
32:02
important. But then we also had the
32:04
reflection of like so many people need to be more aware of
32:08
what's what's happening. So we, we shifted a little bit,
32:12
still raising funds that we're trying to raise as much money as
32:14
we can, but a lot more on the awareness side of things.
32:18
So transitioned from the the event week to now doing a 10K
32:25
runner, a 5K walk to get as many people together as we can to
32:30
have these conversations and, and still, yeah, raise those
32:34
funds, but but more sort of raise the message of what
32:37
schizophrenia is and how we can support each other.
32:40
And Harry, you spoke about how all different parts of the
32:44
community came out before this podcast, how they came out of
32:48
the woodwork and just got behind the course.
32:51
Yeah, Yeah. It has been pretty, pretty
32:53
incredible. June.
32:54
I think the first year we probably had like 3030 people
32:58
down there supporting us and then I think about 100.
33:01
Second year we want about 300, three, 150 last year or 303
33:04
hundred last year. Yeah.
33:06
So it's like the community aspect of it has has grown and
33:09
grown. Hopefully tomorrow we'll exceed
33:11
that number again. But even just local businesses
33:14
like you know, the doc, they're probably the ones who deserve
33:17
the the biggest shout out because they've given big
33:19
financial contributions. But you know yourself it R for R
33:23
running for resilience. You guys have really helped us
33:26
sort of figure out, you know, helped us along the journey as
33:30
to what direction are we going to go in and how would we
33:32
actually achieve that. But yeah, plenty of of local
33:35
businesses have have supported us financially and, you know,
33:39
throwing, throwing a bit of weight behind us, help promote
33:41
us. Queen and Tigers who Christian
33:43
plays for and contemplate. He's he's junior footy 4.
33:45
They've been instrumental in sort of helping us grow our
33:49
brand. And yeah, keep going to
33:52
hopefully bigger and better things this year and next year
33:55
and go from there. I think with that too, like with
34:00
with you guys, with shooter and Ben at the dock and all these
34:03
other businesses, it wasn't the fact that everyone helped, it
34:06
was it Will you choose? Is there anything we can we can
34:10
do? And straight away I was like,
34:11
yeah, let's do this, this, this, let's promote you here, let's do
34:13
this. We'll give you this much money.
34:15
And we just had to put in such a little effort from the get go.
34:19
It was less the like the outcome of, you know, donating a grand
34:25
or whatever it might be. It was just that it was so easy
34:27
and people were just so willing to be generous from the get go.
34:31
You know, like the the dock, the reason why we went there the
34:33
first year for the walk and run was because it was raining and
34:37
the park that we had was an open roof of the BBQ.
34:40
So we couldn't go there. And we called them up the night
34:42
before and said, sorry, this is so late notice, but can we get
34:46
150 people and the dock tomorrow?
34:48
And yeah, no worries. We'll book it out.
34:50
We'll sort it out. It's just like it just made our
34:53
life so much easier. So yeah, the sports been insane.
34:57
Shooter, Benny Jane, all those guys at the dock are incredible
35:02
people. Yeah, so big shout out to the
35:03
dock. Yeah, I actually remember Glenn
35:06
Shooter came to our the the was it the Goggins run or the 10K
35:10
run the very first year in the rain as well.
35:13
Yeah, it was pouring down with rain too.
35:15
He was there with his dog, just locked up yet and said right
35:18
boys, let's, let's do this. He's the man.
35:21
Yeah. He's one of those special
35:22
people, something that's come to my mind.
35:26
And I'm thinking about the 300 people that you had.
35:28
I'm thinking about what crowd you might get tomorrow.
35:34
Special people. Connor's mom.
35:37
How does it? How do you What's the day like
35:41
for her when you see her? It's always an interesting one.
35:47
It's AI think for from what I've conversations I've had with her
35:53
and what I've seen, it's, it's a mix of being really grateful for
35:59
continuing legacy and keeping him alive in that sense and and
36:02
trying to really fight for this 'cause that I think is well for
36:06
all of us as well. Like it's just another reminder
36:07
of what's happened. So it's always a conflicting day
36:10
of, you know, you have these really nice conversations with
36:12
people and you'd see a mates haven't seen for a long time.
36:15
But I think there's also still that sense of like, Oh yeah,
36:19
that happened. So but it's really not.
36:22
And like, you know, otherwise we wouldn't have any reason to see
36:26
Connor's family apart from having to do this sort of events
36:31
and and making an effort for it. So it's really nice so we can
36:34
connect with her still and have those conversations again.
36:36
Yeah. And I hope, I hope this weekend.
36:41
So for those where this is Friday the the day before
36:45
crusade for Connor, what are you guys doing in the next couple of
36:50
weeks with a certain footy club? Yeah, so Queen and Tigers,
36:56
who've been pretty supportive right the way through, kind of
36:59
threw the idea out. Can we try and get the club
37:02
involved a bit more this year? And we've organised to have a
37:07
game around where the 1st grade teams wear orange socks with C
37:11
to C logos on them in support for for the Crusade for Connor
37:16
chords. So on the May, the 31st, Queen
37:20
of Ties play at their home ground versus Bateman's Bay, and
37:25
the 1st grade teams will be wearing orange socks with C4C
37:28
logos. There'll be a marquee stand set
37:31
up with Crusade for Connor stuff there.
37:35
And we'll be manned by a few of the boys and we'll just be, you
37:38
know, trying to, if people have any questions they want to come
37:41
up and ask like, what is it? What are you guys doing?
37:42
Who are you supporting? We can kind of tell them like
37:46
we're involved with Mira, we're trying to raise money as well as
37:50
awareness. And yeah, those, those boys
37:52
would just be there to kind of promote what we're trying to do.
37:56
And and yeah, Clementine has been good enough to go ahead
37:59
with it also. I'm pretty keen for it actually.
38:01
It should be, should be a good game.
38:03
You playing? I'll play.
38:04
Yeah, as long as I'm healthy. Touch wood.
38:07
Yeah, Yeah, I should be running out there.
38:08
So yeah, it'd be good 'cause I'm keen.
38:13
It'd be great, yeah. Local footy is always the best
38:16
and when it means something for the people, it's it's a special.
38:20
But I think it speaks to you guys that so many people are
38:23
getting behind. It speaks to Connor.
38:27
What would he say to all this? Yeah.
38:30
I think he'd be pretty, pretty pumped up that at all, like I
38:33
said he'd be. He'd be the first bloke to sign
38:35
up to help out. But yeah, I think he would
38:37
probably, yeah, quite appreciate where, what direction it's sort
38:42
of gone in. And yeah, like I said, he played
38:44
all his junior footy through the through the Tigers.
38:47
So I think he'd probably would really like that.
38:49
Like, yeah, personally I played a bit of junior footy with
38:51
Christian and, and Quinine as well.
38:53
So yeah, that's important to me that they are involved in.
38:56
I do really appreciate that. And I'm sure he would, he would
38:58
certainly appreciate that as well.
39:00
But, yeah, I think just he'd probably be a bit flattered to
39:04
see all the support that he's got obviously as well.
39:08
You know, sort of you're losing his life to suicide.
39:13
And then to see all the support that he he did actually he did
39:16
have there. You know, it's a bit
39:18
heartbreaking that he couldn't see it at the time, but it is,
39:23
yeah. I find it a bit comforting that
39:24
he didn't mean so much to so many people.
39:26
But it's one of those things bit bittersweet.
39:28
It's nice to see, but you also wish wish he was still here to
39:31
see it. Yeah, it's, it's, we spoke about
39:35
it with Andrew on. It's obviously you'd want it
39:38
different, but it's all we got. And so however we can keep the
39:44
people we've lost alive is it's it's all we want to do.
39:49
It's all we got to do. I want, I want to zoom back out
39:53
and bring it back to Connor. And when he was still alive.
40:02
What do you wish you could have changed?
40:07
In how you how you behaved I. Think, I think for me towards
40:17
the end, because I didn't understand what was happening, I
40:22
was quite frustrated. It was you organise a plan and
40:26
20 minutes before you were leaving, you send your text and
40:29
go, Oh, no, I'm not going to make it.
40:30
And it was just a really frustrating process of trying to
40:33
be best friend than I could be, But I just felt like you
40:38
wouldn't let me. And I think I blamed him a bit
40:41
for that at the time. And that was something I sort of
40:43
carried across was like my last interactions with him.
40:47
I wasn't as I wasn't mean, but it wasn't as over the top
40:51
generous and kind of as I wanted to be because I was, I was
40:54
really fed up of like, man, I just want to see you.
40:56
I just want to hang out with you.
40:58
So then that's something for me. I wish I could have done a
41:01
little bit differently. Was just really just kept
41:04
persisting. That's like, go to his house,
41:07
let's just sit on your couch. Like just something.
41:12
Yeah, that's a big one for me, I think.
41:15
Yeah, I think definitely, which is as we've touched on the part
41:19
of today's you're trying to raise the awareness is it would
41:21
have been good to have been a bit more informed as to what we
41:25
could have done. I'd be better.
41:26
I think for me personally, yeah, as Lisa just reaching out more
41:30
and I'm in there for anyone listening, if you, anyone you
41:32
know is going through, that's probably the one piece of advice
41:35
I would I would want to give anyone who knows someone who's
41:38
struggling is yeah, don't be disheartened if they're bailing
41:41
on plans with you. It's not personal, you know,
41:44
keep reaching out, keep making the effort because yeah, when
41:47
they're gone, you do carry a lot of guilt and you do think about
41:50
all the things you could have done.
41:51
And there's a million times, you know, I could have gone.
41:54
Yes, Lex had gone to his house. I said, mate, I'm picking up,
41:58
let's go for a kick of the footy or let's go get a beer, let's go
42:00
get a coffee, whatever it is. But, you know, yeah, sort of one
42:04
of those things that hindsight's a wonderful thing, but if I
42:07
could have my time different, that's probably the probably the
42:10
the big thing I would have done is, yeah, just made that little
42:14
bit more effort to go and see him and lock in plans and have,
42:20
you know, sort of tried to give him a bit more, yeah, time with
42:23
his mates. You never know.
42:25
I mean, yeah, can't do anything about that now though, yeah.
42:29
I think on that too though as well.
42:31
I think something that has been really reassuring for me and,
42:34
and I think a lot of us boys too, like talking to the newer
42:36
guys. It's like, I really wish I could
42:40
have done more for him. But also recognising now that
42:44
even if I was there all the time, that's not going to fix
42:46
his schizophrenia. Like we need to have the
42:48
research to get the medication running.
42:51
It's the the the medication that's going to actually help
42:55
him through that process. We're just there to support him,
42:59
not try and fix him. I think that was something for
43:02
me that I really was trying to fix what was going on.
43:05
But I think now I recognise like you can't just going to be there
43:08
for him. Just be a good mate.
43:10
And that's that's the reason I'm asking you guys.
43:12
I know it's a it's, it's a tough one.
43:14
I can see it in your eyes, Harry, where it's because I
43:18
recognise it in myself. It's you kind of hard on
43:21
yourself that you didn't do differently.
43:25
And I was certainly the same with my dad is just, oh man, it
43:30
could be so different by just a few different behaviours.
43:34
And but at the same time, I said before, you just got to give
43:37
yourself a bit of credit for at the time you were, you meant
43:41
well, you were operating with what you knew.
43:44
And that's all you can do in life is just do your best with
43:47
what you got at the time. But that's why I respect you
43:51
guys so much is because you're using something that's obviously
43:56
still very raw, but you're laying out a blueprint of, hey,
44:00
I want to do things. I wanted to be able to do things
44:04
differently. I wanted to know more if I could
44:05
have my time. Again, somebody's going to be
44:08
listening to this or somebody's going to come across your
44:09
community that's going to go, I recognise this.
44:14
I'm going to change my behaviour.
44:15
And that, in many ways, is the legacy of Connor is the lives
44:22
that the crusade is going to impact for the better.
44:29
That's the plan. That's the plan, yeah.
44:31
So we'll we'll wrap up with this.
44:34
But what what do you hope beyond beyond this year with crusade
44:43
for Connor? If you could lay out the
44:45
ambitious goal, What are you what are you guys?
44:48
It's certainly not a whimper at the moment, but I have a feeling
44:51
that you guys want to honour him even more.
44:55
Yeah, I think personally I'd like to see it continue to
45:00
expand beyond just like connections that we have that
45:04
would, that would be an awesome thing to see is, you know,
45:07
there's people now that have come and supported us for three,
45:11
4-5 years. Seeing those people then extend
45:14
to their connections and and it kind of, you know, snowballing
45:18
that way would be amazing because that's how truly we're
45:21
going to spread the awareness and not just have it contained
45:25
inside a little bubble. So it's always something that
45:29
like I'm trying to push on my connections is saying like, oh,
45:33
make sure, you know, invite, invite people that aren't just
45:35
necessarily they didn't have to know Connor.
45:37
This is about we're trying to make it bigger than that.
45:40
As much as Connor is always the driving force behind this, we
45:44
want, you know, the awareness for schizophrenia to spread.
45:48
We want the day to become bigger.
45:52
Yeah. I think a few things that we're
45:55
trying to do. I know with the AFL side of
46:00
things, I'd like it to be almost a club wide thing eventually and
46:06
I think Tigers are on board with that.
46:08
So having the whole weekend where it's not just the first
46:11
grade people wearing the socks, it'd be cool to have the whole
46:13
club wearing the socks. Or can we extend it somewhere to
46:16
AFL can? But like, there's always avenues
46:18
that I'm trying to chase in that route and I think I know next
46:23
year I'll throw to Luke, but we've got some plans to bring
46:26
back the events. Yeah, next year is Year 5, so
46:30
we're thinking we'll keep the The Walking around alive because
46:33
it's working really well to bring people together.
46:36
But we want to go big. So we'll do the event week
46:40
again, I think and, and try and step it out from last time.
46:44
Maybe I'll do 24 hours and 1 minute or something of tennis,
46:47
slightly bigger. But yeah, we're trying.
46:50
We'll go big again and then we'll try and maybe find, find
46:54
new things that represent Connor to us and yeah, push ourselves
46:58
again. But that'd be it'd be a big one
47:01
next year. Yeah, yeah, you boys have
47:05
touched on it, touched on it perfectly.
47:07
Yeah. Big 5 years, it's nice, nice
47:09
number to probably, yeah, go, go a bit bigger, bigger on again.
47:13
So yeah, I mean, it's been a pretty forever evolving journey
47:17
for us. Like, yeah, as Lee said, our
47:18
first goal was, you know, $10,000 and we didn't really
47:22
have much ambition past that. I mean, for me personally, it
47:25
was when we went and visited the, the nearer facility.
47:29
Yeah, obviously, again, quite an emotional day.
47:30
And we saw, yeah, Cindy and Yasmin and Haley, who were the,
47:36
the, the girls in the in the lab.
47:37
And yeah, they were just these inspirational people who were
47:39
just so passionate about what they were doing.
47:41
They really wanted to, to help people.
47:44
So that was a big driving factor for me personally to want it to
47:48
keep on going. And yeah, keep helping these
47:51
people help people because, yeah, they're the ones who are
47:53
doing the hard work that are, yeah, got this impossible task
47:56
on their hands. And yeah, they're taking it on
47:58
every day for yeah, just to just to help people.
48:01
So yeah, that's sort of probably for me personally was a big
48:04
driving factor into trying to keep it getting bigger and
48:08
bigger. And yeah, probably after
48:10
tomorrow we'll see how we go and, and reassess the situation
48:13
and see what direction and what avenues open up.
48:17
But yeah, like I said, it's a, it's a forever evolving process.
48:20
And it is, there is a lot of hard work behind the scenes, but
48:22
it is very, very rewarding. Probably more so for Luke's
48:25
probably the, I'd say he's, he's probably the, the main driving
48:29
factor. Yeah.
48:31
He, he, he probably carries, carries the team a bit and then
48:34
the rest of us sort of help him where, where we can.
48:37
But you know, it is, it is a exciting but yeah, also tough,
48:42
tough thing to organise and. Yeah.
48:46
One other thing that I'd like to throw in there, as much as we
48:49
bill it as the fun run and the walk, it doesn't have to be just
48:54
that. Like if you, we're trying to use
48:56
and thank thanks to the dock for getting on board with this, but
49:00
we're trying to use the dock as that meeting place.
49:02
And as much as it's, you know, people go out and do the walk or
49:06
or the run. If you don't want to do either
49:08
of those things, we still like people to turn up because when
49:11
everyone gets back at the same time, which is the goal, the
49:14
walk in the runner, hopefully the right distance that people
49:17
are all coming back at the same time.
49:19
Then everyone kind of gets together, shares a drink, maybe
49:23
a meal. And then it's just a meeting
49:25
place where they can talk. And then if mental health comes
49:27
up in the conversation, that's a tick.
49:29
But even if it's just a time that people are, you know,
49:32
rekindling, there's there's friends that we barely see that
49:35
show up. They they travel back from the
49:37
coast or from Sydney or Melbourne and yeah, just having
49:41
that way that everyone's regularly catching up, that's
49:44
something that's important to us, yeah.
49:47
Absolutely. It seems, it seems pretty
49:51
special what you guys have. Obviously there's still a strong
49:55
connection with Connor in the, you know, tragic way.
50:00
But also, I can see you guys light up a little bit when
50:02
you're talking about how how you're going to think about
50:05
you're going to bring new challenges in that reflect him.
50:10
There's also quite a strong connection that you guys seem to
50:12
have with each other and with, I mean, I admire people like you
50:17
guys who do what you can, however you can to improve the
50:20
world around you. But it just feels like there's
50:23
no doubt in my mind that, yeah, it's it's going to keep evolving
50:29
and it's going to be fun to watch what you guys are up to
50:32
next. Yeah, it's not going anywhere
50:35
anytime soon. It's it's great to see and thank
50:39
you so much for coming on this podcast because I truly believe
50:43
that, you know, these stories like this, they help somebody
50:48
else find their way through the unknown, like just give someone
50:53
a blueprint through times of ambiguity.
50:55
And so, yeah, respect you guys a lot.
50:58
Thank you very much for coming on.
51:00
Thank you, man. Thanks for having us.
51:01
Thanks. Really appreciate the chance to
51:03
sort of, yeah, tell, tell Connor's story and yeah, promote
51:06
what we're trying to do. And as you said, hopefully it
51:08
does help guide someone through the, through the unknown.
51:11
As you said, it's probably a good, good way to put it.
51:13
And that's, yeah, probably a big part of what we're trying to
51:17
trying to achieve. Thanks for the chat.
51:19
Oh Ru. Thanks mate, much appreciated.