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CHRISTINE BRENNAN
Naomi Osaka

Opinion: Naomi Osaka has sparked a mental health conversation. Are we willing to have it?

Once again, sports has taken us to a national and international conversation that we as a society otherwise most likely would have ignored. Just 23, Naomi Osaka, already the highest-paid female athlete in sports history, posted news Monday of her struggles with long bouts of depression and anxiety since she won her first Grand Slam tennis title at the U.S. Open in 2018. She withdrew from the French Open and left us with this parting line: “love you guys I’ll see you when I see you.”

So this prodigious talent and remarkable social activist, at the top of her game, has now disappeared from public view, for how long we don’t know. Let us hope she takes care of herself and gets the understanding, guidance and love she needs to return when she is ready.