BUI Irish Featherweight champion Eric Donovan states that his three-year break from boxing allowed him to learn about life outside of the ring where he decided to reinvent and change his lifestyle.
Speaking on the OTB panel alongside Irish football international Aine O’Gorman and current Zebre rugby player Ian Nagle, Eric Donovan described his loss of identity during his amateur career as he tried to balance his boxing career with a life of drinking and drugs.
“In 2013, I was 27-years-old and I returned from an eight month stint in Kazakhstan, I gave up on my education, gave up on work life and gave up on Sport Ireland who supported me for ten years. Now I wasn’t number one anymore, I wasn’t supported anymore, I had two young boys and I was standing in the queue signing on the dole.
“This is not how I envisaged my life. I was very lonely and confused at that time because I had given so much to my boxing career.”
Donovan walked away from the world of boxing from 2013 to 2016 after suffering for some time with mental health issues and frustrations over the lack of growth in his amateur career.
It was also at this time where the Clonmullion native sought to receive an education and learn about the sport of boxing from different perspectives rather than just a fighter.
“I was boxing for the wrong reasons. I was boxing for my coach, boxing for my family, trying to make people happy around me, so I walked away from it and went back into education as a mature student and got a two year diploma.
“I was about to go for my degree in 2016 when I started to get the urge to box again, this time for all the right reasons. It was like a redemption story on all the near misses, all the setbacks and all the shortcomings I had in my life. I got my life back together and found myself again.”
Donovan spoke about his new look on life being much more mature. It was at this time Donovan returned to the ring but this time as a professional fighter.
“The conclusion I came to is I can always go back and do my degree, but I can’t always go back and box. I always felt I had one more round in me, one more fight in me and I didn’t want to finish up and have any regrets.
“Now I’m undefeated since I turned pro in 2016 and I’m on the verge of a world ranking title fight.”
The Kildare man whom is 12-0, claims he is now a better fighter at the age of 35, than he was when he was in his prime 10 years earlier, due to leaving his old life of drugs, alcohol and loss of identity behind him.
“I had to learn more about Eric. I had to change my life because I was very distracted throughout my amateur career. I suffered badly with mental health issues and I was almost a slave to my addictions. I was obsessed with everything, no matter what I touched.
“I had to educate myself and understand a lot about the mind and once I could do that, I could make decisions for my life.
“It got to the stage where I hated boxing because boxing became my identity and didn’t even know who I was.”
As life for the 35-year-old spiralled out of control, his sporting career ultimately suffered and his passion for fighting deteriorated which led him to a feeling of hatred towards the sport of boxing.
“When I was a kid, I remember loving boxing, it was so much fun and I could go anyway, I was so confident but then I started going down the road of drinking and smoking and using drugs. Boxing became uncool and I became lost.
“I tried to juggle both parts of my life, but it wasn’t really working for me. It was an awful strain in my life, and I was like that for a period of ten years.
“I had to change my whole life, change my old habits, friends and social life and I’m happy now.”
Donovan also spoke about the world of individual sport being a lonely and frustrating place, so much so, that he would hope for his children to venture into more team-based sports.
“The principals of boxing are very good but ideally I would like my kids to go down the route of team sports because I think it’s more beneficial in a wellbeing way.
“At the end of my amateur career I was so disheartened because I won so much and I achieved so much and there was no celebration of what I done, I felt so alone. There was no benefit to me for what I had given most of my life to a sport.
“I’ve done so much in my career but none of this was going to pay the bills.”
Since his return to the ring, the Kildare man has since began his own personal training with individuals and GAA clubs. He also advises future sports stars to stay on the right track and not fall the steps he did as an athlete.
“You have to have a good bit of talent. Then marry that with hard work, commitment and being a good human. If you do that, you’ll get your just rewards.
“I had so much talent, but I wasn’t marrying that with hard work, I cut corners throughout my life, but I learned and came through all that and I’m still competing still at a top level.”
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