It all started in late August when he began to feel a constant headache. It got worse and worse until one night when it escalated.

- Then I went and spit, though I didn't spit. Without me walking and "itching". Then I started to panic, Thern tells SVT Sport.

Although tests showed nothing, he believed he had suffered a serious illness.

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Simon Thern. Photo: Bildbyrån / SVT

Thern describes it as being too much. Since he is a new dad, he got some sleep and he also ran two companies at the same time as he was an elite football player.

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Thern: "Didn't think I had a roof"

The heaviest thing when Thern was down at the bottom was to not be the dad he wants to be.

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Thern: "Watching my daughter was really tough"

The turnaround began when IFK Norrköping put him in contact with a psychologist and later he also got help from the Reception for elite sports and health, which is a collaboration between the Swedish Sports Federation and the Beroendecentrum Stockholm.

- Although it is good with support, it is also very important that the experts help you out of it, says Thern.

Thern chooses to tell him that he hopes it can help others. He also thinks it would have helped him if he had had someone who had told something similar before.

The 27-year-old thinks it can be difficult to talk about mental ill-health in a sports environment.

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Thern: "Think many are afraid to open up"

Today, Thern is feeling much better and looking forward to a new season with IFK Norrköping. During the preseason, he managed, among other things, to shoot in a long shot from over 25 meters.

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Thern: "I had thrown away all that ..."

See the full story with Simon Thern here:

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Simon Thern got out of anxiety: "I couldn't walk around the house"