Yeah i was very naive in my thoughts originally. Must be tough for anyone to go through without the added media spotlight he'll no doubt get being a professional sportsman
There is no shame in assuming things about it, because it isn't something that is discussed as much as it should be. There are alot of misconceptions and rather sadly today, a lot of people who decide they have depression so they don't have to go to work.
It is very difficult to describe to someone who has never experienced it what it is all about without it sounding 'a bit daft'. Trust me, it is anything but daft. Due to the insidious nature of it, sometimes the hardest thing can be to realise what is going on. Indeed I went through a couple of very dark years not knowing (or thinking) what was going on. Although you realise you are different to how you were, until someone realises or you realise yourself eventually, you have no idea what is going on. It was only really once I had had the luck to have removed myself from the environment in which it first struck, that I was able to look back and realise what was going on.
The other thing that isn't commonly understood is that it never really goes away. You have good times, you have bad times. Anything can trigger a bad time, no pre planning can be done. But it doesn't go away. It is always there, you can have the best day of your life and it is still there, niggling.
From my own experiences, the one most important thing you can do is you have a doubt, no matter how silly or trivial you consider it, get it checked out. In fairness, the health professionals who deal with this kind of thing are absolutely wonderful. If it turns out your concerns are nothing to worry about, so what? You've lost nothing. What you cannot allow to happen is to let it go on unchecked. It sucks you in, makes you unrecognisable in the way you live before you know it. Also, if you do suffer, tell people. Tell your family, tell your friends. Tell the people at work. People who have regular contact with you provide a good way of noticing if something isn't right, often before you realise you are on the way down again.