Nobody, least of all Leilani Rorani herself, could have possibly imagined this day would come.

The celebrated squash star (36), formerly Leilani Joyce, had been a well-known sports champion – a double
Commonwealth gold medallist. She was a natural leader, a motivational speaker and an inspiration to young athletes. But one morning, two years ago, in a fog of deep depression, she found herself walking vacantly, kilometre after kilometre, away from her home, her husband Blair (30) and their three beautiful children.

“I walked and walked and kept walking and I ended up at a hotel,” Leilani begins. “I booked a room. I called my husband and I told him, ‘It’s so peaceful here. I’m not coming home.’ Of course, he was very worried, particularly that I was going to do something terrible. But I felt blank. I thought there was no hope. Life was too overwhelming and I couldn’t deal with it.”

It’s a scenario many Kiwi women identify with. Leilani was suffering from postnatal depression – she now believes she’d had it for years, since her eldest child, Joseph (6), was born in 2003. Pearl (4) and Jasmine
(2) soon followed and, although Leilani had made a conscious choice to devote herself to family life when she retired in 2002, she found herself consumed by the pressures of motherhood.

“It was supposed to be a happy time for me – a time to be grateful for the blessing of having three healthy children,” she says quietly. “But instead, I felt swamped, trying to adapt to the needs of each child. I would
cry a lot – often in the shower. It was the only time in my day when I was alone. I would think about where I was at with my life, and feel I had failed as a mother and wife. I would scream, completely overwhelmed by simple routine tasks.

“My life was dealt with in the blocks between meal times – I would survive from breakfast to lunch, get through lunch to dinner, and then dinner to bed.”

Leilani – who is expecting her fourth child next month – says her husband and family watched helplessly as her life slowly unravelled. With a wry smile, she describes the “evil woman” who moved into her home – an unhinged version of herself who couldn’t bear to be alone but, at the same time, fervently avoided other people.

“I hated it when Blair went to work,” she recalls. “I would watch the clockwaiting for him to get home. And I was
paranoid. Friends wanted to cook us meals or come and see how I was doing but I didn’t want to answer the door. The sound of the phone ringing would send me into a state of high anxiety. I was convinced people were talking about me behind my back, saying, ‘Oh, poor Leilani. She’s a casualty of life. She used to be a great sportswoman, but look at her now.’”

Leilani often found herself collecting up the children, then going to her sister Wanita’s house and crawling into bed for the day, waking only in time to return home before Blair arrived back from work.

Everyone, she says, including herself, was bewildered by her behaviour and felt there was nowhere to turn. “We were all so confused. Nobody knew what was going on or how to look after me.”

One day, when Jasmine was six weeks old, a Plunket nurse dropped in for a scheduled visit. The nurse took one look at the shell of a woman standing before her and gently suggested the former New Zealand Sportswoman of the Year might be depressed. Leilani admits she’d never understood depression, despite losing her brother Quenton to suicide in 1997.

“I had a very naive view, very immature” she confesses. “And I never considered that someone like myself – a former world number one – could ever get depressed. As a sportsperson, you’re taught to be positive, to lift yourself up. When the going gets tough, you get tougher! As far as I was concerned, depression wasn’t an illness, it was a state of mind.”

Although the nurse advised Leilani to seek help, initially in the form of an online postnatal depression assessment test that could be done privately at home, Leilani ignored her. She says now, simply, “I was afraid of what I would find.”

Crunch time came in the form of that phone call from a hotel room. Leilani crumbled. It occurred to her that she – a person who once inspired others to reach for the highest possible goals – was now operating at the lowest possible level. She was hollow. With her husband at her side, Leilani summoned what strength she had left and went to see her family doctor, who diagnosed moderate depression.

A treatment plan quickly fell into place. Although she insists that she has nothing against antidepressants, she preferred not to take them, opting instead for a herbal remedy. She and Blair enlisted the help of family and friends they trusted deeply to assist them with day-to-day tasks.

There was also counselling. “It seemed so expensive!” Leilani recalls. “I felt so guilty about spending our savings. But we couldn’t afford not to – I was at rock bottom. And while your family can make you a Milo or clean your house for you, when it comes to the tools that you need to overcome depression, you have to talk
to professionals.”

Leilani stresses that recovering from depression takes time and requires real commitment. As much as she would have loved a magic cure, she says, there wasn’t one. Instead, there were plenty of small celebrations as she slowly overcame hurdles and faced fears.

“I learned how to be a better friend to myself,” she explains. “I patted myself on the back for the things that I was able to achieve instead of scolding myself for the things I didn’t. I would say, ‘I’m such a superwoman today because I was able to make the kids’ lunches.’

“Initially, I felt stupid talking to myself, but I found that the more I did it, the better I felt. I started getting out of the house more. I took the children to playgroups and swimming and ballet lessons. I’d watch them do well, which would make me feel good, and then I’d feel like I was a good mum after all.

“I also got back into playing squash, which was really empowering. I felt a real boost to my self-esteem – I started to lose weight, and had lots more energy.” Leilani pauses, and beams, “I felt happy!”

The Leilani of today is warm, gracious, and softly spoken. She is looking forward to welcoming another baby into the world – this time without fear or doubt. “It’s going to be an awesome time,” she enthuses. “This will be the best experience of motherhood for me.”

There’s also a new fire in her belly as she gears up to front an online campaign for the National Depression Initiative’s self-help programme The Journal. “I was inspired by the John Kirwan campaign,” she says. “So I sent a letter to the Ministry of Health asking how I could help. It’s amazing to me that such a terrible experience can be turned into something so powerful. And talking about it openly, which is something I’ve never done before, has been really helpful for me too.”

Leilani’s case study features with John’s on the website www.depression.org.nz, where Kiwis can also access a free online course to help them overcome mild to moderate depression, with the option of personalised support by telephone, text message or email.

Of course, it’s Blair’s “unwavering” support that has helped her get to this place and, for the first and only time
in our interview, Leilani’s eyes fill with tears as she describes the delicate care administered by her husband.

“As a wife, you want your husband to view you as someone who is awesome and capable and nurturing,” Leilani
explains. “But when something like this happens, he sees your weaknesses. I’m so grateful to Blair and I love him so much for being so patient and strong. Boy, he had to work hard on getting me well! He had to soldier on for the kids, because Mum wasn’t operating. I’m very lucky to have him.”

Leilani’s message now, she says, is one of hope. She wants other Kiwi women to know that they can overcome postnatal depression too. She is living proof. It could easily have gone another way – and Leilani knows that better than anyone.

“I always wondered what my brother was feeling before he took his life,” she says. “And bearing in mind my diagnosis was for ‘moderate’ depression, I can’t imagine what life must be like at the other end of the depression spectrum. It takes time, but you can recover from this.”