Footy star reveals the horror impacts of concussion at just 33: 'I haven't slept without assistance for three years'
Seedsman, now 33, sustained the concussion during a training session in late 2021, just months after completing the best season of his career with the Adelaide Crows.
That year, he played 22 games, earned selection in the All-Australian squad of 40, and finished third in the club's best and fairest count.
However, the head knock that followed soon after would ultimately force his early retirement in 2023 on the advice of an independent medical concussion panel.
Nearly four years on from the initial injury, Seedsman says he continues to suffer from debilitating symptoms every single day, varying in severity and duration.
Speaking on Grandstand SA, he described waking up some mornings unable to move or leave his bed, while on others the symptoms escalate as the day progresses.
'I get headaches, nausea, dizziness. Some mornings I wake up and I can't get out of bed,' Seedsman said.
'Other days it gradually just increases throughout the day until I have to stop everything.'
He likened the daily toll to a mobile phone battery draining, with basic tasks quickly depleting his energy reserves.
'When I hit the red zone, I can't move, I can't speak, I just have to lie down,' he said.
'In December, I was bedridden for two to three weeks after doing just a couple of small things one morning.'
Seedsman described those severe episodes as resembling a stroke, saying he loses the ability to lift his limbs or speak and must slowly regain function with fluids, food, and rest.
'I've never had a stroke, but it sort of feels like one,' he said.
'Eventually I can move again, but during those moments I'm completely stuck and in agony.'
After 132 AFL games, Seedsman was forced into early retirement due to ongoing concussion complications
In addition to the physical effects, Seedsman also revealed he suffers from a chronic sleep disorder and has been reliant on medication for sleep assistance every night for the past three years.
'For six months I couldn't sleep at all without help, and that just compounds everything else,' he said.
The former wingman also takes antidepressants to help manage his condition, admitting that even now he has not yet discovered the limit of what he can physically do before symptoms worsen.
'I have to be really careful about how much I do,' he said.
'Every day is different and I haven't figured out the line yet.'
Despite the immense physical and mental toll, Seedsman maintains a remarkably positive outlook, which he credits to a personal development course he took in 2020.
At the time, he was struggling with form and confidence, having been dropped multiple times during one of Adelaide's worst seasons.
'I always thought I was a positive person, but I was really negative then,' he said.
The course helped him develop tools such as gratitude journaling and mindset awareness, which he believes have been crucial in coping with his post-concussion challenges.
'It talks about the laws of polarity – that there's good and bad in every situation,' Seedsman said.
He added that the support of his wife Alice and their daughter Cami gives him daily motivation and a sense of purpose.
'They've given me so much to hold onto and focus on,' he said.
'Even on the worst days, I try to find something good.'
Seedsman's story comes as the AFL continues to face scrutiny over concussion management and long-term player safety.
Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), a degenerative brain disease linked to repeated head trauma, has been diagnosed posthumously in several former AFL players including Shane Tuck and Danny Frawley.
In response, the AFL has implemented new concussion protocols, including the introduction of smart mouthguards designed to measure head impacts in real time.
However, many experts argue the league's actions remain insufficient given the long-term risks involved.
Former players have also filed class actions against the AFL, alleging inadequate handling of head injuries during their careers.
Seedsman's case illustrates that even a single concussion can lead to lifelong consequences, a reality he hopes the wider football community continues to confront.
While he no longer plays, his willingness to speak openly has added a powerful voice to the growing conversation around brain health in sport.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Mail
42 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
WWE legend's daughter left with life-changing injuries after rollercoaster ride
The daughter of WWE icon Mick Foley has revealed that she suffered a rare neck injury more than five years ago that has left her with headaches ever since. Speaking on the 'Rulebreakers' podcast, Foley explained how her neck was injured after the ride 'went up, down, and immediately went back up.' The daughter of the retired wrestler said that it had been a 'huge mystery' why she was experiencing a headache for so long — until she was finally diagnosed with a rare neck issue. 'It took me about two months to realize I had a concussion. I'm like, "This headache is not going away, and I'm so sensitive to lights and sounds and I feel all weird,"' she said. 'And I was asking my dad, who you would think would know a lot about concussions, but he was like, "Sorry, I don't really know."' 'I feel like his concussions, boom, they happen, and he's like OK. But he never really had a concussion that lasted longer than maybe a couple months. I've been to around 50 doctors, between doctors and physical therapists. It's just been a mystery.'
The Guardian
42 minutes ago
- The Guardian
As Australia's natural disasters worsen, ‘vets carry on, even while their own clinics are under water'
'Horrific' was how veterinarian Dr Stacey Rae describes what she saw while helicoptering above south-west Queensland farmland in the aftermath of ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred in March. Scores of livestock were scattered across the formerly dusty plains – some still alive, many dead. As flood waters receded, animals struggled in the thick sludge, slowly succumbing to starvation, exposure and illness. Because rain struck just before shearing time, sheep carried full fleeces, which made the impact 'tenfold' worse, Rae says. Sign up: AU Breaking News email She estimates the final death count of stock stretches into the hundreds of thousands, though that cannot be determined until surviving sheep are shorn and cattle mustered. 'I've not seen this in my lifetime.' Recent figures suggest 150,000 stock losses so far. After the floods in remote Queensland, New South Wales also experienced record-breaking rainfall in May, flooding the Hunter region and mid-north coast. Farmers in the area were forced to bury their dead stock. Rae worries about the wellbeing of farmers. 'It's these months where reality sets in, mental health issues really come to the top.' Veterinarians face complex challenges too – natural disasters are increasingly exhausting those working in rural Australia. The Australian Veterinary Association (AVA) set up a hotline in March to offer advice to flood-affected graziers and vets in Queensland, which remained open until early June due to demand. Calls initially focused on urgent trauma and delivering vital resources such as medicine to suffering livestock. But months later the hotline was still buzzing as sandfly plagues, emerging plant toxicity, chronic disease, viruses and bacterial infections emerged. The role of vets in regional Australia goes beyond serving as a 'small animal wizard', veterinarian Dr Jeannet Kessels says. 'Veterinarians feel very deeply … I've probably shed a tear with every client that came in for euthanasia,' she says. 'Vets carry on, even while their own clinics are under water.' Kessels, the owner of a carbon neutral vet hospital in Springfield, Queensland, founded the group Vets for Climate Action after the black summer bushfires. In March, VfCA hosted Veterinary Voices to Parliament – A Call to Action event in Canberra urging for formal recognition of the impact the climate crisis has on animal welfare. The former chief veterinary officer (CVO) of NSW and inspector general of biosecurity for Australia, Dr Helen Scott-Orr, says extreme weather events are having 'massive economic, animal and vet welfare effects'. She says major animal health issues – infections, disease and insect-borne illnesses – flourish in extreme weather and euthanising animals amid large-scale natural disasters is 'heartbreaking'. When she was a veterinary student in the late 1960s, Scott-Orr recalls being taught that paralysis ticks didn't exist south of Sydney Harbour – but now, they are found as far south as Gippsland, Victoria. A 2018 study estimates about 10,000 dogs and cats are treated annually for tick paralysis, with unquantified but growing impacts on livestock and wildlife. Rural vets bear the brunt of treating animals in extreme weather events, adding pressure to a worsening workforce crisis – with a veterinarian shortage in regional Australia. There are vet shortages in every state, especially in large animal and rural practice, according to a 2025 report by Jobs and Skills Australia, while a 2024 NSW parliamentary inquiry into the veterinary workforce shortage indicated an urgent need for better workforce data and planning. Job vacancies linger longest in the bush: 44% of regional vet jobs remain open for over a year, compared with a lower 28% in metropolitan areas. Research shows vets suffer from high emotional strain, moral conflicts, chronic underpayment and alarming suicide rates, while 42% of vets in remote areas work more than 50 hours per week. 'The veterinary profession already has a higher-than-average suicide rate,' says former Queensland CVO, Dr Ron Glanville – one of 33 former Australian CVOs and senior animal health officials lobbying the government for stronger climate action. Glanville also warns that the threat of climate-related disease is becoming more serious – the spread of Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV), used to be limited to the Top End, he says. 'Now we've seen outbreaks right down into South Australia.' In 2022, an outbreak swept through more than 80 piggeries across Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. Domestic animals were infected and three people died. 'We had to make difficult decisions,' Rae says, recalling the catastrophic Queensland floods. 'Some stock weren't able to be saved and it was more humane to destroy them.' One producer, she recalls, had to shoot 80 bullocks in one paddock out of the helicopter. 'That's hundreds of thousands of dollars just gone, they were booked in to go the following week … It's not like a flooded home you can insure.' Rae encourages Australians to volunteer with BlazeAid, or visit the regions to help local economies. Practical donations are also welcome, including initiative Pay 4 a Panel, helping rebuild fencing. Rae says there has been an 'amazing' community response but many vets and farmers feel forgotten – as if the nation has simply has 'moved on'.
The Guardian
42 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Milk, carbohydrates or a late-night pudding: what's the secret to eating for a good night's sleep?
Have a glass of warm milk. No, a cup of herbal tea. Eat carbs, but only the right carbs. Have fats, but not too much. Have a filling meal. No, not that filling. Eat early, but not too early or you'll get hungry again later. Ask the internet for advice on how to eat for a good night's sleep and you could lose a whole night trying to find a clear answer. But amid a global shortage of good sleep (48% of Australian adults report having at least two sleep-related problems), dietary habits are emerging as a key factor that can make the difference between refreshing rest and a night spent regretting every food choice you made in the previous 24 hours. Some of the most useful insights into the effect of timing, size and quality of meals on sleep come from studies of those who work through the night to keep our world running. At CQUniversity in Adelaide, research psychologist Dr Charlotte Gupta has been studying how different eating patterns affect shift workers' performance. Her most important piece of advice for a good night's sleep is to eat well before bedtime. 'We're not primed to be digesting food at night,' Gupta says. A meal eaten too close to sleep forces the body to focus energy and resources on digestion, when it should be resting and performing other tasks that take place while we rest. 'So it's likely to impact the quality of our sleep; we're more likely to wake up during the night, remember our dreams, not get that really restorative sleep,' she says. The ideal is to eat your last food at least two hours before going to sleep, which means no pre-sleep pecking at leftovers or midnight raid of the fridge for a spoonful of cold pudding. The size of that final meal can also make a difference. Ideally, we should be having a bigger meal in the middle of the day, when light exposure means our body is very much awake and primed for digestion, and a smaller meal in the evening. But not too small. 'We don't want it to be so small for dinner that you feel really hungry during the night, that your body's going to wake you up and want food,' Gupta says. On the question of what to eat for a good night's sleep, the answer is less clearcut, says exercise physiologist and nutritionist Dr Elizabeth Machan from the Woolcock Institute of Medical Research and the University of Sydney. 'We haven't got extensive research that has given us the perfect recipe for what the evening meal should be,' she says. There's some evidence that higher-fat meals are more filling, so in theory people will have more restful sleep, Machan says. But diets high in fat are also associated with shorter sleep duration. Similarly, despite the popular idea that eating carbs before bedtime is bad, some studies suggest having a meal higher in carbohydrate can actually help people get to sleep faster. 'I think a lot of people might avoid carbs in the evening, for instance, or they'll reduce their carb intake in the evening, and that's when they can become more food-seeking later in the night as a result,' she says. Machan says it's important to include vegetables in that evening meal to help slow the digestive process. 'Your gut's going to be exposed to those nutrients for longer, it'll have a better chance of absorbing them,' she says. 'So if you've got a meal that is lower energy, for instance, it's going to keep you full, you're not going to wake up in the middle of the night hungry.' There's a lot of interest in micronutrients such as the amino acid tryptophan, which the body can convert into the sleep hormone melatonin, and which is found in a range of foods including eggs, tofu, salmon, milk, turkey and some nuts and seeds. While some studies suggest increasing tryptophan intake might boost melatonin and improve sleep quality, Machan is more sceptical, arguing that light exposure is much more important in regulating melatonin. 'You're not going to make [melatonin] if you're sitting in light – it's a signal that we're not needing to go to sleep, that it's daytime,' she says. One of the challenges with exploring the link between diet and sleep is that it's a two-way street, says Dr Jen Walsh, director of the Centre for Sleep Science at the University of Western Australia. Studies connecting late meal times with poor sleep are measuring not necessarily sleep quality on one night, but over the last month. 'I think what it's telling us is that individuals who have poorer sleep are more likely to eat later in the evening.' While one way of looking at it is that eating later means poorer-quality sleep, another way of interpreting the data is that people who have poorer-quality sleep are more likely to eat later. 'It's potentially [the case] that people who eat later have worse health behaviours in general,' she says. Like so many other health stories, good sleep ultimately seems to come back to that same old chestnut of healthy diet, healthy lifestyle. 'I say that sleep impacts diet and it also impacts exercise, so really we need to be getting the sleep right, and it will get everything else right,' Walsh says.
