"How terrible is the world going to be to my son?" - When Michael Phelps' mother recalled Olympian's DUI arrest during mental health struggles

Michael Phelps' mother once revealed that she was increasingly worried about her son after she received a call that he had been arrested over drunk-driving charges in 2014. The swimmer was also dealing with mental health issues during that time.

Phelps struggled with depression following his early retirement from swimming at the 2012 London Olympics. He has admitted experiencing suicidal thoughts and had once locked himself in his room for several days.

Baltimore-born legend also got into drug and alcohol addiction and was charged with a DUI arrest in September 2014. When the news reached his mother, Debbie, she was shocked.

"I just put my head on the desk. I thought, Oh, my God, here we go again. How terrible is the world going to be to my son?" Debbie told Sports Illustrated.

Meanwhile, Phelps' longtime coach, Bob Bowman, revealed he was anticipating hearing bad news about the swimmer, looking at his mental health condition.

"I had been living in fear that I was going to get a call that something had happened. Honestly, I thought, the way he was going, he was going to kill himself. Not take his own life, but something like the DUI, but worse," Bowman said.

However, the DUI arrest also put Phelps on the path to recovery, and he joined a treatment facility. He would later admit to feeling a ton of difference through therapy and then made a comeback at the 2016 Rio Olympics, winning five gold medals to retire as one of the greatest athletes in history.

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"It scares the hell out of me" - Michael Phelps on witnessing an increasing number of suicides

Michael Phelps during the Match 10 - Source: Getty

While Michael Phelps was suicidal at one point in his career, he was grateful for not having taken his life. Phelps made it his mission to spread awareness about mental health issues, but in 2022, he revealed that the increasing suicide rates left him worried.

"I read about suicides almost every single day. We just had two high-schoolers from a local school here that committed suicide a few weeks ago and as a dad, that scares the hell out of me," Phelps said via Yahoo.

"I just want to be able to give them the tools to understand that it's OK to talk about a struggle or a problem. From firsthand experience, I was someone who stuffed things down and compartmentalized for a large chunk of my life and that extra weight should never be on anybody's shoulders," Michael Phelps added.

Since his retirement, the American swimmer has been focused on his Michael Phelps Foundation, which addresses water safety, among other issues.