Brock Lesnar Opens Up About Struggling With Anxiety

Inside a professional wrestling ring, Brock Lesnar often appears invincible, carving his way through opponents in last month's Royal Rumble en route to a title match at WrestleMania. But he says the reality of being a WWE performer takes a toll on him mentally.

"I have a total crash after being in front of audiences," Lesnar told The Pat McAfee Show. "Like, I go hibernate in Saskatchewan. Like, my downers – like, the anxiety from that – like, takes me a few days to recover. Forever, yeah it's been that way. Like, I used to be on – have big wrestling matches in high school and – like, to come down from big arenas it's like, I get nervous around people and I'm awkward as f*ck. Yeah, but I'm putting on a show.

"Like I've got to go through all this thing, and that's just who I am," Lesnar continued. "And I like to go and just get away from the people. And it's not that I dislike people. I mean, it's not been that way, but some people, yeah, I don't like. I just like to be left the f*ck alone, and because I'm like – like, I'm in front of an audience then it just exhausts me. And so I've got to go and like, recharge up."

Brock Lesnar says he comes from a family of fighters. He grew up alongside two older brothers and often followed the path they carved out in Webster, South Dakota.

"The Lesnar family were fighters," Lesnar recalled. "And so I grew up six years younger than my two older brothers who were getting out of jail on Monday mornings to go to school because of street fights and you know. So I grew up with that stigma. We went to street dances, I went there to fight. That's what we did. That's what I did, anyway. And then it was girls after that and maybe I'll have a couple of drinks."

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit The Pat McAfee Show with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.