From the outside, Drew Petersen is living the dream. As a professional skier, he is paid to travel the world, ski powder, and make turns in front of a camera. It’s the life kids dream of, but it isn’t the full truth.
Petersen, 30, has fought a lifelong battle with mental health, nearly ending his life multiple times before seeking help. He was diagnosed with type-two bipolar disorder, PTSD, depression, suicidal thinking, and post concussion syndrome. With the support of a therapist, EMDR treatments, and brain rehab, Petersen forged a new path and started talking about his struggles.
Petersen grew up in Silverthorne, Colorado, a small town of 4,940 residents situated between Vail and Breckenridge, in the heart of the Rockies. With his dad working as a ski instructor, Petersen was “all but born on a pair of skis,” he says. His parents picked the town for skiing, helping Petersen and his older brother make their first turns when they were just a year-and-a-half old.
“My upbringing was guided by the mountains,” says Petersen. Living next to the Gore Range, he fell in love with skiing while chasing his dad and brother around the mountain. Petersen attended public school and played team sports, like soccer. “Life was pretty normal. I was extremely nerdy with perfectionist tendencies. I tried to excel at school and skiing so people didn’t see what was wrong inside my head.”
When he was 15 years old, Petersen competed in his first ski comp, the US Extremes in Crested Butte. “I took second place and beat a bunch of guys I had seen in magazines,” said Petersen. The next weekend he won a competition in Taos and not long after landed his first sponsorship. The following season he made it into Powder Magazine, putting him on the fast track towards stardom.
Despite the accolades and attention, Petersen was struggling internally. “I had a lot of concussions when I was young, all the way back to elementary school,” he says. “Brain injuries don’t create mental illness, but they can exacerbate it. They overlapped with episodes of depression and my earliest suicidal thinking. The spiral fed itself. If you can’t get out of bed, you can’t fix anything.”
Meanwhile, his success on skis continued. Petersen won competitions, landed larger sponsorships, and made a name for himself in prominent magazines. After high school, he moved to Salt Lake to attend the University of Utah, spending most of his freetime skiing in the Wasatch Mountains.
“From elementary school, my dream was to be a pro skier,” says Petersen, “by college it was starting to come true, until the crash.” Petersen landed awkwardly while doing a cork 720, dislocating his hip and shoulder, tearing his ACL, and breaking his sacrum and ribs, which forced him to move home for help. “To be 19 and have your mom help you into the shower is super humbling.”
With multiple surgeries and a two-year recovery, Petersen lost all of his sponsors, but he continued to chase the dream. He returned to the sport and again found success, driven by his passion for skiing.
Years later, Petersen would learn that this high-low rollercoaster was due to type 2 bipolar disorder. “It’s defined by hypomania. Lots of energy, not sleeping, lots of partying, and doing things with a high focus, like skiing,” he says. “Then a crash and a long episode of depression, which could last for months.”
The cycle repeated itself again and again. “I would pull all-nighters to cram for tests, ace an exam and drink hard after, then wake up early the next morning to chase snow. Eventually I would burn out. These were the breaking points of the manic episodes. My physical body would break under the mental and emotional trauma I was going through.” Due to this, Petersen has had 13 surgeries in his life.
In May 2017, Petersen was riding a high again. Over the winter he starred in ski films, traveled to British Columbia, Japan, and Kyrgyzstan, and was making more money than he ever had. But, on a ski trip to Mount Hood in Oregon, he was hit in the head by a falling rock, only surviving thanks to his helmet.
Immediately after the accident, Petersen told everyone close to him that he was ok, but he knew this time was different. “I had hid my struggles my whole life, riding the highs and ignoring the lows,” says Petersen. “Before the accident, my thoughts weren’t bad enough for me to be scared. I thought about suicide, but knew I wouldn’t do it. Maybe that’s hard for some to understand.”
That changed with his near death experiences on Hood. “I started to wonder why I was still alive. I wasn’t thinking about death in a philosophical way, but in a real one. I knew something was deeply wrong.”
In August of 2018, more than a year after the rockfall, Petersen finally asked for help. “I was spiraling and my body was breaking down under the mental trauma.” After breaking his collarbone from a fall, Peterson called his mom and brother to tell them he was struggling and ask them to hold him accountable for finding professional help.
Soon after, Petersen found a therapist who he still sees today. Over the next two years, he began uncovering different diagnoses and providers. Eventually he would go through EMDR treatments, brain rehab, and physical therapy for back pain and migraines. “I didn’t know there were so many ways to help yourself,” he says. “There’s a tool for whatever problem you’re dealing with. They can feel abstract, but they all help in some shape or form. Just chipping away at each level.”
After years of work, Petersen has a new lease on life. “I have my oxygen mask on and can help others now,” he explains. Over years of reflection, he’s realized many factors played into why it was so hard to share his struggles with others. The shame rooted in suicidal thoughts, depression, and mental health struggles was the main reason, but so was a social dynamic of toxic positivity.
“My role models growing up never showed vulnerability,” says Petersen. “They would chase the highs while skiing and continue off the mountain, never showing weakness. It was good vibes only.”
The downside of good vibes only is that you always have to be stoked. The mindset doesn’t allow for the hard, messy, and complicated parts of life. But, Petersen says, “sometimes I’m not happy. Sometimes I’m not living the dream, and that’s ok. We need to allow people to show up in a real way.”
For that to change, someone has to open the door for others. “I’ve been put on so many pedestals for how good I am at sliding on snow, but why can’t we also celebrate the people talking about hard things?” Petersen is committed to sharing his story, because, he says, “vulnerability begets vulnerability.”
“The stories of other people were instrumental in my courage to ask for help,” says Petersen. “Rob Krar talking about depression and Corey Richards’ sharing his experience with EMDR showed me you can recover. They were raw, authentic, and vulnerable. They went deeper than just saying mental health struggles. That’s why I talk about suicide. So people like me know they aren’t alone.”
While sharing his struggles is still difficult, Petersen believes it will create more vulnerability in our communities and the future generation. “I’m secure with where I’m at. If I lose sponsorships for talking, I’m fine with that. If my truth doesn’t vibe with someone, or they view me as less, I’m not going to stop. People need the truth.”
