Kalen Jackson talks mental health after father Jim Irsay’s final struggle

Colts owner Kalen Jackson joined a panel to talk about mental health in sports for TEDSports Indianapolis on Thursday.
Jackson recalled early discussions about the Irsay family’s Kicking the Stigma initiative and wondering how Jim Irsay would feel. ‘And I think we did say, ‘Will dad want to talk about this?”
‘If someone makes a mistake because of their addiction, or depression .. you have to let them heal,’ Jackson said. ‘And actually, on the other side, still accept them.’

INDIANAPOLIS — Colts owner Kalen Jackson remembers that day in middle school when the reality of her life, of her struggles — she’d had anxiety for years and had been seeing a therapist since she was 8 — and of her family’s struggles became very real and very raw.

The news had broken that her father, then-Colts owner Jim Irsay, was at the center of a federal investigation into his use of prescription drugs. The 2002 investigation, prompted by records of a prominent plastic surgeon, showed that Irsay received 120 prescriptions over a one-year period.

The prescriptions included painkillers like Oxycontin and, in one 24-day period, Irsay was prescribed 400 Oxycontin tablets. Irsay publicly acknowledged his addiction at the time and announced he had sought treatment at a rehabilitation center.

“And it was probably the first time that I fully understood what that meant in my life and in his life,” Jackson said. “And I hadn’t told anybody. And I remember being really upset in the hallway and feeling like I was going to cry and going to the bathroom stall and crying.”

Then Jackson went back to class, still struggling, having no idea that others, outside of her family, were struggling, too.

“And it sounds really sad, I realize,” she said. “But also, it was this moment that I look back on, and I’m like, everyone should know that there’s so many people (crying in bathroom stalls),” she said. “There are so many different ages, different genders, everyone has something. And I think that it’s important to realize you’re not the only one feeling that.”

Jackson spoke Thursday, just two weeks after Irsay’s final struggles were revealed in a report by the Washington Post that detailed Irsay’s battle with pain pills and the sedative ketamine, which ultimately took his life May 21, 2025, at the age of 65.

Jackson joined the TEDSports Indianapolis panel called “The Mind Game: Rethinking Mental Health in Sports.” She sat alongside fellow panelists Hope Solo, World Cup Champion and advocate for athlete rights and mental well-being, and Dr. Jesse Andrew Steinfeldt, a renowned sport and performance psychologist who challenges the stigma around mental health.

“I wish people knew that it’s okay (to struggle with mental health). I wish people knew that it’s not abnormal,” Steinfeldt said. “I wish people knew that you’re not messed up.”

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‘Will dad want to talk about this?’

As a recovering addict in 2020, Irsay and the Colts created Kicking the Stigma, their initiative to combat mental illness with a combination of philanthropy and transparency.

“If we were to do something that was specific to our family, what would that be? What’s something that could really touch our lives?” Jackson said. “And we kept coming back to mental health for many reasons.”

Jackson, who leads the organization for the team, recalls early discussions about the initiative and wondering how Irsay would feel.

“And I think we did say, ‘Will dad want to talk about this? How will he feel about it?'” she said Thursday. “And he instantly embraced it and got excited about it.”

Irsay filmed the first public service announcement for Kicking the Stigma from his basement during the COVID pandemic.

“It was something that he really got inspired by that moment and by actually doing it and speaking it,” Jackson said. “And we weren’t asking for a call to action, we weren’t asking for money, we weren’t asking for anything. It was literally just saying, ‘We know this is happening and we’re the first to tell you, Us too.'”

The Irsay family, who envisioned it as a local campaign at first, had no idea how big it would become. Five years later, $33 million has been committed to mental health organizations, research and to raise awareness through Kicking the Stigma.

“And after that, it kind of really just kept going in a way that we didn’t even expect,” Jackson said. “We really hit a nerve in a very positive way and realized that people in our community, both nationally and internationally (need) someone to say, ‘It’s OK.'”

Jackson has hundreds and hundreds of letters and e-mails. She’s had hundreds of phone calls. And she’s had hundreds of people come up to her and tell her their story. That’s what she is most proud of about Kicking the Stigma.

“They’ve been given the permission to talk to somebody that they knew wasn’t going to judge them,” she said. “It gives so much credit to my dad, for one, sharing his story, but also putting the money behind it, because it does take a lot to get something off the ground and to get people to talk about it and notice it.”

For her dad, Jackson said, this was the one thing that didn’t have to be about the Colts. Irsay wanted Kicking the Stigma to be connected to everything.

“And he was the one who said, ‘I want this on Fox News and CNN … and I want it in big sporting events,'” she said. “And the reason was not to shine a light on the horseshoe. We used that because we knew people pay attention to that.”

‘Doing the right thing is always the right thing’

Each season, Jackson meets with Colts players and staff to let them know about Kicking the Stigma, and about the resources the team offers. There is an in-house clinician for all the staff. She tells them it’s OK to struggle with mental health. It’s OK to tell somebody.

That talk made a crucial difference to one Colts player, who Jackson didn’t name, only saying he had played for the Colts in the last five years.

“So after one of the talks that I had to the team, (he) reached out to his coach, (he) was sitting in a park, saying he needed him to come,” Jackson said. “You know, he needed him to come. (He told his coach), ‘I don’t know what to do.'”

When the coach arrived, that player told him if Jackson hadn’t spoken that day to the team, he never would have called his coach. But because of Jackson’s words, he did.

“Those moments are the ones, and that’s, you know, that’s not happening every day in our building or anything like that, but those moments matter,” she said.

She pointed to another Colts player, Braden Smith, who earlier this year talked with IndyStar about his mental health battles.

“He got the help that he needed, and we were extremely supportive,” she said, “and he’s back and he’s playing better than he was before.”

That’s the key for businesses and companies, Jackson said, to not only accept that employees may have mental health issues but then take action to help them.

“Doing the right thing is always the right thing. There does still need to be a shift in, if we’re going to preach that we agree with de-stigmatizing and agree with letting people heal with dignity, then you actually have to let them heal with dignity,” she said.

“Because if someone makes a mistake, or because of their addiction, or depression, or maybe does something that they are not proud of, and they go through the steps to heal, you have to let them. And actually, on the other side, still accept them.”

The battle doesn’t define the person: ‘We are all humans’

For Jackson, her platform with Kicking the Stigma has been a natural fit because it is so very close to her heart.

“One thing as a family who, you know, we each have our own individual stories that we tell, and then having a father with substance abuse disorder,” she said. “I think what we used to say is like, ‘Even if we told people the truth, they wouldn’t believe it.'”

She calls herself “an open book,” who since that day in middle school has grown into a person who doesn’t feel shame or embarrassment for her family’s mental health battles.

“I was very blessed to be raised in a family that was very accepting of getting the help that I needed,” she said.

Jackson was also taught that her anxiety, or her father’s substance abuse or someone else’s struggle with depression or anyone else’s inner battles, do not define who they are as a person.

“What people have to realize is that we all are humans. That’s just one part of that person. Like, they’re also a mom and a dad, and they love music, and they like to do puzzles …” she said. “But, they are all these other things, but they get defined as this one thing. And imagine it’s like you got defined by your asthma.

“It’s bizarre to think but that’s the reality. And so I think it just is about shifting the way we view it and the way culturally we talk about it.”

Follow IndyStar sports reporter Dana Benbow on X: @DanaBenbow. Reach her via email: [email protected].

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