Molly Seidel Openly Shares Her Mental Health Challenges

For Mental Health Awareness Month, we're sharing stories that highlight the mental health benefits of running and other forms of exercise. Find other stories, mental health resources for New Yorkers, and events taking place this month, here.

Molly Seidel is one of the top American distance runners competing today. She won a bronze medal in the marathon at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, and she’s the fastest-ever American woman finisher of the TCS New York City Marathon.

Molly has dealt with mental health issues since she was a teenager, including obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and eating disorders. At the height of her running success in 2020 and 2021 she relapsed into those conditions, struggling to manage fame and pressures that felt overwhelming. She was open about her mental health challenges, both in the media and on her own social media platforms, where she shared details of her efforts to find effective medications and therapies.

“I know that when it comes to mental health stuff I’ve tried to be as open as possible, in an effort to de-stigmatize that even pros deal with this,” she wrote on Instagram.

Molly will be at Open Run for an Open Mind on May 2 to share her story and connect with the NYRR running community.