Wife: Depression Ate German Keeper

Enke feared he'd lose adopted daughter before train suicide
By Will McCahill,  Newser Staff
Posted Nov 11, 2009 9:50 PM CST
Wife: Depression Ate German Keeper
Widow Teresa Enke is seen during a press conference today.   (AP Photo)

The German soccer star who committed suicide yesterday by jumping in front of a train had battled depression for years, his wife said today, with Robert Enke fearing he could lose his newly adopted daughter because of his condition. “We thought we could cope with everything. We thought that with love there would always be a way,” Teresa Enke said. “But sometimes you just can’t cope with everything.”

Robert Enke, 32 and on track to be the national team’s goalkeeper at next summer’s World Cup, was first treated for depression in 2003, the Independent reports, and the condition worsened in 2006, after he lost his 2-year-old daughter to a heart disease. He and his wife adopted a 3-month-old in May. “He was frightened about losing Leila because she had a depressive father,” his wife said. “I always tried to help him out of his anxiety, but it didn’t work.”
(More Robert Enke stories.)

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