The Bachelorette alum Ryan Sutter has dealt with highs and lows of his Lyme disease battle.
“I’m at a pretty good place. I think the majority of my days are good, with a few bad ones sprinkled in there,” Sutter, 51, told People in an interview published Thursday, March 19. “I’ve kind of learned how to handle those. If I pay close enough attention, I can feel the onset of things coming on, and then I’ll just make sure I don’t overdo it or overexert myself.”
Ryan, who is married to the first-ever Bachelorette Trista Sutter, confirmed his diagnosis in 2021. While dealing with the health battle, Ryan soon began navigating a series of dark thoughts and feelings.
“It’s the first time I’ve ever sympathized with suicide,” Ryan told the outlet. “I was never like, ‘I need to go [act on the thoughts],’ but I understood that [chronically ill] people get to this level of frustration where they just feel like they’re going to feel like this for the rest of their lives, or be a burden on everybody that they’re around.”
He continued, “You think, ‘I don’t know what my purpose in life is,’ and if there is no purpose to it, if it’s just getting up every day and feeling like this. It really hurts me to think that so many people are in that kind of pain and don’t think they’ll ever get out of it.”
Ryan noted he’s learned to pay “closer attention” to his moods and make sure to take supplements to help combat any suicidal thoughts.
“As long as I can keep going, moving forward, I feel like that keeps it at bay,” he explained. “But, compared to when I first got diagnosed, it’s like night and day. If I refer back to that time, I’m always like, ‘I’ll take this a hundred times out of a hundred.’ It’s way better than what it used to be. Also, the mindset I’ve developed is that it’s just not going to be what gets me off the rails.”
The firefighter is also hopeful that there will eventually be a cure for his future family’s sake.
“I just want to be healthy enough that, God willing, we have grandkids that I can do fun things with them,” he said.
Ryan has been married to Trista, 53, for over two decades, during which time they welcomed son Maxwell, 18, and daughter Blakesley, 16.
Watching Ryan navigate his Lyme battle has been particularly “scary” for Trista.
“He definitely has a lot of ups and downs still and really would like to feel better at least most of the time. He says he’s about 80 percent,” Trista said on Chris Harrison’s “Most Dramatic Podcast Ever” in April 2025. “I would go to his doctor’s appointments with him because he is so incredibly humble. So he’s like, ‘Oh, I don’t want to complain about whatever’s going on with me,’ even if it’s really significant.”
She added at the time, “If it was me that was going through what he’s going through, I would be bedridden every single day and maybe even hospitalized. He is able to get through this because he’s freaking superhuman. I don’t understand it.”
If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, contact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).
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