Jake Paul, a controversial YouTuber turned boxer, recently revealed that he’s been experiencing memory loss and slurred speech since pivoting to his new career.
“I notice it in conversations with my girlfriend or friends — not remembering something that I should be able to remember that happened a couple days ago,” Paul said during an interview on In Depth with Graham Bensinger. “Sometimes in my speech, every hundredth or two hundredth word I’ll mess up or slur, which I didn’t do before.”
The 24-year-old YouTuber opened up about his symptoms in an interview with journalist Graham Bensinger ahead of his fight against Tyron Woodley. Paul claimed he’s had anywhere between 20 and 30 concussions in his lifetime, though “it’s really hard to say” exactly how many.
When asked if he is scared by the number of concussions he’s sustained, Paul said, “Of course.”
Repeated concussions and traumatic brain injuries can lead to CTE, or chronic traumatic encephalopathy, which is a rare and progressive degenerative brain condition that can only be found after you’re already dead.
The disease has been found mostly in athletes who play contact sports, members of the military and victims of physical abuse. The symptoms of CTE include difficulty thinking, depression, impulsive behavior, short-term memory loss and emotional instability. Irritability, aggression, speech difficulties, trouble swallowing and vision problems may also be signs of the condition.
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Paul said he was told that one of the impacted areas is his frontal lobe. He returned for another brain scan one year later, “and it was worse.” He was then advised to quit boxing.
“I think before, it was affecting me more at a rapid pace because I never took it easy,” Paul explained. “I was always thrown in there with people who were way, way better than me until I started to slowly get to their level.”
He also admitted to ingesting psychedelics such as toad venom to combat his issues.
“I’ve experimented with that and it’s definitely helped out,” he told Bensinger, citing “new research and science” he has discovered about the physical impacts of the substance.
Paul will square off against Woodley tonight.
