CATHERINE Riewoldt has opened up on the difficulties of dealing with husband Nick’s concussions late in his AFL career.

As part of a compelling interview on Fox Footy’s On the Mark, Riewoldt said Nick’s awful collision with Brodie Smith in May 2015 was the worst he’d suffered.

Catherine flew immediately to Adelaide in the aftermath of the incident, and recalled the severity of the concussion was such that Nick did not remember his sister Maddie had passed away just months earlier.

“I think the worst concussion he had was in 2015 when he was in Adelaide and James was just a few months old and so I got a call from the doctor just saying that I needed to be on the next flight, which was unusual, because the staff is always very low key and always had everything under control,” Riewoldt said on On the Mark.

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“So I knew it was serious. And I got there and I had to leave James behind, which was already hard enough because I hadn’t left him before. So I had to hop on a plane and it was real frightening just sitting there in the hospital.

“Maddie had just recently passed away and the severity of Nick’s concussion was that he did not remember Maddie had passed away. So he had to get re-told that Maddie had passed. So I mean, that in itself was terrible, but sitting there just seeing the effects … it changed the way I watched football games.”

Nick Riewoldt. Photo: Calum Robertson Source: News Corp Australia

Riewoldt said the incident had made her “anxious” when watching Nick play — to the point she had wanted him to retire then and there.

“I remember even being pregnant, I just watched the game differently — I was a lot more anxious,” she said.

“And so it was the biggest fight of our marriage actually, because I said ‘okay, you’re retiring tomorrow — there’s just no question to be asked.’

“I did not win that battle, which is rare, but it was a very difficult discussion.

“But I had a really great relationship with the medical staff and trusted them 100 per cent, went along to all the meetings that Nick had with neurologists, and he still gets scans to this day.

“And I think it’s just such a hot topic now, there’s so much more research being done and the press is covering it, that it just needs more research, really.”

Having grown up in the USA, Riewoldt said concussion had felt like it was a bigger issue there.

Nick Riewoldt poses with kids William and James (R) and wife Catherine after announcing his retirement. (Photo by Michael Dodge/Getty Images) Source: Getty Images

“Well it feels that way growing up, I felt like it was probably a bigger issue there before. I have done a lot of research — and it’s funny, when you look back, a lot of the research around concussion didn’t start happening until 2008 in the states and that’s when the US government got on board to help fund research — so everything, it blew up a bit then. So I think the press just started covering it more and more and more players have now started donating their brains, a tonne of NFL players, to science afterwards and they’re just finding a lot of stuff out that you can’t find when someone’s alive.

Riewoldt said she had struggled to come to terms with the idea that a brain scan could be clear now, but show changes in the future due to trauma sustained in the past.

“So that was my whole concern was ‘I know nothing’s showing up on the scan and his brain looks great, but can you guarantee me in five, 10, 20 years something won’t show up because of this hit?’” Riewoldt said.

“Which obviously, you can’t guarantee that — so that was my problem at the time, just trying to wrap my head around that.”

WATCH ON THE MARK AT 8.30PM WEDNESDAYS ON FOX FOOTY