Wreck My Life Read online

  With no time to explain in more detail, she told us that she had been trying to call my dad all evening. She took us back to her room and showed us a simple, handwritten note he had left beneath the phone. A note that simply read, “I do love you,” and had his name signed beneath it. Mind racing, heart pounding, I found my body tensing and my nerves coiling tight. I couldn’t put the pieces together. I couldn’t wrap my head around the situation. There was so little detail, so little explanation. What was going on? Where was my dad? Were my parents going to go to jail? How big was this lie? How were we going to get in touch with him? When was he coming home?

  It was then that I noticed a blinking light on the voicemail machine by the phone and asked my mom who had called. Reluctantly, she told Sloan and me that she had found a voice message along with the note. She pressed the button and I immediately heard my father’s voice. In that moment the reality and severity of the situation hit me—the instant I heard him speak. Because I knew it was my father talking on the answering machine, but it wasn’t my daddy’s voice. It was hollow and broken and empty. It was a voice so desperate, so shattered, that it sounded like a stranger. He sounded like it was taking every ounce of his energy and pride to muster a noise, draining his heart with every word.

  He apologized. Said he needed to drive around and clear his head. Said he needed to be alone for a while to figure things out. Said he loved us and would always love us. And said little else before he said goodbye.

  That was when true fear set in. Where was my dad and how were we going to find him? My mom, sister, and I sat up for hours trying to put the pieces together, giving accounts of our day and the last time we had seen him or talked to him, calling friends and family—anyone who may know where he was, anyone who may be able to contact him. With each lost lead, a hot burn slid down my spine as we tried, in desperation, to find him. I could feel the enemy feeding off of our fear and I knew my faith and trust were fading faster than I wanted to believe.

  When exhaustion set in, Sloan and I lay down on our mom’s bed. I squeezed my daddy’s pillow tight and sucked in his aroma as deeply as my lungs could muster. While my mom sat up in the kitchen making countless calls and desperately seeking help, my sister and I cried ourselves to sleep. Holding each other tight, we offered empty assurances to ease one another’s angst and hoped that everything would just disappear. That my dad would come driving up and everything would go back to normal. That some resolution would come soon and that we’d be able to cuddle up next to our daddy in this very same spot the next night.

  That was the first night I couldn’t pray. I was too confused and too blindsided to even think of what to say. I couldn’t muster the strength to reach out to a God who seemed nowhere near. And that hot burn that had coiled around my spine seemed to linger in the depths of me. Maybe you’ve wrestled with the same struggle at some point—unsure of what’s even sufficient, what words could possibly wrap around a situation that feels bigger than any words. That feels bigger than our own strength. It wasn’t that I didn’t desire to reach out to God, I simply didn’t have the words. In the midst of so much confusion, my heart just couldn’t find its way.

  At some point in the night I stumbled up to my own bedroom, but no more than a few hours into our shallow rest, my sister and I were woken by a scream. I could hear my mom’s feet sprinting up the basement steps from our home office and a sheet of paper crackling in her hand.

  “Get in the car! Now! Get in the car!”

  My sister came bounding up the steps to grab me, and after I threw on my shoes and a jacket we fearfully ran downstairs. My mom, grabbing boxes of papers, contact information, her purse, and her shoes, ordered Sloan and me into my sister’s Mustang GT. As we sped around town searching for any place my dad might be, I remembered the sheet of paper my mom had been holding and I begged to see what she’d seen.

  It took a while for my frantic, frazzled mom to concede, but in desperation she finally shoved the crumpled sheet of paper into the backseat.

  “Fine, read it. Then help me! Please!”

  Absentmindedly smoothing out the creases in the paper, I looked down and read. Horror overcame me. It didn’t take long to realize the sheet I was holding was an email she’d found from my daddy. A suicide email, addressed to our family.

  It’s hard to understand how someone could sum up their life on three-quarters of a page of paper. But my dad’s suicide letter did just that. It was vague and empty and shallow. As my mom sped through town, stopping at every location she could imagine my dad might be, my sister made desperate phone calls to the police, my dad’s friends, his coworkers, and family members. But with life moving five hundred miles per hour around me, I found myself frozen. The world surrounding me seemed to turn to molasses, slowly flowing by in a foggy, glazed state. I couldn’t peel my eyes from the letter in my hands.

  He first apologized. He explained, in complete brevity, that he couldn’t overcome his own personal demons. He referred to himself as a lone soul and he offered his guidance for how we could move forward without him. Then he wrote a small paragraph to my mom, followed by a brief paragraph about my sister. And lastly, a short series of sentences about me. His words were generic and gross—stripped of any sincerity or passion. As if he were a shell, void of emotion, when he wrote them. As if he had already accepted his fate and telling us his plans was just a formality.

  When I snapped back into reality, we were pulling up to his office building and all I could see were police lights and uniformed officials. My mom had tried calling the police the night before when my dad didn’t come home, but seeing as how he had only been gone a few hours, there wasn’t much they could do. Apparently later in the night she had thought to call the suicide hotline to simply pick their brains on if they thought the specific circumstances warranted concern. Their reaction and instruction led to the involvement of the police. And early the next morning, on January 3, my mom discovered the email. It wasn’t long until we stood in a parking lot surrounded by flashing lights and concerned faces and an air of desperation that made everything far too real. My dad was a known attorney in town, so the faces of the officers who surrounded us weren’t unattached strangers just doing their jobs—they were colleagues and peers and badges who knew and loved Big John.

  Upon my mom’s instruction, we ran straight into his office, hysterically searching for any shred of evidence that might provide a clue to his whereabouts—frantically trying to find my daddy before my daddy gave up. I’d like to write that I was in any way helpful. But the fact of the matter is I felt numb. I sat at his desk and stared at his blank computer and shuffled through mounds of paper as if I knew what I was looking for. We were in a race against time and the seconds seemed to be ticking by faster and faster, but my muscles and my mind just couldn’t keep up. The police filled the office building, fielding calls and tracing clues. There was so much noise—so much commotion. Phones ringing, people yelling, papers shuffling. Chaos and voices and sound. Then before I knew it—nothing. Silence fell all around.

  I’ll never forget the moment when everything stopped. My mom, my sister, and I were all behind my dad’s desk. But suddenly the air hung thick with unspoken words. The three of us looked up at the same time and saw three officers in the doorway. The looks on their faces were indescribable. My mom stumbled back and demanded they walk away, get back to work, and keep searching for her husband. But the officers didn’t move until, finally, one spoke up.

  “Ma’am, we have found your husband.”

  A flicker of hope! A relief, oh what a sweet relief! A moment of utter joy, a moment of—

  “I’m sorry, let us clarify: we’ve found your husband’s remains.”

  It was then that my world froze. No child should ever have to endure the sound of their mother’s heart breaking. The sight of their sister shattering and falling broken to the floor. The sound that I realized was resonating from the deepest depths of me wasn’t a cry or a scream. It was a sound of utter anguis
h. It poured from me with such ferocity I could feel the heat rise from my soul. I felt a numbness overwhelm my body and expand into every crevice of my being. In that instant, our perfect family was shattered. Our perfect lives were destroyed. Normal was an illusion. All I could do was heave.

  My dad’s delicately built world had crumbled around him in a matter of days. The secret my mom had stumbled upon was a lie woven through fourteen years of life’s tapestry. It was all so avoidable. There was no infidelity, no impurity—but there was deceit. My dad had allowed his personal issues he protected so privately to escalate. I think that by avoiding handling the “tough stuff” of life on a day-to-day basis and instead allowing it to accumulate through time, he lost his way. Financial issues mounted. Disorganization snowballed. Shame grew. His struggle to independently handle the things he believed were his duty and responsibility, as a man, seemed to challenge his identity as a husband and a father and a provider. His pride and his desire to maintain a carefully crafted perception left him overwhelmed, overstimulated, and struggling in a hole of insurmountable depth.

  There is much to be said about a humble country boy who builds himself into a man of earthly prestige and success. My mom once told me that sometimes, those who come from such humble beginnings carry their pride in their back pocket along with their crisp hundred-dollar bills. While there is much to be respected and admired in men who have the strength to build their own empires, the foundations of their intentions must be pure. Never forgetting who they serve and what is required of them. Never sacrificing integrity for the sake of image—particularly when they have everything to lose.

  I don’t think my father had the capacity to handle the fact that his pride and issues had damaged the one thing he cherished above all else: his family. I don’t think he could face me and my sister with the truth, nor do I think he could face his mother or his wife. Unwilling to reach out for help and blindsided as his great weaknesses were brought into the light, he panicked. The personal demons he already wrestled with in so many ways seemed to have a stranglehold on a man who, at his core, yearned for the simplicity of boyhood. In the face of his greatest fears those personal demons coaxed him to a place of desperation.

  He had run. He had picked up in the middle of the day and made his way back toward his humble roots. Back toward his childhood home in Alabama. He took every precaution to assure his success. He came home to get his guns in the middle of the day, leaving the note and the message when nobody was around to stop him. He turned off his phone and severed any chance of contact. Then he drove. Away from his problems, away from his responsibilities.

  I’d like to think something snapped in my dad’s mind. I’d like to think his actions were rash and his decisions were spontaneous. But the fact of the matter is that my dad spent a great deal of time thinking that day. From the time he left his office at lunch to the time his suicide email was sent in the early morning hours, he had spent hours drowning in thought. Hours harboring a war within his spirit. Hours hosting a battle in his soul. I won’t write much more about what I don’t know. It hurts too badly to let my imagination wander. But I do know one thing: my dad was a beautiful man. He was also a man riddled with wreckage and personal sin-struggles, paralyzed by fear and caught in Satan’s snares. A man who loved others far more than he was ever capable of loving himself. And that is what breaks my heart the most.

  The police were finally able to track him down only because one call had been made from his cell phone in that time. One single call, to 911. He had distanced himself far enough from his family but close enough to his home. He had checked into a hotel room, neatly hung up his clothes, written on a small slip of paper what he wished to be done with his body and called 911. I can only assume he did this so that a maid wouldn’t walk in on the scene and be scarred by a pain she had no need to feel. My daddy then sat down on the hotel bed with a gun and gave up.

  It was before dawn on January 3, 2009 that my daddy put a gun to his heart and pulled the trigger.

  And it was January 3, 2009 that I took off running from God.

  6

  Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

  I lost myself in 2009.

  The funeral home preparation room smelled like formaldehyde and wreckage. The worst kind of wreckage. The kind that ravaged and tore at me as I stood by the cold metal table and stared at the white sheet outlining my dad’s body.

  I wasn’t surprised when no tears could come as they pulled back the sheet and I saw his pale face. There were none left to shed. Not after the past few days of relentless crying. Every ounce of me felt dry as I stood over his body and rubbed my fingers over the small hole in his chest, just above his once beating heart. In that moment my heart felt just as dead as the broken one left in his body. I struggled to wrap my mind around how such a small hole had taken down such a giant. How that familiar chest and those strong, broad shoulders, and those coarse, loving hands could sag so heavy and lifeless.

  It was all so unexceptional. So unimpressive. So final. I imagined he preferred it that way. To go out as unceremoniously as he felt he deserved. To exit just as he believed he had walked through life—unremarkably. Because that’s how it all felt. Suicide. Dramatic and horrific and theatrical, yes, but more than anything—unremarkable. Because in the end, it was just that—the end. Nothing anyone could do could change that.

  Or maybe he felt heroic in some twisted, broken way. His suicide letter had mentioned that his decision would be for our benefit—he would be sparing us the problems he always felt he was creating. He explained he was wrestling demons, so maybe he thought ending the torment would finally set him free. Maybe he thought the insurance money would do something to bandage the wounds he left our family.

  Either way, his twisted perspective and wrecked mentality and deceit-fueled demons were the same demons quickly overcoming me. It was with the thought of that blood-soaked hotel bed and the echo of that pistol shot to the chest that I took off running.

  And running.

  As far and as fast as my mangled heart would carry me.

  Questioning God

  It’s amazing how quickly our hearts can move from praising God to blaming Him when life’s circumstances suddenly become overwhelming. It’s as if, at times, our threshold for pain has the strongest pull on our loyalty. As if we’re willing to walk in faith until true faith is actually required of us in great quantity. As if the degree of affliction we face in our lives is somehow directly related to the degree of God’s capability. Pain-induced arrogance. It’s our greatest defense mechanism. And one that always sends us running.

  I first ran into denial. Denial of my circumstances and denial of my new reality. This couldn’t be my life. This couldn’t be my story. None of this numbness, this pain, this wreckage—none of this was in the plan. It was all too overwhelming.

  I can’t tell you the number of times I caught myself trying to call my daddy. The subconscious habits were the most painful to break. Every time I’d be reminded the line was disconnected. Every time I’d feel the stabbing reminder that things weren’t ever going to be the same. Every time I’d be forced to remember I was never going to hear my dad’s voice again.

  I had to return to LSU just a few weeks after I stood next to my dad’s casket and hugged the hundreds of friends and family members who filed through the sanctuary. Every face mirrored the one before it—dumbfounded by the incomprehensible truth. Soaked in shock that this piercing pain had so quickly entered their stories too. A part of me wanted to stay home and help my stunned mom and stoic sister pick up the pieces of our family’s shattered story. But another part of me longed to run away from everything—the sounds, the smells, the memories, the triggers. To get far away from the constant reminders that my brain refused to believe were true. It didn’t take much convincing for me to pack up and head back to school. I needed to continue my education. I needed to lace up my cleats and continue competing. After all, my mom assured me, it’s what my dad would have wanted me to d
o.

  When the staff had recruited me to LSU they had made many promises about the quality of care and provision at the school. I should have known their words were true when my coaches and teammates traveled from around the country to stand alongside me at my dad’s funeral. But if there was any doubt left in my mind, it was dispelled as soon as I stepped back onto campus and realized everything they had set up for me to help me grieve and process moving forward at school. From a grief counselor to an academic support staff, it seemed like every administrator on campus was made aware of my circumstances and prepared to help support me through my healing. Even the coaches informed me I was free to miss any spring practices I needed to as I healed. I missed one. And the next day I stayed after practice to make up for my absence, running sprints on my own.

  I wanted to focus. And I wanted to remain disciplined. Part of my heart wanted to receive all of the warmth that was offered to me; part of me was still that innocent girl watching her proud daddy cheering in the stands. This part of me yearned for normalcy and purity. So for a while I worked to cling to happy memories: childhood lake trips on our wave runner, Saturday afternoons watching football in our pajamas, the look on his face after I’d scored that goal. I fought for joy for a stretch of time, but it was hard to hold a smile when my mind constantly crawled back to envisioning his face in the hotel room, envisioning his body on that bed, wondering what he could have been thinking and feeling. And growing angrier that now he was nothing more than dead.

  Like an old familiar friend, the enemy capitalized on my emotional depression and was never far from me. It wasn’t long before my heart shifted to anger. And resentment. And hatred toward my dad as the initial shock began to wear off and the unyielding pain started to seep through. A pain so debilitating, so crippling, it made it hard to even think. I began to foster feelings I had never truly known before. Feelings of passionate resentment. Feelings of confusion, jealousy, pain. Feelings of envy, impatience, obsession. Feelings of loneliness, deep inadequacy, weakness. Feelings of fear, crippling fear. Feelings of abandonment—not only abandonment from my father but abandonment from God. How could my dad have done this to our family? How could God not have stopped the situation from happening?