- Alcohol
- Faith
- Mental Health
On February 7, 2010, trailing 10-6 to the Indianapolis Colts at halftime of Super Bowl XLIV, New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton made one of the gutsiest calls in Super Bowl history when he told the team that they would start the second half with an onside kick called Ambush. A role player named Chris R., a back-up safety and special teams player, wasn’t supposed to recover the onside kick, but when the squiggling ball bounced off the chest of a Colts player, Chris pounced on the ball and held on for everything he was worth.
His recovery changed the tenor of the game and propelled the Saints to their first Super Bowl victory and gave their Hurricane Katrina-weary fans something to cheer about. Sitting on the 25 yard line behind the Saints’ bench and watching the Super Bowl game that night in Miami was Chris’ father. His father’s life had been filled with bad choices and poor decisions, and his father also needed his own recovery; a recovery from his addiction to sex and alcohol. Little did both men know how that moment would change both their lives forever. I am the father of that Super Bowl hero.
As the son of a teenage mother and a boozing father who struggled with life, I grew up on the working class streets of Chicago. I was sexually abused and terrorized by my paternal grandmother. Around my eleventh birthday, my family decided to move to Atlanta to search for a better life. At thirteen, I started drinking and a couple of years later I discovered sex and enjoyed how alcohol numbed my emotional pain.
While I was still in my teens, I married my high school sweetheart. Even the subsequent birth of two sons failed to tame my desire for sexual trysts and all-night drinking escapades. An affair with a woman I met while carousing in a bar led to the destruction of my first marriage and left my two preschool-aged sons without a father in the home.
My younger son Chris was just a two years old when I walked out on my family. He didn’t understand why his father had abandoned him. His mother was a strong and hardworking woman that always put the needs of her children first. Never once did she lower herself to say mean, hurtful or derogatory things about my lying or cheating ways even though such actions would have been justified. Instead she kept the door open that one day our sons would have the type of father-and-son relationship they needed. Through her strong leadership at home, Chris became a Christian in high school, and he deepened his faith during his playing days at Georgia Tech. After college, Chris eventually won a spot on the New Orleans Saints roster, and he became a Super Bowl hero with his historic recovery of that onside kick.
You may be asking yourself, “What does your son’s recovery of a football have to do with your recovery from sex and alcohol?” Everything! Up to that point in my life I had tried all the options ranging from support groups and therapy to white knuckled willpower in the hope of breaking the cycle of my addiction, but I failed miserably each and every time. What I realized just a few short weeks after the Super Bowl was that my son and the example of his life held the missing transformational link to successful addiction recovery for me. The missing link for the type of real and lasting recovery change that I experienced can be summed up in three very simple words: “Live for More.”
I often classify a fundamental idea like “Live for More” under the heading of “easier said than done.” And that’s the point. It’s easy to understand but very challenging to execute, and the meaning of “Live for More” is different for everyone.
Let’s go back to that night in Miami that changed both our lives forever. When Chris recovered that onside kick, my first thought wasn’t about the game changing impact of the moment. Instead I thought about all that Chris had to overcome in his life just to be in position to recover that kick, and I began to cry. Over 111 million viewers watched for 63 seconds as the referees untangled the mess of bodies to see what team had possession of the football, and I couldn’t help but think that no one really understood what it took for this young man to be at the bottom of that pile.
His life epitomized what it means to “Live for More.” Living for more than himself, Chris decided at a young age to postpone immediate gratification and to live for his long term goals and dreams. He was more focused on creating a life that was far more important to him than drinking or doing drugs, partying or staying out late. I was just the opposite with my “live for today” mentality, and I was a master at lying to myself. I always found a way to justify my behavior, blame it on my past or blame it on someone else.
Just two weeks after the Super Bowl on February 20, 2010, I was arrested for driving under the influence. Even my claim to fame of having a son help win the Super Bowl couldn’t get me off this time. It wasn’t my first rodeo either. I had been arrested before, and as DUI arrests go, this one was a piece of cake. I was out of jail on bond within 2 hours. But this time was different. I started to think about my son’s life and all that he’d accomplished on and off the field. That’s when I decided to “Live for More”, and I began the process of getting the help I needed to maintain long term sobriety. It was a long battle, but after 35 years of alcoholism and other cross addictions, I did it! I won, and I have been sober ever since!
Today I live a life dedicated to God, family and serving others. I walked away from a high paying job in corporate America in 2012 to co-author the book Recovery of a Lifetime: The Inspirational Journey of a Super Bowl Hero Son and His Father’s Battle Against Multiple Addictions with my son, former New Orleans Saint Safety and Super Bowl Champion, Chris R. In addition to being an author, I travel the country speaking about addiction, and I work as a client advocate and addiction counselor at a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center in Ball Ground, Georgia.
Embrace your addiction as a blessing that allows you to become the man or woman God always intended you to be and to live a life of purpose, peace and joy.