Healing Is a Team Effort: Breaking Cycles, Building Legacy

I knew it was time.

Time to face my trauma.

Around the age of 35, the weight of my relationship with my father had become too heavy to carry in silence. So, one day, I asked him to visit me in Atlanta.

My goal?

To finally have a real conversation—one rooted in truth and transparency.

I wanted to speak openly about the pain I had held onto for so many years.

He agreed.

He came.

We sat in my living room.

And I looked him in the eyes.

I replayed every example of what I saw as abuse.

I described how it made me feel, and how it had shaped me—emotionally, mentally, even professionally.

But as I kept talking, something shifted.

I realized this conversation was not about me.

I needed to understand him too.

What was going on in his life back then?

What was his marriage like? His career?

What was his relationship with his father like?

What I discovered floored me:

My father was still carrying wounds of his own.

The truth is, he had never been shown how to love.

He had never received the kind of care, affirmation, or emotional connection he needed from his father.

So, he could not give me what he did not have.

His trauma had never been healed.

It showed up in his aggression, his silence, and his pain.

That moment changed everything for me.

I realized my decision to heal—and to love him without condition—was not just for me.

It was for him.

And for my daughters.

And for everyone who would ever experience me as a leader, a father, a friend, or a teammate.

~ Coach Delmont