A Father First: How My Life Became Bigger Than Basketball (40 page)

I knew then exactly what I had to do—to spend time with the boys regularly and to focus on my training. Assuming that I’d see my kids when I wasn’t in the gym, I rented a condo in downtown Chicago, close to where I’d be working out. Strangely enough, even with all the changes in my home base over the years, this was my first time living alone. To get me healthy, my trainer, Tim Grover of Attack Athletics, who had worked wonders in training everyone from Michael Jordan to Kobe Bryant, among numerous other elite athletes, had said he would require six to eight weeks. That would be cutting it close for the tryout that would determine whether I would go to China to compete. But if I was going to have faith in anyone, now was the time to have it in myself.

MAY 2008 WAS A RELENTLESS ROLLER COASTER OF HIGHS and lows.

On a high note, one of the silver linings of this period, starting from the time that I was no longer living with Siohvaughn, was being given time to get much closer to my mom, my dad, and other family members who still loved me for the person that I was—in every season. During the last five years, I had been so focused on driving to the basket that I wasn’t always aware of what was going on with my family. There was a blessing, without a doubt, in being reminded of how important those meaningful relationships really are—and, yet again, of how life was still bigger than basketball.

Dad, after going through his own contentious divorce, moved to Miami around this time. Before leaving Chicago he had started attending services at Mom’s church—which she began in a tiny storefront with forty-seven members, not long after being ordained in January 2007—and he had been moved by her to examine how he had been living. Once Dad got settled into his new life in Florida, he decided to take more active steps toward his sobriety.

The miracle of Jolinda Wade continued to inspire not only our family but also a growing number of people who heard the power of her testimony. Indeed, that growing number could not fit into that small space where she had been preaching. In January 2008, in the middle of trying to fill out paperwork for loans to buy a medium-size space, Mom drove by a larger facility that was for sale. When Tragil paid a visit to practice at the American Airlines Arena in Miami and told me that Mom had found an ideal spot for her dream church that only needed a little TLC (like a lot of us!), I couldn’t think of any gift more fitting for her. T.J. confirmed that Mom’s testimony had started changing so many people’s lives now that she was able to tell her story, offering her powerful message of hope.

In March, when the time came to fill out the paperwork for buying the building, Siohvaughn, then still in touch with Mom and involved with the church, agreed to sign off on the purchase.

My mother wouldn’t have asked me for the help. That’s not her. Throughout my success she was always so proud and grateful for the smallest things that I’d been able to do for her that I worried she would feel overwhelmed if I bought the church for her. But with the vision that she had for her following to grow and the ways she could serve the Chicago area community, Mom accepted my offer, only on the condition that I stand at her side for the ribbon cutting.

In mid-May, in front of a packed house of hundreds, dressed regally in purple, the same color she had chosen to paint the interior of the sanctuary, Pastor Jolinda Wade and Pastor Ladell Jones held their first service in the new home. Several NBA moms, including Magic Johnson’s mother, were there to take part in the celebration. Between the press and the out-of-town guests and the regular congregants, the parking lot overflowed and latecomers had to park blocks away.

I spoke to the press ahead of time and summed up her story by saying, “I respect my mother so much, from the life that she used to live and to see her today in the life that she lives. I’m so proud of her. Everybody thinks I’m the miraculous story in the family. I think she is. I think what I’ve done means I’ve been very blessed, but she’s been more than blessed. She’s been anointed.”

Tragil joined me to give praise for our mother and for the new church home. Only six years earlier, the family had gathered in their Sunday best to support our mom when she turned herself into the court. Here we were on a real Sunday to support our mother on what Mom described as “one of the highest of the highest moments in my life.”

Tragil and I both shed tears of pure happiness. My sister commented, “All I can say: Hallelujah.” The way she described the big move was that Mom and her following were coming from a “space to a place.”

Pastor Wade then cut the ribbon. She declared, “Today is the crossover. We’re in here today because of God’s goodness and God chose to use the heart of my son to do this for us and he trusts the heart of his mama. Ain’t that something?”

Everyone shouted, “Amen!” The festivities continued from there. How strange and great. In a life in which the basketball court had always been my sanctuary, now I could sit in a real sanctuary to feel the hand of grace.

In a month that was mostly tough for me, that day was a most loving reprieve. At the time, I especially needed my mother’s wisdom and every family member’s loving reminder of the power of faith.

When I first confronted the truth that there was no saving my marriage, I never expected my family to be dragged into it. They knew what was going on; they had been through some of the drama before; but I certainly didn’t want to disrupt the relationship that Von had with them any more than I wanted to be separated from her mom, who was a grandmother to my children.

But as I saw it, from the moment Siohvaughn picked up and returned to Chicago with my sons, she had done all she could to make me seeing the boys difficult. The custody judgment would cite notes from the court-appointed expert about my ex’s efforts to keep me from seeing the children in this separation stage before there had been a court-ordered visitation schedule. The expert expressed concern about Siohvaughn’s willingness to foster a relationship between the boys and me, stating: “For a long period of time she made visitations challenging for Mr. Wade and the children beyond what could be explained on the basis of concern for the children’s well-being.” So the attempt to control my access to the boys (“in a bad way,” as the expert put it) had been there even before there had been a filing for divorce.

Before that nightmare had come to pass, I continued to believe that soon enough we’d get past the anger that was coming out during this time. In hearing about divorces that others had been through, I expected that eventually we would find a way to communicate about arrangements that were in the best interest of our sons. But by the end of May, with no hint of cooperation in establishing a schedule, I finally filed a petition for divorce.

I went back and forth so many times. My sense of self, so connected to being a dad and a family man, was in question. That was the most self-conscious I’ve ever felt in my life. When I was leaving my hotel and going places on my own, it felt like people were glaring at me. In the end, though, that wasn’t helping me see my boys.

Asking for joint custody, I looked to a court-ordered schedule to create a fair structure that would let my sons stay part of the time with me in Miami and part of the time with her in Chicago. Siohvaughn was ready and responded by countersuing for divorce and suing for sole custody. She would insist, as I understood it, that joint custody was not in the boys’ interest and if I wanted to see them I could do so in Chicago—despite the fact that my work, the source of the income, required me to stay in Miami.

Just as I’d continue to be devoted to making sure my sons never had to want for anything, Siohvaughn knew she would be provided for. That ought to have been clear in the multiple settlement offers that unfortunately were rejected time and again.

None of it made sense. No doubt the psychology of doing anything to hurt someone at any cost was one textbook chapter I’d never studied in school.

Little did we know that this had been only a brief preview of what was waiting in the wings—in which I would be accused of unbelievable outrages. As in: total lies (that would later be discredited) that portrayed me as the most abusive husband and father, doing stuff like throwing her and the kids across the room, and on and on. This tactic was used to bring in allegations that weren’t in the least true but were enough to raise questions that would lead to me being investigated by the Department of Children and Family Services. Not once but three times. One comment that came out of those interviews was from an expert who suggested the resources of parenting classes. Based on that recommendation, I did take an informative one-on-one parenting class so that I could learn more about being a better dad in general and a divorced father specifically.

But, in the meantime, even when the accusations of abuse were completely baseless, there on the record were those visits from child services that could raise questions for the custody judge. Later, the allegation would be made that I’d punched my own son in the face fifty-five times. He would be forced to tell that story, too, after being coached to say that it did happen, but only once. Who would punch a six- or seven-year-old—or a child of any age—in the face?

Before that insanity was unleashed, I turned the battle over to my lawyers and went forward with training to prove myself worthy for the Olympics. While I was in Chicago, I trusted that seeing my kids would be overseen by the court. My thought was, how much longer was I supposed to be punished? My heart was heavy for my boys to have to go through this. Surely, though, the worst of the storm would soon pass.

Not a chance. We hadn’t seen anything yet.

WITH ONLY ME OUT ON THE FLOOR, I CREATED MY OWN OBSTACLE course and became my own unrelenting drill sergeant, with everything reduced to its primal elements—just this ball, this rim, this moment. Revisiting the great coaching lessons that had been given to me by all my mentors, I went back to being the little boy trying to get himself into a game with the big guys. I was my father’s son, alone in the backyard willing myself to be the best. I was all my heroes refusing to be undone by challenges that threatened to take them down—Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Alonzo Mourning, those just a few of the names that kept me going.

Getting to see Zaire and Zion turned into a major obstacle course, too—even though we were in the same city and even though the court gave us guidelines. There were all kinds of hoops to jump through just in arranging a time to visit; calls weren’t returned and changes were made at the last minute. Then, since I could only see them on their mom’s turf, I’d drive over to the house only to be made to sit and wait for long periods of time without being told where they were. The experience became so uncomfortable that I decided to pull back, not wanting to make the situation any worse. For the entire summer, I was able to see my sons probably all of two times. But that contact was enough for me to reassure six-year-old Zaire that we would be able to spend much more time with each other soon and to allow one-year-old Zion to be able to know me a little better. Initially I was such a stranger to him that he cried and wouldn’t come to me. That killed me.

But these interactions also sharpened my focus on the job training at hand and stoked the furnace inside me. Every day, from the minute I woke up in the morning until I put my head on the pillow at night, my mental regimen was driven by two tasks—getting healthy and becoming the best basketball player in the NBA. Also driving me was some anger. Scratch that. Down in the belly of the beast, I was one pissed-off combatant. So I used that anger, allowing it to just add more fuel to the fire.

The chatter inside my head was mean punching-bag stuff: how
they
(everyone who failed to believe in me and said I’d never be nuthin’ from the start) thought I was done, ready to be put out to pasture after an injury, undervalued, a meteoric rise only to crash and burn. I thought of a powerhouse like Penny Hardaway, my former teammate, who had contributed so much to basketball but whose career was slowed by injuries and multiple surgeries, how I was not going to let that happen to me and how I would show
them
because I was going to come back stronger and tougher, an even better, more formidable player than before.

With that blasting on the turntable in my brain, I put myself back on the radar and invited Jerry Colangelo, then the director of USA Basketball, and a few others who along with him would be making the decision for the Olympic roster, to come see me work out. They saw that I was healthy. Reports surfaced later that after the tryout the concern was no longer about whether my body and my heart were back but if I had my head on the way it would need to be.

To answer that question, I had two close friends, Chris Paul and LeBron James, come up to Chicago to put me through the paces. L.B. and I had grown up in the league together since our rookie years. With his infectious spirit and unstoppable positive energy, C.P. had been as close to me as a brother since he had come to the NBA in 2005. Both had played at the level where Olympic-caliber basketball was by now; both knew me before I had become superstar D-Wade. Their assessment mattered to me. After several sessions, they both acknowledged how hard I’d been working. They not only personally gave me a nod of approval that bolstered my confidence even more but also let it be known to others that I was needed in Beijing.

With that I cleared the hurdle to compete in the 2008 Olympics in China. The true tests would come during competition. But in the meantime I couldn’t let any negative thinking impair my game. At a less mature point in time, I might have been bothered by not starting; I might have thought too much about not having enough minutes in the game to show that I was on the same level as the best. None of that was in my thinking.

When I arrived in Beijing, I took stock of all the athletes and realized that most everybody had been a star in their field for most of their lives. Everybody had been dreaming gold forever. On the one hand, the reality was daunting to be among so many gifted athletes who had been pushing their training to their upper limits, too. On the other hand, I was inspired and humbled to be there in whatever capacity I could help my team and my country. The first thing I did was to ask our coach, Mike Krzyzewski, to tell me how he saw my role.