Oscar: An Accident Waiting to Happen (10 page)

------Original Message------

From: Oscar Pistorius

To: Trish Taylor

To: Samantha Taylor

Subject: Oscar

Sent: Jul 18, 2012 4:34pm

To Sam and the Taylor Family. I’m not really sure how to start this email, I’m not to sure what to write and how much to say so I guess I’ll say everything and be honest. After all the pain and humiliation I have caused you I guess I owe you that. I guess as this email goes on there is a lot I’ve thought about saying and all
I ask is that you try not to judge me but understand where I’m coming from. Some of this are [sic] things I haven’t told anyone and never thought I would. I still am not too sure how I’m going to voice some of my emotions and thoughts as many of them I have denied to myself many times. The problem with personal truth is that as clean as the slate you want to portray may be, there are often very dark areas that haunt you and some days manage to influence decision one makes. Most of my Adult life I have had moments that I sabotage the good that I have and to find myself back in the comfort of instability that I had become accustomed too. This email is not easy to write as many of these things I have been denying to myself for years.

People’s first impressions of [me] most often go one of 2 ways. It’s [either] what they have heard through friends of friends or what they have read or seen in the media. Both having positive and negative connotations mostly due to my personal actions. In the past when someone took me for the positives I was all to [sic] quick to allow myself to be content. When the negatives came up I put my guard up and tried to defend myself. In my career which was the one I have become accustomed to defending this came naturally. Although I often get sick of it it is something that I have realised that I’ll have to deal with. On a personal front when people have judged me negatively, I haven’t been able to be all so comfortable. Partly due to me not wanting to believe the truth at times, often because I didn’t feel I had to explain myself or my actions as I hadn’t had anyone to answer too [sic] from a young age and other times because I saw people’s perceptions of me made up already.

Sam I know you are uncomfortable with my history with Jenna. I have pretty much lost you already and don’t have much to loose [sic] so I may as well be honest with you and probably for the first time in many years open with myself. I know some of this is going to make you angry and more upset but I hope it allows you to understand me like I haven’t allowed someone to before. This is my most personal shit so I beg of you to respect my honesty if nothing else. Everyone has their darkness, yet everyone has a
burning desire, a need to find that one person that understands them and their thoughts without saying a word. There [sic] emotion without a flinch. Jenna and I started dating when I was 20, I met her and fell for her pretty quickly. I had grown up with her cousins and on the weekends that my brother, sister and I were able to see my dad, my mom being friends with Jenna’s mom and aunt would take Jenna to church. It was surprising that we had only met some years after my mom had passed but this immediately drew me closer to her. I don’t talk about my mom and dad to anyone as it wasn’t a pretty picture, not the one that I became accustomed to portraying as a kid anyway. The fact that my mom had known Jenna meant a lot to me and was one of the base notes of our relationship, which maybe kept it together long after it should have ended. Jenna and I started dating and in the beginning everything seemed like it was perfect. She understood me and was willing to support me no matter what. When I got back from Beijing in 2008 we started having problems, I found myself struggling to make sense of the things around me. Some of it went to my head and looking back, I regret a lot of the decisions I ended up making. I often found myself having to explain situations I was in – many highs and under a lot of pressure many lows. I started feeling more and more isolated as I believed no matter how much I would explain things and how understanding Jenna was that she didn’t fully understand. In retrospect I was struggling to grasp it so how could I expect her to. I had to deal with a lot of travelling and found myself wondering [sic] away from her. I met a girl later that year and in my mind I made myself believe that this was what I had been looking for. I fell quickly and I fell fast for this girl but within a couple of weeks I realised that I had been so desperate to chase something that wasn’t there that I had made myself believe it was. Jenna and I got back together. After months of trying to make it work I realised that I had broken her trust and called things off. A couple of weeks later I found what I thought I had been looking for but it didn’t take long for me to realise that it was my desperation and loneliness coming back to get me. I had all the money a 23-year-old could spend and as fast as I was making it I
was spending it. Trying to buy happiness, surrounded by fake friends, who although as time went on I knew were just there for the good – made me feel better about myself. In 2009 I crashed my boat on the Vaal whilst I was trying to get some time away. I ended up in a coma for 6 days after being airlifted. It breaks my heart when people joke about it and me being pissed because I can remember everything about that night like it just happened and I thought I was going to die. My nose was peeled open and it felt like mince was coming out of my face. My eye had moved into my head as I had broken my jaw and eye socket and I remember hearing the water trickling into the boat as it sank and the evening was dead quiet whilst it was taking me away. I called my brother and sister and thanked them for always staying by my side and called Jenna even though we hadn’t spoken in weeks to apologise for being a lost dumb fuck and playing with her heart. It wasn’t my intention to hurt her but like I have so many times by being selfish done so. When I woke up in Milpark [Hospital] Jenna had slept next to my bed for 6 days, she was in the middle of varsity exams and had her books all over the room. When I recovered I thought I had been blessed and given a second chance. 2 months later I left for the European season and struggled because I had lost so much shape. I found myself once again isolated and unable to deal with the pressure. Sponsors dropped me and the pressure just built up again. As I was trying to explain and get advice from people close to me I realised who my friends where. Out of anger and desperation I pushed a lot of people away, finding it easier to isolate myself than to try and get them to understand. Jenna and I tried on and off and in time I got more and more frustrated. We were not meant to be yet I felt that although she didn’t fully understand me I believe she understood me enough. I would get upset when I didn’t feel like she got the highs and lows that I had become accustomed to and in fairness I didn’t take the time to always communicate with her what I was going through as I could see she didn’t believe in us anymore and didn’t have the energy too [sic]. When we argued I would sometimes just shut off and find a way of justifying it in my head, either I would focus on my running
or try to find someone else. She started living her own life in the beginning of 2011. It was difficult and made me crave the understanding and support even more. When I found it too difficult I would just ignore her. There was a night when I had an important race the next day when she went out with a friend of hers who I wasn’t fond of and when she hadn’t replied to my
SMS
’s I called her before midnight to see if she was safe. Her phone rang and after trying for a couple of hours her friend answered and she was drunk and said a something’s [sic] and that changed a lot between us. It broke my trust and for the first time I felt what it was like being on the other end. It broke whatever we had left. Neither of us trusted each other and in a way it hardened me a little more. I was convinced that that was the end. When I got back to South Africa we went out and it wasn’t the same. Part of me felt guilty for the way I had been and she always reminded me about how I had wronged her. It become [sic] the focal point in our relationship. When we were together it was better but the chemistry was lost. I wanted to be friends with her as she had been there with me through a lot. At times I wanted to believe it was still there Sam, I’m sorry as I know you are hurting, I don’t want to tell you what I think it is you want to hear but [I would rather tell] the truth. When I met you I was drawn in. I remember coming to your house and you opening the door and seeing your smile. I didn’t know what to expect but for the first time in a long time I had my guard up. It was comforting knowing that you had come out of something recently too as I didn’t want to rush into anything like I had always just done in the past. From the beginning it just seemed to be too good to be true. I was worried that it was me making it all up in my head again. Wanting to believe, wanting to find the perfect girl that I had realised doesn’t exist. You have an amazing amazing family. I find myself wondering what that must be like when I’m around you all. Sometimes it comforts me and other times I feel a little jealous of you. Sure Kerrie [sic] wears your clothes and your dad is away from you at times but the love and respect you all try and show each other is true love. Something I learnt recently is that you can’t be perfect but you can try and be perfect for someone
else. I think I learnt it more or less when I started having feelings for you. I’m not used to having to think and consider others feelings. At times I thought I had to be selfish to be where I am and looking back now being in the wrong relationship I guess I did. At your birthday party Ash said to me, “look after my friend Oz.” and I remember thinking that I wasn’t ready for that. I wanted to get to know you, I didn’t trust myself with my feelings. As time played on I found myself getting drawn in by you. The weeks we spent together felt so right. I love how we just know what the other is feeling and how you [are] so thoughtful of those around you. I wish I had been more thoughtful of you and less hung up about my goals and career at times. I found myself leaving for Europe [to train for the Olympics] and not sure whether to allow someone into my life that could allow me to risk all I had worked for this year. I didn’t want to have to risk waiting up the night before a race to put my heart on the line. At some point you found your way into my heart as much as I tried to deny it. Being caught up in my own world I didn’t take into consideration how supportive you were being. I become [sic] reliant on your support without giving you the commitment which should’ve accompanied it and I can’t tell you how much regret I have for that. When I was in NY I went to drinks with Anastasia [the Russian] before we met other friends for dinner. We are just friends, nothing more. I haven’t spoken to her in weeks. Once again in my mind I justified it. It was selfish and I’m not proud of it Sam and I could deny it that I did, but I’ll always know the truth. I should never have done that and I know it would’ve broken me if the roles were reversed. I don’t want to have any secrets or lies with you, even if it’s too late. I’m sorry for the humiliation it caused you and your family. A year or two ago I stopped telling those close to me what’s going on. I would disappear to Europe between May and September to my other life, my other friends, my other commitments and pressure. In many ways when I have to leave for Europe I’ve had to harden myself. It seems like no one understands that at times. I invited Jenna over last year for a week to Gemona but after the night she went out with her friend I cancelled the trip because I didn’t want
to be emotionally venerable [vulnerable] before the world champs. Later when we were trying to patch things up she said one of her biggest difficulties is that I sometimes promised to invite her to Europe and never did. I didn’t want to invite you to London if I wasn’t sure and couldn’t deliver. I find it hard to explain what I do to people what I go through here. I don’t take photos anymore because when I show them to people they don’t describe the emotions I had at the time and I end up feeling more isolated than before. It’s hard when I come home because sometimes I feel disconnected with my friends and family and when I come back I realise their lives have gone on without me. I felt a little of that the past weeks with you. I’m sorry that I wasn’t supportive of your work and that I didn’t take the time to listen to you and hear what opportunities had arisen. I tried to be supportive but it felt to me like your life was moving on without me, that familiar feeling setting in as I had started becoming reliant on you. It wasn’t fair on you and made me realise what you meant to me. The way you wanted that to come across was through commitment and love and affirmation. Unfortunately the way I showed it was through my insecurities – jealousy and showed doubt when you were working. Sometimes I find it easier to believe that there is darkness in others like I know is in me. That was not fair on you as you have never given me a reason to mistrust you and have only been EVERYTHING I could ever want. This is so hard to write because I don’t deserve you Sam. When I invited you I was so excited to tell you because I knew we had had some hard days behind us. I had asked Peet to do everything he could last week to find you a ticket. What I thought would be good news came too late and when I didn’t get the response that I was hoping for it confused and broke me. I was so engulfed in my own happenings the past couple of weeks that I had taken little notice that you had started loosing [sic] faith in me. I’ve been so scared to open up to anyone before the Olympics because I know I act hard but I’m emotionally soft. I realised that you mean the world to me and that running there means nothing to me if I cannot share those memories with the people I love most. I have got a lot to learn, but I do know what is
right and wrong and taking you for granted was been one of saddest moments of my life.

I don’t even feel like going to London now that you won’t be there with me. I don’t know how I let it go this far but I’ll never forgive myself for not looking after your heart that you placed in my hands. I’m still learning lessons. Many of them I probably wouldn’t have had to learn if I just thought more about others, those I love and those that are important for me. I’m sorry for the pain I have cause [sic] you and your family. I had the most amazing amazing women [sic] that I have found myself thinking about pretty much from the moment I wake up till the time I close my eyes. It took me a long time to be honest with myself and to truly fall in love with you Sam. At least I know it wasn’t forced, it wasn’t a figment of my imagination. I invited you to London because I know that without me knowing, you have had my heart in your hands for months and never once let it go. I’ve portrayed an image of being dishonest and selfishness once again. This time it was true. How could I be honest with you if I wasn’t able to be honest with myself. You bring out the best in me, you inspire and support me the way I need. I know no one’s perfect but you have loved me perfectly. I at times made myself believe it wasn’t there because I was scared, I didn’t trust myself or I thought it was going to influence me negatively being vulnerable. Well here I am being as open as I can be. Vulnerable in telling you that my life that I have now is better than it’s ever been with you in it. I’m sorry you can’t say the same right now but I know if you gave me one more chance, open your heart up just a little that I could show you that I am the guy you believe I can be for you. I’m sorry I have let you all down. Oscar