In a Heartbeat

IN A HEARTBEAT



We were on our way out to breakfast. He was trudging down the street in nothing but a T-shirt and shorts, his arms wrapped in a sad knot, his breath visible in the cold. We glanced at him, briefly. Then we did what comes too easily to all of us. To be honest - gut-punch honest - we kept on driving and passed him by.

But, as we left him behind, a thought tugged at Leigh Anne’s consciousness.

“Turn around,” Leigh Anne said.

With that, our lives changed in a heartbeat.

If you are among the millions of people who saw the movie The Blind Side, or read the book it was based on, then you know what happened. You know how a wealthy suburban couple pulled over and spoke to young, rootless Michael Oher. How Michael was a ward of the state, his mother an addict, his father murdered. How he ran away from 20 foster homes and passed through 11 schools before he met us. How he eventually became a second son to us and earned a football scholarship to the University of Mississippi, where he made the Chancellor’s Honor Roll. How he then went on to stardom in the National Football League. How an Academy Award - nominated film was made about our family, and how Sandra Bullock won her first Oscar for her portrayal of Leigh Anne.

You probably think you know everything about us, our whole story. Actually, you only know part of it. Don’t get us wrong. Our friend Michael Lewis, the author of The Blind Side, wrote a wonderful book that deserved to be a bestseller. (Most of his books sell big. We haven’t read all of them, but if you see him, tell him we did.) Our friend Sandra Bullock is a brilliant actress and her star turn in the movie, all nerve and bluntness, was perfect. (Leigh Anne doesn’t actually wear skirts that tight, but it’s a minor point.) Compared to our real lives, though, the book and movie were just sketches.

For instance, people ask all the time: “Is Leigh Anne Tuohy really like that?”

Our friends are quick to answer: “It’s worse. The movie could only get an hour and a half of her in.”

The truth is, childbirth is easier to explain than our story. So in this book we’d like to introduce our family properly, tell you how we saw events through our own eyes, and deliver our message in our own voices. It’s a message about giving. We often say that our son Michael gave us much more than we gave him. That confuses people: how is it possible that a homeless kid could give anything to wealthy parents who already had two perfect children? It’s possible because in every exchange with Michael, we came out on the better end. We gave him a home - and he gave us back a stronger and more centered family. We gave him advice and support - and he gave us back a deeper awareness of the world.

Excerpted from the book IN A HEARTBEAT: Sharing the Power of Cheerful Giving by Leigh Anne Tuohy and Sean Tuohy with Sally Jenkins, published in July by Henry Holt and Company, LLC. Copyright (c) 2010 by Leigh Anne Tuohy and Sean Tuohy. All rights reserved.