Sharing an incredible life

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This article was published 28/11/2022 (1214 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Ten years of pain for a lifetime of justice.

Wade Davison and his younger brother Todd forged a tight bond while growing up. The Winnipeggers played hockey together from peewee to stints in the Western Hockey League with the Regina Pats and the Alberta Junior Hockey League with the Lloydminster Blazers. A shoulder injury Todd suffered after taking a hit wouldn’t heal and went untreated after several people suggested it was a typical hockey injury.

It was more than bumps and bruises, however. Todd was later diagnosed with synovial sarcoma — a malignant cancer that targets soft tissue and is often found near joints. He died from the disease in 2006 when he was 20 years old.

In 2009, three grief-filled years after Todd’s death, Wade, 24 at the time, decided he needed to share his brother’s story. He decided to write a book recounting Todd’s life and how he came to terms with his impending death.

“I witnessed Todd’s incredible life from right beside him and I knew how powerful and extraordinary it was,” Wade, now 37, told the Free Press Monday. “So I just wanted to share his journey with the world, and I knew that telling his story could bring inspiration, empowerment and healing to whoever read it.

“After he died, it just became my life mission and it was something I couldn’t ignore and it was just something deep within me that I needed to bring to the world. It was my way of doing his life justice.”

In April, Wade published His Last Shift: The Playbook of Todd Davison. Within a week, the 312-page book was Amazon’s No. 1 Best Seller in the hockey and sports biographies categories, and was quickly picked up by Indigo, which stocks it at 30 locations across Canada. Wade said countless fans and social-media personalities alike have reached out to him with positive feedback about the read.

“I think after he died there was a lot of processing of how we could carry on without his presence, but after witnessing what I saw of his extraordinary journey, it was just finding a way to compile these powerful stories and put them together in a form that people would appreciate,” Wade said.

“It was always one of those things where I knew I wanted to do it, but it takes a lot to actually put pen to paper.”

That would be one of the toughest parts of the process for Wade — starting. While the idea for the book came to him in 2009, it wasn’t until 2013 that he inked his first words.

He conceded the grieving process, coupled with the pressure that comes with writing another person’s life story, kept him from starting the project for a few years after Todd’s death. Wade also feared reliving some of the agonizing emotions that came from watching his brother’s battle.

Wade worked on the project while attending law school. Every few weekends, he would bang away at the keyboard, putting his brother’s life into words that would captivate a reader. In 2018, when he and his wife moved to San Diego, Wade was left without a licence to practise law in California for a few months, leaving him to write for upwards of five hours each morning.

“There would be times when I was writing and I would just start bawling. Tears would be flowing down. It was that type of process that happened so many times over,” he said.

“The book really allowed me to work through that.”

One of the key voices in the book was Dr. Peter MacDonald, a Winnipeg-based orthopedic surgeon, who conducted Todd’s biopsy and had the unenviable task of delivering the diagnosis to the Davison family.

“When (Wade) said he was going to write a book, I thought, ‘Well, that’s really nice,’ but I didn’t really have high expectations, knowing that it’s his first book,” MacDonald said. “But everybody I know who’s read the book was really astounded by how well he did in terms of portraying the situation and keeping the story so interesting that it’s difficult to put the book down.

“Just very analytical in terms of the events and how it relates to life in general. A lot of life lessons in there. Really, Wade did an outstanding job. I think he’s got a real talent there.”

MacDonald said he became close friends with Todd, Wade and their parents throughout the treatment process, something that rarely happens with his patients. Todd and one of MacDonald’s daughters were dates for his Grade 12 graduation from St. Paul’s High School.

“We grew to be fairly close throughout his treatment and, subsequently, when he passed. In this situation, we did become friends and it’s hard to turn your back on somebody in that situation when he’s reaching out for help and advice,” he

“(Todd) was mature beyond his years in terms of knowing what was happening and trying to make the most of it and wanting the leave a legacy of courage and strength and battling a terminal disease. He inspired a lot of people along the way.”

While the idea was overwhelmingly supported by friends and family, Wade admitted there were several moments where he questioned why he was writing and whether the book would be accepted by the masses the way he intended.

He said the hardest part of the process was writing Todd’s last month and the day he died.

“He was coaching the Winnipeg triple-A Thrashers at the time and there would be times where he’d wake up and we’d hear bones cracking and he would still find a way to get to the rink. There were so many emotionally-charged moments — so many painful moments — to relive. He died in front of us on Dec. 2… so some of those really intense stories… were some of the toughest ones to get through,” he said.

“My reward is just people reading the story, appreciating it and having their hearts touched by it.”

Maybe above all, the book hasn’t just changed the way some people value their playbook, but the way Wade plans to live the rest of his shifts.

“When he was diagnosed, I was just a teenager living a typical life in a lot of ways. After he died, I just realized: the little moments, you need to learn how to appreciate them more and find a way to do your best and realize there’s something you’re going on,” Wade said.

“We don’t know the mystery of life but at the end of it, there’s something powerful to living, and living fully with the moments and time you have.”

jfreysam@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @jfreysam