Help Brad make a better life for his girls

On Mother's day, 2010, Brad's wife Karen and mother of three very young daughters, Kayla, Ashley and Page passed away unexpectedly and suddenly. It has been a desperate struggle for this family since, in all respects. The family needs a change in fortune.

Brad is working hard to create ways to raise money and to free himself up so that he can work again. But he needs our help to get there. Kayla, amazingly, has already been accepted into EGGS despite this being a Tier 5 application. So this remains an option which Brad is keen on and continues to investigate.

Nevertheless the main focus here is do what we can to help Brad and his girls break out of their current situation and move forward in a way that they can control their own destinies.

I have known Brad since I was 8. We were both boys at Dilworth Boys Building School and whilst at the School we were both always in close proximity to each other; being in the same class, same School House and same Sports House.

Dilworth is a very special school for boys from single parent families in straightened circumstances. As such typically the boys who attend Dilworth don’t have a lot of family to support them, and so this in itself contributed to the problems Brad faced after Karen passed.

Brad has wished many times that there was a School, like Dilworth, for girls. Dilworth receives no payment, other than the family benefit, from the single parents who have their boys placed at the School. Brad and his girls have been in straightened circumstances and so would have been an ideal fit for such a School. Likewise, 9 years ago there was far less support for Widowers (ie man who has been widowed), so both of these were “hard pills to swallow”.

Brad and I were both very good at Sports and Brad was prominent within the class as a sort of cultural leader; music, skate boarding and so forth. We were both on the School 4x100 metres relay team and achieved success there in New Zealand competition. Brad also excelled at Softball and Soccer. Brad was everyone’s good mate and was very well liked – he was one of those guys that everyone is attracted to.

On leaving Dilworth Brad did well. He bought a house at a young age and also launched and maintained a successful business; Sharp Signs. Always a loyal man, Brad hired school mates from Dilworth into the business. Brad was always there for his mates.

Brad then met Karen, fell in love with her and they started their life together. Karen was the sister of Brad's flatmate. She was an extreme ski instructor and had worked in Canada for 11 years. She was everything Brad could have hoped for in a partner. Brad says, “the chemistry was just right.”

Before Brad met Karen he had purchased an old run down villa in Mangawhai and began work on it to create an upmarket and beautiful Golf Lodge. This was his next project after Sharp Signs. During August of 2006 Brad and Karen decided to move to Mangawhai, with Karen expecting their first child to be born. Then two years later, Brad sold Sharp Signs and was now “all in” on the Golf Lodge.

Things were going extremely well and Brad's hard work over many years was paying off. As always work and life was not without its challenges but as always Brad came through. An exciting future was before him and Karen and their growing family.

On 11th September 2006, their first child was born, a girl the named Kayla. Things continued to go well and before long Karen became pregnant again and on 16th September 2007 Ashely was born.

What an amazing thing - two beautiful daughters, Karen, the Golf Lodge and living in Mangawhai, just amazing.

Not long after, Karen fell pregnant again with Page, a third girl born on 17th December 2008. Three beautiful daughters! They were so happy; three perfect daughters. The Sharp family were becoming well known at the Warkworth Birthing Centre, “an amazing facility,” Brad says.

And then, on Mother’s day 2010, with no warning and no indication, Karen passed away from a brain aneurism, and Brad was on his own with three girls. The suddenness of it was excruciating for all.

Brad had been at a friend’s 40th birthday in Auckland and was about to leave Auckland to ensure he was back for Mother’s day with Karen and the girls. He received the phone call which would “turn his world upside down.”

Brad was told that Karen had been found unconscious and not breathing. First response was their working on Karen trying to resuscitate her.

Twenty minutes later Brad received a second phone call where he was informed that Karen had passed away.

Brad was driving back to Mangawhai at the time; driving too fast no doubt …in tears and heaving as he tried to get back to Karen and the girls. As you would expect he was having an inner conversation. How could this have happened? Three girls 1.5, 2.5 and 3.5 years old not having a Mum anymore? What do I do? How am I going to handle this? Why me? What about me? It was a drive that none of us ever want to take.

Brad arrived at Mangawhai and was immediately faced with trying to explain to Kayla, Ashley and Page about what had just happened. Kayla actually witnessed the event and was old enough to understand what was going on. Family and friends arrived over the next few days and stayed for a week and then suddenly they were all gone, and Brad and the girls were on their own. Brad was still raw inside going through the stages of grief and spent a lot of time crying each day, which went on for weeks and months. The first day, with everyone gone was the loneliest day of Brad’s life, and the most daunting. Reality hit hard.

As one would expect as the days and weeks followed one after the other it was hard, very hard. Trying to make sense of it was impossible. Brad says, “even now after 9 years I still struggle with it.” Trying to cope and still having to face up to each day; school lunches, looking after the girls; life just became day after day of trying to manage grief, yet still function. Losing Karen became very hard for Brad. Very few of us would be able to understand what he must have gone through.

I saw him at times in this period; and it was clear to see that Brad was struggling, depressed and lonely. As Brad said, he suddenly was thrown in at the “deep end” having to on his own raise three girls and trying to understand what this role entailed, for Brad, was incredibly difficult. From my own perspective, I just cannot imagine how Brad coped.

And so, this was made all the more complicated with the growing Golf Lodge “situation.” It had been nearing completion and was about to open for business. That all fell away as a new life enfolded itself upon Brad and his girls – they were simply in survival mode – and there was no time for the Lodge.

As Brad said to me; “It is the hardest job in the world raising children by oneself. I find it very hard mentally and physically. My whole life I have worked as the hunter/gatherer, so to speak, and now I could not even think about that and everything was directed inwards to looking after my girls. I lost any concept of self, finding that any time I did turn my thoughts to me, created feelings of depression.”

The rest of the world carried on whilst the Sharp family focussed on their own micro-world.

And so to the Lodge. Financially everything was starting to “go to custard”. Brad and the girls had to move in to the Lodge because they could no longer afford to rent plus pay the Lodge mortgage. The Golf Lodge, according to plan, needed to have been producing money long before now and it was not even ready for opening. Brad’s dreams and aspirations were shattered.

A couple of years passed and suddenly there was no money to pay the mortgage for the Lodge.

Brad said, “I contacted the bank and said I have no more money and asked if I could sell the lodge to not only get their money back plus the equity I held in the property. Valued at 1.2 million the housing market, unfortunately, conspired to crash outside of Auckland at the time the Lodge was on the market. Things went from very bad to even worse. It was dire and the stress of that along with everything else was hard to cope with. I noted, not for the first time over the last few years, that life has a way of beating you down.”

The bank ended up accepting an offer of $580k for the house and all of Brad's equity was gone! He lost the lodge that he had worked so hard to create and with that “hope”. Brad and the girls were at rock bottom.

And so since then it has continued to be difficult. Brad is very lonely; he has not been in a position to date. The girls have not been ready to accept, Brad dating or anything like that. The one time he did try to go on a date he had to leave after the 26th call he had received from the girls. For the last 9+ years it has been all for the girls with no time for himself nor being able to earn an income; being forced onto a benefit.

It has been a very long 9 years.

Brad’s concern now is very much focused on two things:

1. Getting his girls into a good Schooling situation

2. Freeing himself up to seek opportunities to create a good income and get off the benefit

Brad has a history of overcoming challenges and succeeding, so any support we can provide to the Sharps now will no doubt bring great reward for this family.

Brad's eldest daughter, Kayla, has been accepted into Epsom House EGGS boarding next year. One of the best schools to go to academically. Brad says “The best news I have had in 9 years.” So this is an option that Brad and Kayla are very keen on.