Courtesy of Essence.com
On November 27, 2011, former NFL star Chris Draft married the love of his life, professional dancer LaKeasha Rutledge, in an intimate and beautiful wedding ceremony surrounded by loved ones. Exactly one month later, on December 27, his wife lost her brief battle with stage 4 lung cancer, and he sat by her side as she took her last breaths.
When we shared Draft’s heartbreaking story with you, the outpouring of support and well wishes was tremendous. Then came your questions. What can you do to help? How could this happen? A healthy, 38-year-old woman whom friends described as a “fitness nut,” Rutledge never smoked a day in her life. Her diagnosis came just a year before her death, and seemingly out of nowhere. Draft, who’s continuing his fight for a cure through their organization Team Draft, must now begin to heal. ESSENCE.com sat down with him to learn what the couple’s last year together was like, and how Draft’s Valentine would have wanted to be remembered.
ESSENCE.COM: Since your wife’s passing, you’ve shown such strength and shared so much of her life with the world. Why did you choose to share her story in this way?
CHRIS DRAFT:We put the pictures up [online] so people could really see the life in her, not just how she passed away. We want people to see that her faith allowed her to live before her diagnosis, and to continue to live with it, and find the joy in each day. Even when you get bad news, you have to find the joy in life, which is definitely not easy. Most of the pictures in the montage people have seen are from the past year. She was still enjoying her friends, and still enjoying her family. Yes, it was a little different with cancer being there, but at the same time, you find a way to enjoy it. That’s where you’re at, you know?