By MADD
“So I don’t drive drunk…But what do I do about my friends who do?”
The question came at the NFL’s Rookie Symposium from a player ready to enter the NFL. But what was more interesting was to whom he was asking the question.
They seem like an odd couple– Delanie Walker, an eighth-year tight end now for the Tennessee Titans, and Nina Walker, a national board member for Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD). In fact, Delanie got laughs at the beginning of their presentation by mentioning that there was no relation between the two despite their shared last name; although, no one in the room had been making that mistake.
But what they had in common was a shared tragedy and a shared purpose.
They called her Peaches, because she was so sweet…
In February 2013, Delanie was on top of the world. After he and the 49ers had won the NFC title game, they were headed to the Super Bowl in New Orleans. And he knew he had to get tickets for his auntie Alice and uncle Bryan. They were his best fans, he says, coming to see every game since college.
When Delanie shares his story, he always mentions that he just knew his auntie as “Peaches,” who got that nickname because she was the youngest sister and she was just so sweet. “I didn’t even know her name was Alice until I was 13,” he says.
They watched him play in the Super Bowl, and the last time Delanie saw them was hugging them goodbye at the 49ers friends and family post-Super Bowl party.
Less than 24 hours after the big game, football turned out to be the furthest thing from Delanie’s mind. He’d woken up the next morning to family members calling him, saying “something’s happened to Peaches; she isn’t answering her phone.” He thought that, after a long night, they were probably sleeping in, or their cell battery had died.
What he found out later was at about 5:30 a.m., Alice and Bryan were inside their car on the shoulder of Interstate 10 outside New Orleans when an alleged drunk driver slammed into the back of their 2012 Nissan Altima at more than 100 MPH. The Altima burst into flames and burned for two hours. The alleged drunk driver woke up in jail, with no memory of the crash.
Alice and Bryan Young left behind eight children.
Player Health & Safety panelists from left to right former players Dwight Hollier, Irving Fryar, Tennessee Titan Delanie Walker, and former player James Thrash speak to the rookies at the 2013 Rookie Symposium.
Now, Delanie is working to open his fellow players’ eyes, and the nation’s eyes, to the high cost of drunk driving. “This happens so much and now it’s really hit home for me. I just want to make people more aware through my story.”
Each year, in the U.S., there are 10,000 stories like Peaches’ story, with someone being killed every 53 minutes in a drunk driving crash. And there are about 315,000 people injured in drunk driving crashes every year.
Which takes us back to the question…
“So I don’t drink and drive… But what do I do about my friends who do?”
Nina Walker, the MADD volunteer and national board member presenting with Delanie in this session of the Rookie Symposium, asks the question “How many of you have stupid friends?” A laugh works its way through the room as almost every hand, including Nina’s, goes into the air. Nina, too, knows the toll of drunk driving, having lost her daughter, Ginger, in a drunk driving crash. Nina told the room that it’s natural to have stupid friends, but emphasizes one of the themes of the Rookie Symposium – that simply by getting there, players have proven themselves to be exceptional and different.
Delanie then speaks up. He says you have to do anything you can to get those keys, even saying that if a guy’s bigger than you, wait until his back is turned and put him in a chokehold. Since this is a solution that would probably work better for Delanie than Nina, MADD has a few tips for how to intervene with someone who is about to make the potentially life-changing or life-ending decision to drive drunk:
- Be as non-confrontational as possible. Delanie talks about how he suggests “let’s go in style” by ordering a town car or limo.
- Suggest alternate ways of getting to their destination — a cab, a non drinking driver, public transportation. Delanie talks about a car service he uses. He also emphasizes that almost all teams have a similar program and that the executives want players to use the service “because they use it themselves.”
- Remember that the person you are talking to is impaired — talk a bit more slowly and explain things more fully than if you were speaking to a sober person.
- Explain that you don’t want them to drive because you care and you don’t want them to hurt themselves or others.
- Suggest that they sleep over if possible.
- Enlist a friend or teammate to help you or to act as moral support — it’s more difficult to say “no” to two (or three or four) people than one.
- If possible, get the person’s keys. It is far easier to persuade the potential driver when you hold this leverage. Ideally, this would happen without chokeholds involved – one tactic is to simply say “let me see those.”
- If all else fails, call law enforcement. It’s better to have a friend arrested than injured or killed.
Above all, both Delanie and Nina emphasize that the safest plan is always make a plan before you go out. Once you go out and start drinking, it’s too late to make a good decision.
Delanie drives this home at the end.
“I’ve sat where you are sitting. I remember sitting here through these presentations. And I remember thinking, that can’t happen to me. I’m special. I’m different. And I’m now the one here telling you, it can happen to you.”
For more information about MADD’s efforts to stop drunk driving, serve victims and prevent underage drinking, visit http://www.madd.org/.
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