Secret's out, demons gone for Demers
The former Lightning general manager writes about a lifetime of illiteracy, and frees his lifelong anxiety.
By GARY SHELTON
Published November 10, 2005
It was one of the best days of his career, and Jacques Demers was terrified.
Demers was in charge. He had a new job, a new challenge and a new boss. It was Bloody Tuesday, the day in 1998 when Lightning owner Art Williams fired every Esposito in the building, but Demers had survived.
Two games into the season, and Demers was now general manager as well as coach. The man who had once driven a Coca-Cola truck was now steering a franchise.
For most of the afternoon, Demers smiled. He shook a lot of hands. He made a few promises.
Deep inside, where he kept his secrets, he was scared to death.
Was this it? Was this how everyone was going to find out? Was this the promotion that was going to expose him, embarrass him, drive him from the NHL?
Was this the move that was going to allow the world to find out that Demers could barely read or write?
Even now, there is a quake to Demers' voice when he talks of that day seven years ago and of all the fear that was hidden in a wounded soul. He is a charming man, Demers, but beneath it, there was the fear and anger felt by many illiterates.
"That was the closest I ever came to being caught," Demers says now. "I was so afraid of being caught. I knew I couldn't be a general manager, but if I said no to Art, he probably would have fired me, too.
"If people had found out I was illiterate, I would have been kicked out of the league. ..."
Demers exhales audibly, and it sounds as if another ghost of a memory has escaped from its hiding place. He has set his demons free. Together with former Canadiens beat writer Mario Leclerc, Demers has released a biography - Jacques Demers En Toutes Lettres (translated, it means: Jacques Demers From A to Z) - that talks about a lifetime struggle to hide his illiteracy.
Reading is difficult; he has improved, but even now he estimates it takes him three or four times as long to read a newspaper article as most people. Writing is almost impossible. "On a scale of 10," he said, "I'm about a six. Ten years ago, I was about a two."
For Demers, 61, the last week has been a liberating experience. Old friends, coaches, co-workers have called by the dozens to encourage him, to congratulate him. No one knew, not even his four children.
Demers says he has been liberated by the book. For most of his life, Demers admits, he has been ashamed by his own deception, afraid of exposure, frustrated by his inability.
"There has been such a relief to this for me," Demers said. "Nobody can fire me now. Nobody can take my coaching record away from me."
He was a success. Despite never playing in the NHL, Demers won two coach of the year awards and a Stanley Cup. Yet, he was always a different cut of coach, emotional, somehow fragile. He was one of those likable men who is easy to make laugh and difficult to make angry. Beneath his charm, however, were hidden wounds.
Demers' problems were born in the cycle of domestic abuse. He remembers watching as his father, Emile, beat his mother, Mignonne. Because of that, his mind wandered in school. Because his mind wandered, his grades were poor. Because his grades were poor, his father turned into more of a tyrant.
"He would tell me how stupid I was, how dumb, how I was never going to amount to anything," Demers said. "I forgive him for what he did to me, but I can never forgive him for what he did to my mother."
A lot of the time, Demers didn't do his schoolwork. Other times, he would talk his sister Claudette into doing it for him. Or his friends. Or his mother.
"You find ways to survive," Demers said.
That never changed. Even after he left school after the eighth grade, Demers was able to find ways around his illiteracy. At 16, Demers talked his way into his first driver's license. His mother had died of cancer at 41, his father was an alcoholic and he needed to go to work. He told all of that to employees, and they helped him pass his exam.
Later, Demers was able to talk his way into his United States license and into his green card. He became an expert at trickery.
If someone asked him to read something, he would pat his chest and proclaim that he had left his glasses somewhere else. When the document was in English, he would point out that he had grown up speaking French. When the document was in French, he would say he had spent too long in the United States. He would ask one of his secretaries - "angels," he calls them - to summarize the documents. With the Lightning, contracts went quickly to the desk of assistant Jay Feaster.
At restaurants, Demers would listen closely to the specials. Or he would ask a companion what he was going to order. Or he would look for the familiar letters of "filet mignon."
"If you can talk to people, it's fairly easy," he said. "You can hide. You can fool people."
For a long time, even Debbie Demers, now Jacques' wife, was fooled. The two of them were living together in St. Louis when Jacques saw a stack of unpaid bills and asked if she would pay them.
"No," she said. "I'm not your secretary."
"Then we're going to have a problem with the bills," Jacques said. He then told her he was unable to write a check.
Always, Demers was in fear of being discovered. Once, Demers admitted he was a million-to-one shot to end up as an NHL coach. Considering his background, that might have been conservative.
"I was in hell," Demers said. "I would get angrier and angrier. I had this weakness, and I couldn't tell anyone. I had to protect my identity. It's like I was two people: The Jacques Demers that everyone knew, and the guy who knew what he was covering up."
Even after he left the NHL, the anxiety lingered for Demers. Three years ago, Debbie suggested he visit a psychiatrist. Demers said no; he didn't believe in psychiatrists.
Eventually, however, he went, entering the back door so no one would see. And it helped. He began to take Paxil, a medicine designed to control anxiety disorder, and the calm began. He decided to let go of his secret, and it spread.
These, too, are good days for Demers. His book is outselling Harry Potter in Quebec. Literacy groups in Canada want him to be a spokesman. A few days ago, a former NHL star - Demers won't say who - told Demers that he, too, is illiterate.
"I wanted my head to be free," Demers said. "Now I'm free. I'm happy."