Sean O’hair stands out on the PGA Tour due to his unique sense of perspective. Rather than placing blame or playing victim, O’Hair always adopts an open and objective stance when responding to situations or issues on his course.
O’hair has amassed over $24.5 million during 17 seasons on the PGA Tour despite encountering many difficulties.
Tough Love Childhood
Nowadays, preteens and teenagers often narrate tales of their wrongdoings while boasting about how they managed to avoid the consequences they deserved. Many children can do so due to the type of parenting they receive – typically, tough love is used as one strategy that includes discipline and punishment.
Tough love often takes the form of physical violence, humiliation, and other abuses shown to lead to lasting damage. Maia Szalavitz’s book Help at Any Cost details how such methods have been utilized at boot camps and “scared straight”-type treatment environments with horrific outcomes and limited regulatory oversight. An authoritarian parenting style using tough love has also been linked with lower self-esteem and mental health problems for children who experience it.
Sean O’Hair, now 29, was raised by his father Marc; however, they haven’t spoken for more than three years since Sean relocated from Florida to the Philadelphia suburbs with his wife Jackie and began competing on both the Cleveland Tour and Southwest-based Gateway Tour; ultimately qualifying to play on the PGA Tour and finishing as its rookie of the year.
Tough Love Family
Tough love may be necessary when someone is in danger of harming themselves or others, but be wary of going too far with this mode of intervention. Remember, tough love’s goal should be helping individuals become autonomous without becoming victims due to their actions.
Last month when Sean O’Hair won on the PGA Tour, his father, Marc, wasn’t there to celebrate. Instead, he remained bitterly silent as his son earned a paycheck from this tournament.
O’hair had come a long way since first playing mini-tours and trying to qualify for PGA Tour qualifying school. Although he worked tirelessly and gave it his best effort in every round he played, both physically and psychologically were significant obstacles he needed to overcome before reaching this point in his journey.
O’Hair had only known his in-laws until recently, but since then, he’s found another family with his wife, whom he credits with helping him through difficult times. Additionally, O’hair has grown more confident and set boundaries with his dad – even tattooing “Only God Can Judge Me” to symbolize his attitude about others’ opinions of himself.
Tough Love Golf
Every player on the PGA Tour has an extraordinary story of struggle and perseverance on their path to becoming champions. Still, few can rival Sean O’hair regarding physical and psychological toil endured on this path.
His father, Marc, sold off their share in a family shutter company so Sean could pursue golf professionally, eventually selling their shares back after four unsuccessful attempts at qualifying school. Sean attended Brophy College Preparatory School and David Leadbetter Golf Academy before beginning professional life on mini-tours. Since 1999 he had made regular attempts to enter PGA Tour Qualifying School but had only been successful once out of five shots.
But he kept working, and his hard work paid off. Today, he is one of the most popular players on the PGA Tour and an ever-present contender for major titles. Not a sex icon nor seen appearing in commercials for television commercials, he plays excellent golf – well deserving of his $12 million net worth as 43rd on FedEx Cup list and 60th in world rankings with four top-10 finishes at Mercedes-Benz Championship and AT
