From Hockey Night in Canada’s Scott Oake, a raw and honest memoir about his son’s struggle with opioid use and how he turned a father’s worst nightmare into a second chance for others battling addiction.

A father’s love. A devastating drug crisis. A stirring call to action.

When veteran broadcaster Scott Oake first held his infant son, Bruce, in his arms, he never imagined that Bruce would become a statistic in the losing battle to opioid abuse.

In those early days, Scott, a new father, watched Bruce with awe, marveling at the potential of his funny, charismatic boy. As Bruce got older, though, he struggled to fit in at school and began showing signs of having ADHD, including a streak of impulsiveness that often got him into trouble. Scott and his wife, Anne, did their best to support him, and for a time, he found community and belonging in boxing and local rap battles. But when Bruce was pulled into a world of drugs and gangs, Scott and Anne experienced a crash course in the reality of loving someone battling substance use disorder.

Then one quiet day in 2011, Scott got the phone call that every parent dreads: Bruce had accidentally overdosed. At just twenty-five, Scott’s vibrant, creative, first-born son was gone forever.

It was a loss that could have broken a man, a marriage, a family—but Scott, Anne, and their younger son, Darcy, instead turned the worst day of their lives into a way to help the thousands of Canadians struggling with addiction. After nearly a decade of fundraising and battling red tape and political machinations they launched the Bruce Oake Recovery Centre, a free, revolutionary treatment centre staffed by addicts and alcoholics in recovery.

For the Love of a Son is the story of a father’s unconditional love for his son. Above all, it’s the story of a young man who never got to grow up and a family who gives others the chance to find their way home.

Scott Oake is a Gemini Award–winning sportscaster for CBC Sports, Sportsnet, and Hockey Night in Canada. Raised in Sydney, Nova Scotia, he began his broadcasting career at Memorial University’s campus radio station before going on to work with CBC for five decades. Oake has covered Canada’s biggest sports moments, including the Olympics, Commonwealth Games, CFL football, in addition his long standing role as part of Hockey Night in Canada. He is included on the roll of honour of the Manitoba Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association and has been appointed a Member of the Order of Manitoba.

Scott Oake's profile page

“A heartbreaking journey into every parent's worst nightmare. Scott Oake does us all a public service by unravelling the misconceptions around addiction and recovery. Poignant, and at times, maddening, For the Love of a Son is ultimately a testament to the bonds of family and the unconditional love of a father and husband.”
— MELLISSA FUNG, author of Between Good and Evil and the #1 bestseller Under an Afghan Sky

“There is a reason Scott is our best at inquisition. Humour, compassion, and the right words. Here is the end of all that his beloved son Bruce was. It’s also a beginning.”
— RON MACLEAN, Hockey Night in Canada

“This is a story of rare courage and resilience, but above all this is a story of a family’s love for their son and brother and their love for all those families facing the horror of addiction.”
— MARK J. CHIPMAN, Executive Chairman and Governor, Winnipeg Jets

“A gifted communicator, Scott Oake shares the account of a father, son, and family who turn the depths of loss to drug addiction into an unstoppable force for change and recovery.”
— ERIN DAVIS, media personality and author of the bestseller Mourning Has Broken: Love, Loss and Reclaiming Joy

“A moving and heart-rending personal story of a family struggling through addiction and searching for treatment—searching for hope—for their son and brother Bruce.”
— GARY DOER, former Premier of Manitoba

“Scott Oake offers graphic insight about his son’s tragic and ultimately fatal journey into a world of drug addiction, a world that all our brothers and sisters—Indigenous and non-Indigenous—can relate to and through which many have suffered great personal loss . . . the Oake family are dynamic and proactive in response.”
— JIM BEAR, Former Chief of Brokenhead Ojibway Nation