Why Mom

Some stories are difficult to read because they are difficult to believe. This one is true.

Before Larry Alan Cole became a successful businessman, he was a little boy trying to survive a childhood filled with abuse, violence, poverty, fear, and loss.

By the time most children were learning what it meant to feel safe, Larry was learning how to stay alive. His childhood included sexual abuse, brutal beatings, near-death experiences, extreme poverty, family violence, and the terrifying night his mother was shot. As a teenager, he eventually escaped home and tried to build a life of his own.

But leaving did not mean the pain stayed behind.

The frightened and angry boy grew into a man still carrying the wounds of his past. Alcohol, drugs, broken relationships, dangerous choices, emotional breakdown, and relentless ambition became part of a life spent trying to outrun memories that never really went away.

Then, in 1987, everything changed.

Larry met Jesus Christ.

The hatred he had carried for decades began to give way to forgiveness. The past that had controlled him no longer had the final word. Years later, one of the clearest signs of that change came when Larry found himself caring for the very man whose violence had haunted him for years.

Why Mom: A True Story of Abuse, Survival, Forgiveness, and the Power of Love is more than a memoir about what happened to one little boy.

It is a story of survival, anger, addiction, success, brokenness, faith, forgiveness, and redemption.

Larry tells his story for people who have ever wondered whether the damage is too deep, the past is too painful, or they have gone too far to begin again.

His life offers one clear message:

Your past does not have to determine how your story ends.

The abuse didn't win.
The anger didn't win.
Love won.