Gisele Bündchen had something to tell Tom Brady and didn’t say it out loud.
According to the book “Brady: An American Story and the Price of Greatness”, by author Lars Anderson, the model handed him a handwritten letter just after the 2018 Super Bowl, when the Patriots lost to the Eagles. In it, she explained that their marriage wasn’t working.
She asked for specific things: for him to be present at home, without his phone in his hand or his mind on the latest game. More help with the kids. Being able to sleep in a few days a week. And more room for her own career. Anderson sums up the heart of the message this way: she needed “more from him, more of his time, more of his attention, more of his heart”.
A former teammate of Brady’s says in the book that Gisele was a bigger international star than he was and was tired of living according to Tom’s schedule, while she had left her career to care for her family.
The couple went to therapy, and Brady put the letter in a drawer. He reread it on nights of reflection as a reminder to care for his marriage with the same tenacity as his work.
They stayed together for about four more years, but a series of Brady’s broken promises (related to sports) ultimately destroyed the model’s patience. The divorce seemed to come as a surprise, but behind closed doors, it never was.
