Teddy Pendergrass was on top of the world throughout the 70’s and 80’s. He was widely known as the R&B singer who women threw their panties at whenever he performed.

A true sex symbol in the eyes of the public…then it all came crashing down March 18, 1982, when the brakes on his Rolls-Royce failed, causing the car to hit a metal guardrail, cross into oncoming traffic, and ram into a tree. Once the smoke settled, Pendergrass suffered a broken neck, a crushed spinal cord, and damage to vital nerves. He was unconscious for eight days. Once he’d regained consciousness, he learned that he was paralyzed and would be confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life.

Teddy P.’s Confession & Death Request To His Then Wife

So it got to a point where Pendergrass couldn’t handle his new condition and was ready to unfortunately desiring to commit suicide. In his 1998 autobiography, Truly Blessed, he revealed he tried very hard to convince his then-wife, Karen (pictured above), to do him one last favor.

Teddy confessed that he’d asked Karen to to kill him by giving him an overdose of sleeping pills, seemingly because he couldn’t get the pills inside of his mouth himself, following his car accident.

What Happened Next – His Turning Point & Mock Funeral

Of course his wife denied his request and Teddy P. continued to suffered severe depression and insomnia for years after the accident.

Pendergrass said “We cried and decided that wouldn’t be the best thing to do.” He credited Karen with helping him “through a lot of hard times.”

There was a turning point though. His road to recovery began when he tried out his voice by singing along with a coffee commercial on TV. Although he had been warned by doctors that he might not ever be able to sing again, Pendergrass realized that his voice was still in tact. “Nothing ever sounded as sweet to my ears as my version of that silly damn jingle,” he wrote in Truly Blessed. Pendergrass sought help from a quadriplegic therapist, who helped him exorcize thoughts of suicide through the staging of a mock funeral.

The Rumors

In addition to his disability, Pendergrass had to defend himself against rumors that his accident had been caused by excessive alcohol and drug use. Although Philadelphia police cited Pendergrass for reckless driving, they found no evidence that alcohol or drugs had contributed to the crash. Another rumor circulated that Pendergrass’ passenger at the time of the accident, Tenika Watson, was actually a transgender he was dating but that was 100% FALSE. He’d just offered her a ride home and had never met Tenika prior to that night. That rumor was finally laid to rest once and for all in 2014 when the transgender woman, Tenika Watson, gave a very thorough, detail by detail account of what happened that night and she proved from in her own words that she never knew Teddy P. and that he never knew she was a transgender.

When Life Throws Us Curveballs…

Oftentimes when life throws us curve balls, as long as we’re still breathing after being hit by them, we always know things could be worse. It’s all about standing on the outside of our situation and asking ourselves a simple question: ‘What is it that I have?’ Once we’re clear on that, we then understand our starting point and can ultimately figure out how to take a step from point A to point B and beyond. Teddy P. did just that. He eventually dug his way out of a depression that almost took his life and he went on to continue his life’s work. Job well done Teddy P….rest well.

Reminisce with us to these classic Teddy P. videos!