“What Do I Say to the World?” Oh God…I married Kasi Bennett for the benefit of my father—and for myself. Not out of love. Not out of a shared dream of forever. But out of something far more complicated: legacy, ambition, strategy… survival. And now, my father is gone…

“What Do I Say to the World?” Oh God…I married Kasi Bennett for the benefit of my father—and for myself. Not out of love. Not out of a shared dream of forever. But out of something far more complicated: legacy, ambition, strategy… survival. And now, my father is gone…

 

And with his death, everything I built on that foundation—the appearances, the partnership, the promises—feels like it’s crumbling around me. What do I say to the world now? How do I explain that I made a life decision not with my heart, but with my head? And worse: that I involved another human being in that calculation?

This isn’t easy to admit. I’ve worn the suit, played the part, smiled at cameras, convinced even myself at times that it could work. That maybe, in time, real love would grow. That comfort and compatibility would be enough. That the benefits—to both me and my father—justified the cost.

But no benefit is worth the weight of a lie lived daily. No gain is worth the quiet pain of knowing you didn’t choose with your whole heart.

Kasi is not the villain here. She is strong, beautiful, intelligent, and full of grace. She’s been more than I deserved under the circumstances. She showed up with sincerity, with loyalty. She built something she believed in—even if I didn’t fully believe with her.

To the world, I may seem ungrateful. Cold. Calculated. And maybe, in some ways, I have been. But I ask you to understand this: we are often products of our environments. My father believed in securing the future. In building alliances that made sense, that served a greater vision. I bought into that—maybe because I wanted to please him, maybe because I was scared of what choosing freely might cost me.

But now he’s gone, and the blueprint I followed no longer makes sense. I’m left with a reality I helped create, but no longer want to live in. I’m grieving—not only the loss of a parent, but the realization that I’ve been grieving my own truth for much longer.

What do I say to the world?

I say this: I made a choice I thought was right—for reasons that now feel hollow. I hurt someone I should have cherished honestly. And I’ve reached a point where pretending would be more cruel than confessing.

To Kasi: You deserved more. And I am sorry.

To the public: This is not a scandal. This is a reckoning.

I’m not proud of how I got here. But I want to live the rest of my life with intention, not obligation. With truth, not performance. And that starts by facing the world—and myself—with honesty, however painful it may be.

This is not the end of a love story. It’s the start of a truthful one—even if it begins alone.