Why this Chiefs player credits Andy Reid with helping him find peace

Clyde Edwards-Helaire saved his best friend’s life in 2018, but his heroics came with both a mental and physical cost.
As football players at LSU, Edwards-Helaire and Jared Small were victims of an armed robbery that resulted in the death of the man who tried to rob them.
While on “The Pivot Podcast” recently, Edwards-Helaire opened up about the shooting and how Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid has supported him in the years since.
In December 2018, Small, who was Edwards-Helaire’s teammate and roommate at the time, was selling a PlayStation. Edwards-Helaire had a bad feeling when Small told him he was leaving to meet the buyer.
The meeting was happening near where Edwards-Helaire grew up, and Edwards-Helaire asked to come along.
Unbeknownst to Edwards-Helaire, the selling price hadn’t been negotiated yet. Once at the meeting site, Small and the buyer, 18 year-old Kobe Johnson, went back and forth on the price.
That’s when Edwards-Helaire became a little worried. With a mom who was in the Army and a step dad who was an ex-Marine and narcotics police officer, he was taught to always be on his toes.
“Next thing I see is a gun towards Jared’s head. I mean my only reaction was either I’m about to watch my best friend lose his life or do something about it,” he said.
Edwards-Helaire was armed and shot Johnson. On the podcast, Edwards-Helaire said he’d been trained on how to use a firearm.
“It was Jared or him. I honestly hate how it went, especially learning just more things about the individual. … I wished it’d never went that way. I just wanted the best for everybody in that situation. The way I kind of looked at Jared felt like that was probably going to be my last time seeing him,” he said.
Ryan Clark, one of the hosts, asked Edwards-Helaire to describe how he felt in that moment.
“The very first thing was I don’t want my best friend dying. The second is, if that happens to him, what’s stopping the gun coming towards me after the fact and it being two of us gone for no reason,” he said.
The Baton Rouge district attorney said the shooting was justifiable after reviewing the evidence, according to the Daily Advertiser.
Edwards-Helaire thinks of Johnson “more than some might think.” He said Johnson is the first name he prays for.
“I think about him and his family more than anything,” he said.
Ahead of the 2020 NFL draft, every team during the draft process asked Edwards-Helaire about the shooting and his trauma, he said. But he was shocked when he met with the Chiefs and Reid didn’t know about the shooting. Edwards-Helaire then shared the story with Reid.
“(Then Reid) gave me one of the biggest hugs that I’d had in a while,” the running back said on “The Pivot Podcast.”
Throughout his NFL career, Edwards-Helaire’s PTSD from the shooting and cyclic vomiting syndrome led to him missing practice while he suffered from episodes that often resulted in him vomiting.
He said on the podcast that he was doing fine in training camp this offseason until the final week when he suffered from a severe episode. He couldn’t stop vomiting and was taken to the hospital for four or five days. Listed as 207 pounds, his weight dropped to 180.
When Edwards-Helaire joined a Chiefs meeting via FaceTime from the hospital, Reid said hello and was surprised to see him in a hospital bed.
“(Reid) was like, ‘I didn’t know it was that bad every time that they were telling me you were sick. I’m just thinking you’re probably at the crib, tucked in bed, do whatever, and you’re just sick,’” he said. “He didn’t think it was to the extent of ‘Clyde has to get pretty much hospitalized and revived every time he has one of these episodes, and he comes back in the building, smiling, cracking jokes and all these other things like nothing ever happened.’”
From that moment on, Reid wanted to get his running back as much help as he could. He wanted Edwards-Helaire to take time away from playing to get better.
Edwards-Helaire said Reid told him, “You’re 25 years old, you’re gonna have to live the rest of your life with this, so why not get the help that you need now, get all the questions answered so you can be able to enjoy your life, not only for the rest of your NFL career, but life after? What’s the point of us playing this game and being on this platform if we can’t do the things that’s necessary, like (to) help people who need help?”
Before the start of the season, the running back was placed on the reserve/non-football injury list. He was taken off that last month but has yet to be activated for a game.
“And that’s when I just took a step back and really appreciated Coach Reid as the man and the father and just stature of a person that he is. NIFL was a hard thing because, like I was telling him, the only time I felt myself was when I’m playing. So you’re about to put me in a situation to where I can’t feel like myself. But you need to learn how to be able to cope with it and be yourself away from this.”
Edwards-Helaire said he is now feeling “a lot better, mentally and physically than I have the past four years” with the right therapy and medication the past few months and that he’s doing what he can to return to the football field.
“I think the biggest thing was me, was just finding peace within myself, and I think I found it,” he said.
The Chiefs play the Buffalo Bills Sunday at 2:25 p.m. MST.