Paul Teutul - The Build: Designing My Life of Choppers, Family, and Faith

I t remains humorous to me that after ten years of appearing on a reality television show, the question I am most often asked, by far, is whether what happened on our show was, well, real.

But then again, the dynamic that made American Chopper a global phenomenon did appear unreal, prompting the two to three million viewers tuning in on Monday nights to hopeeven pray, for somethat the volatile relationship between my father and me was too bad to be true.

The premise of the show was simple: a father and son work together to build custom motorcycles. American Chopper worked because the bikes and our relationship were jaw dropping. For 10 seasons and 233 one-hour episodes, my father and I were often a relational train wreck that proved equally as difficult to turn away from as to watch.

And, yes, it was real. In fact, I believe that because of my relationship with my father, American Chopper not only was the most real reality show, but it was the first true reality show that didnt involve surviving on an island.

The arguments, shouting matches, door slamming, and wall punching were no different from my life growing up with my father, working for him in the steel business, and then building custom bikes together. The only difference once American Chopper started was that there were cameras around recording our blowups for the world to see.

I have learned that there are many people with stories similar to minepeople who are part of, or are directly impacted by, an abnormal relationship. I have nodded in understanding while listening to fans of our show describe their relationships gone bad. I have even talked with one man who might have had a worse relationship with his father than I did with mine. I had not imagined that possible.

Those conversations are one reason I decided to write this book. I have been married to Rachael for seven years now, and our strong relationship is one my parents did not have. Our son, Hudson, is coming up on three years old, and our father-son dynamic will be the complete opposite of what I grew up with. I have faith that will be the casebecause of my faith. And when the opportunity arose to write a book about choppers, my family, and my faith, I said, Ive got to do this.

Seeing my relationship with my father play out on a reality show for ten years was difficult because our society tends to keep such problems hidden. It has been difficult to detail in this book my bad experiences with my father because he is my dad, and I love him, and I have long desired to have a normal relationship with him.

But I kept it real on American Chopper, and I am keeping it real in this book because I know there are too many others who will nod in understanding as they read my story. Although I have learned that I cannot make my father love me back no matter what I do, God loves me unconditionally, and from the overflow of His love, I can break the generational curse that has marred the Teutul family.

I am not great with dates, but Ill never forget September 28, 2008. Thats the day my father fired me. Getting fired seemed devastating at the time, but it turned out to be one of the best things that could have happened to me.

I was less than a week shy of my thirty-fourth birthday when my father, with cameras rolling, fired me from Orange County Choppers. I had grown up under the same roof as my father. I had worked for him for ten years in the steel business. We had built bikes together for almost another decade, with the previous six years marked by the celebrity and contention that came from filming American Chopper in our upstate New York shop.

The day he fired me began a process that allowed me to come out from under the oppressive environment I had always known; I matured mentally and spiritually and flourished creatively. Until then, I had not realized how negative the dynamic with my father was, or how much and for how long he had attempted to control me. We had spent every day together, at work and outside work. It was like an unhealthy marriage.

My father had separated from my mom in 1997, after twenty-five years of marriage and four kids. But until I got fired, there was no separation from my father. I had never imagined how much good could come from something that, at the time, hurt so bad.

Im forty-two as I write this book, and all my life I have wanted more from my relationship with my father. But I just dont know if he is capable of giving more. My father is a product of his upbringing. We all are, I suppose, somewhat by nature and the rest by choice.

My parents had been separated for five years when we filmed the pilot for American Chopper, so little is known about my mom publicly. But with my father, it takes only one episode, if that much, to peg him for what he is: loud, strong willed, highly opinionated, and very much my way or the highway.

I have a lot of compassion for my father because he did not grow up with good role models. His parents argued constantly in their home, and he had a horrible relationship with his mother. Hes told me how he did not like his mother, a heavy drinker, because of how bad she treated his father in public. As a result, he did not have a nurturing relationship with her.