Cupples releases book based on his life experiences, connections with faith

Doug Cupples challenged himself to write for two hours before bed every night. All he had to go by were his memories, his life experiences and how his relationship with God played a part in those 30 stories of personal ups and downs and in-betweens. Months later, Cupples compiled his writings into a self-published book called “Faith is my F-Bomb.”

This was a first for Cupples, who considers himself more of a storyteller than a writer. Drawing inspiration from different points in his life, Cupples said he was encouraged by a life coach to put pen to paper, all the while thinking about the book’s overarching themes of mentorship and faith.

It didn’t take much convincing. At the start of the new year, Cupples hit the ground running and revisited events from as far back as his childhood to more than a week after he was elected to a seat on the Jasper County Board of Supervisors in 2016.

“I said, ‘You know what? I’m going to do it.’ Because the reality is: we say we want to do things and then we don’t do ‘em and we don’t do ‘em and we don’t do ‘em. And before long you’re 47 years old and you’ve not done a lot of the things you wanted to do,” Cupples said.

He examined each memory with a critical eye, searching for some sort of meaning or questioning how those experiences molded him into who he is today. Cupples said his coach helped him refine the smaller details and the structure of the book itself, like naming chapters after words beginning with F — like forfeit, fluke and favor.

Writing his book was a thrilling process for the now-self-published author, who feels it has helped him discover who he is by writing about his life. But for as enlightening as it was revisiting old memories, it was also just was challenging for Cupples.

Confronting and sharing past failures was no easy task. As was another particular passage in which Cupples recollects his feelings and details surrounding his daughter Bailey’s cancer diagnosis. The family found out about the leukemia 10 days after Cupples had been elected as a Jasper County Supervisor.

Cupples said his wife, Missy, practically lived at the hospital. She was a trooper, he said. The diagnosis, he added, put a lot of stress on his family, his marriage, his job and his income, among other things.

“It was a pretty rough time to say the least,” Cupples said. “But she came out on the flipside — that happens to be the name of that chapter … She got off of chemotherapy April 2 this year. She was two years cancer free as of March 3. It’s been a journey. We’re so thankful. She just got her blood test yesterday and she’s good to go.”

Other stories feature a conversation he has with his daughter Lexie, as well as an interesting boat trip with his son Cade. Cupples wrote about how he met his wife and how his parents’ divorce may have affected him.

Every experience and every memory and all the things that happen to people in their lives, he said, “are lessons to be learned.”

So what was the lesson gained when writing this particular book?

“What I learned was when you write stories about your life and you’re writing purposefully to try to help people, you really do discover who you are,” Cupples said.

Cupples will host a book signing of “Faith is my F-Bomb” at 6 p.m. Thursday at Discover Hope 517 Ministry. Cupples has agreed to donate $3 to the host organization for every copy of the book sold.

Contact Christopher Braunschweig at 641-792-3121 ext. 6560 or cbraunschweig@newtondailynews.com