A phenom, a prodigy, a star -- there are lots of ways to describe the calibre of hockey player that Patrick O'Sullivan was at a young age.

But no matter how well he performed on the ice, O'Sullivan says that his father never believed it was "good enough."

"It didn’t matter if I had four, five goals in a game," he said.

O'Sullivan, now 30, bears the scars of years of physical and emotional abuse at the hands of his father in his new book "Breaking Away: A Harrowing True Story of Resilience, Courage and Triumph."

The former NHLer, who spent eight seasons in the league, was born in Toronto but grew up mostly in the U.S.

By age nine, O'Sullivan was already living the life of journeyman hockey player, changing towns and teams as his dad wore out his welcome.

But he says his father's horrifying treatment started before that, when he was of six or seven years old.

"I think he thought what he was doing was somehow going to make me better," O'Sullivan told CTV News Channel.

In his book, O'Sullivan describes some of the shocking cruelty he says was dished out by his father.

O'Sullivan says he was locked outside until morning. He was forced to run behind his dad's van, in full equipment after games. He says he was woken up in the middle of the night and ordered by his father to do "push-ups until my arms gave out…sit-ups until my stomach cramped."

"When I came off the ice after practice or a game, I never knew exactly what was next, but I knew it was going to be bad," O’Sullivan writes.

"I’d be looking at an hour or two or more of my father’s conditioning program, running the steps in the arena stands like a hamster on a treadmill or chasing after the van for two or three miles. If he didn’t think that was toughening me up, he’d slap me around. Every year he was ramping it up: slap in the face when I was eight; a slap with more force and a kick in the ass when I was nine; a punch when I was 10; a big right hook on my jaw and a kick in the gut or ribs until I was gasping when I was eleven, twelve and thirteen.

And O'Sullivan says he still feels the lingering effects of the abuse. He has an aversion to baked beans because of a gag-inducing incident he says he endured when he was eight.

O'Sullivan says he ate the dish, along with Spam, and threw it up, only to have his father force him to eat the vomit.

The smell of grass also brings up some repressed emotions. O'Sullivan told The Canadian Press that his father would beat him if he didn't mow the lawn to his standards.

"A lot of things around the game of hockey too, certain smells at the arena, stuff like that," he said.

"Kids that are abused, it doesn’t go away when they become adults."

His father was also a professional hockey player, spending time with the Winston-Salem Thunderbirds of the Atlantic Coast Hockey League.

But O'Sullivan, who now has two kids of his own, doesn't understand how his father rationalized the abuse.

"Having kids myself, I think that’s insane," O'Sullivan told CTV News Channel.

"That thinking that abusing your children is somehow acceptable or the right thing to do -- I don’t know how that goes through somebody's mind."

According to Sullivan, the abuse went on until he was 16, when one night he contacted police.

"The older I got, the more I started to realized how crazy and how wrong the whole thing was, and I just had to finally get to the point where I felt comfortable doing something about it and physically being strong enough to defend myself," he said.

His father initially fled police, but was arrested and charged after he tried to watch his son play in the Ontario Hockey League. O'Sullivan was granted a restraining order and his father spent time in jail.

O'Sullivan said that his mother and many others never realized the extent of the abuse.

"Unfortunately, when you're dealing with kids, often times they don’t know how bad it really is," he said.

"It was kind of a situation where people thought they kind of knew what was going on, but didn't think it was their business -- one of those things where 'It is not happening under my roof so I'm not going to worry about it.'"

Part of the research for his book involved speaking to the coaches, friends and family -- the people who saw first-hand how he was raised.

"Some people wouldn't acknowledge it at all, some people thought my father was a good guy, and then there was of course the other group of people who wished they would’ve done more," said O'Sullivan.

O'Sullivan went on to be named the OHL and CHL rookie of the year in 2002, after scoring 92 points in 68 games with the Mississauga Ice Dogs. He spent another three seasons with the team, and remains the franchise's all-time leader in games, goals, assists and points.

Despite being projected as top pick in 2003 NHL Entry Draft, O'Sullivan was drafted in the second round by the Minnesota Wild.

O'Sullivan went on to score 161 points in 334 games in the NHL.

Even with the restraining order, O'Sullivan said that his father would still try to watch his games.

"I would always look around the arena and look in certain spots because I knew where he was going to be, so that was difficult," he said.

When his hockey career winded down two years ago, O'Sullivan went to therapy and says he is now "doing pretty well."

"I have a great wife and two kids that I love more than anything, and I'm one of the lucky ones to go through what I did and still have a normal life," he said.

He hopes that his book can spread the message about what happens to some kids after they've left the rink.

"I think it’s a story that is far too common — maybe not as extreme as mine — but there’s a lot of people, parents or even coaches that think they’re going to be the difference-maker in their kid making it, whether it sports or music or whatever," O’Sullivan told The Canadian Press.

"You do a lot more harm than you do good."

With files from The Canadian Press