Companions in Courage (15 page)

“I really admire her,” Gagliano says. “We worked her hard. She wanted to work and to be good. When she came to practice I
saw a young lady who had a heart of gold.”

Further help came from Van Phillips, a single-amputee athlete who designs artificial limbs for athletes. He worked with Aimee
to fit a pair of legs called “flex-sprint2s,” made of extra-light carbon graphite that lock into the stumps just below the
knees. Her feet, made of the same material, would hit the ground on just the toes. For traction, Aimee attached the spikes
of running shoes onto the tips of her feet.

In April, her first meet with the new legs was the Duke Invitational. She lowered her personal best in the 100 to 16.7 seconds.
A few weeks later at Villanova, Aimee confronted a different kind of challenge. The thick silicone sleeves that held her new
sprint legs to the stump had slipped off because she was sweating. She begged Gagliano to scratch her from the 200. “What
if one of my legs flies off during the deuce? The crowd would freak out,” she pleaded.

She parodies her coach’s response by tilting her mouth sideways and, in her toughest voice, saying, “Ya gotta run da deuce.
Ya can’t be afraida da deuce! If your leg flies off during the deuce, hey, it flies off. So what! You fall down. Put it back
on. Then you finish the race. What the hell.”

Privately, Gags always knew her goals and her desire to succeed. He often says, “You know, she’s not like everyone else.”
That she isn’t. She is the only disabled athlete to compete in NCAA Division I track and field. She competed in the 1996 Paralympics
in Atlanta and holds records for the 100-meter and the long jump. She has been awarded the D.C. sports-woman of the year award
for an athlete with a physical disability. She graduated with a degree in history and diplomacy from the Georgetown School
of Foreign Service.

Aimee’s life took a fascinating turn when she met Heather Mills, a competitive skier who had lost a leg in an accident. Mills
was wearing a specially designed cosmetic leg, and Aimee’s first response was, “I’ve got to have those.” Until then, Aimee’s
legs were rudimentary leg-shaped foam pads. She would spray-paint them to match her skin.

She could hardly contain herself when the technicians brought out her new legs. The lifelike silicone skin and the streamlined
fit were almost real. Because she was getting a complete set, she could create a body design of her liking. She chose to be
five foot nine with a seven shoe size and French toenails. That night Aimee painted her toenails for the first time, went
out shopping, did a fashion shoot, and danced the night away.

Aimee’s new legs also launched a modeling career. Two years ago she debuted in a fashion show for designer Alexander McQueen,
and a year later modeled for Anne Klein, appearing in ads in
Vogue
and
Elle
magazines. “I didn’t need these legs to feel complete, because I felt that before,” she says. “One reason I want to model
is to do projects that challenge people’s idea of beauty and the myth that disabled people are less capable, less interesting.
That we’re asexual. I want to expose people to disability as something that they can’t pity or fear or closet, but something
that they accept and maybe want to emulate.”

While modeling and preparing for the 2000 Paralympics, Aimee cofounded HOPE (Helping Other People Excel), a nonprofit organization
that helps disabled athletes receive training and a chance to compete. She hopes to establish an organization to help amputees
get artificial limbs, as well as to speak to women, host a kid’s TV show, and on and on and on. As her recognition grows,
so does the influence of her courage.

“Beauty,” she says, “is when people radiate that they like themselves. You wouldn’t want praise for having blue eyes, since
you had nothing to do with it. Not having legs is a lot like having blue eyes. I’m not amazing.”

S
am Paneno had found his place, his role. He had transferred to the University of California at Davis from Hawaii to play on
the Aggies Division II football team, becoming the starting running back in 1999. He couldn’t know his career would not last
long.

The second game of the season, against Western Oregon, showcased his skills all too briefly. He scored twice and piled up
more than 100 yards through regulation time, but the scoreboard showed a 33–33 tie at the end of four quarters.

The Aggies got the ball in overtime, and the first play from scrimmage was a routine call, one that had worked well all game.
Paneno took the handoff and ran to the left side. It was his last carry.

As the tacklers unpiled and blockers left the scene, Sam lay injured on the field, holding his knee. It was a dislocated knee,
something to which football fans have become all too accustomed. But this was different. The dislocation had severely damaged
the artery behind the knee and caused a disruption of blood flow to the lower leg and foot. Irreversible damage had been done
to the muscles and nerves. Sam Paneno’s life was about to change forever.

Several surgeries allowed the doctors to restore the flow of blood to the lower leg, but further efforts to preserve the leg
and foot were to no avail. Sam Paneno’s leg was amputated below the knee.

The loss of the limb devastated his family and teammates. Sam, however, stayed centered. Family and faith brought Sam to a
place in life that allowed him to accept and understand the way destiny sometimes unfolds.

The incident drew much attention from the national press, and I was touched when I read the meaningful quotes attributed to
this young athlete. The best way I know to share the courageous attitude that contributed to his recovery is to share Sam’s
statements:

“It’s good to go out that way. I felt I played hard, so to go out of my football career like that, it doesn’t bug me that
much.”

“I have no bitter feelings. I got a chance to play football for a long time. A lot of people don’t get that opportunity.”

“Life is too short to worry about football.”

“Why should I complain? They have good prosthetics.”

“From day one, I’ve looked at it in the aspect of ‘every day is a new day,’ and I have already gotten on with my life.”

“The media experience has been very nice. I’d like to get the message that it’s not that big a deal.”

“I’m actually fortunate in that I thought they were going to cut me off at the knee and I’ve got inches and inches of leg
left.”

“My family and God have been through a lot together. With so much love from God and everybody else, there is no way I couldn’t
look at this in a positive attitude because I’ve gotten so much support.”

“I don’t see this injury as hindering my recreational sports.”

I know I go back to this theme quite often, but my hat’s off to parents who work so hard to instill the values that this young
man expresses. Sometimes the winning and losing become the highlights of a story, at the expense of the hearts of the warriors
who play the game.

That is what touches us so deeply. Sam Paneno lost a leg, but not hope. I have gained a Companion in Courage.

I
n 1990, at the age of twenty-seven, Diane Golden announced her retirement from the world of competitive skiing.

In 1982, while a sophomore at Dartmouth College, she won her first world title in competitive disabled racing. In all, she
won nineteen U.S. and ten World disabled skiing titles. She was once clocked at sixty-five miles an hour—on one ski. In the
1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, Diane won the gold medal in the women’s disabled giant slalom, a demonstration event. She
led an impressive U.S. Disabled Ski Team to eighty-five medals against eighteen other countries in thirteen disabled skiing
classifications.

She was the best, and she was extremely proud of the voice her success gave her with sports fans and sponsors to view disabled
athletes as just that—athletes. In 1986 she won the U.S. Ski Association’s Beck Award, given to the best American racer in
international skiing.
Ski Racing
magazine named her 1988 U.S. Female Alpine Skier of the Year, and the U.S. Olympic Committee named her Female Skier of the
Year. Not disabled skier. Flat-out, Skier of the Year. In October 1997 she was inducted into the Women’s Sports Hall of Fame.

Diane’s story of overcoming adversity is without question one that would inspire anyone who grapples with the meaning of life.
Diane’s athletic excellence, love of life, perky sense of humor, physical vulnerability, and journey through the highlights
of victory and depths of despair have given us a deeply personal look at what it takes to overcome. One of her pet peeves
is the use of the word “courageous” when talking about disabled athletes, but there is no other word that can describe the
manner in which she played the cards she was dealt.

Diane’s parents owned a vacation house in the Canon Mountain ski area close to their home near Boston. At five years old she
was on skis, and her exceptional ability was soon obvious. At twelve, walking through the snow to her house, her right leg
gave out. The diagnosis: bone cancer. Her leg was amputated above the knee.

“Even before surgery, my first question was, ‘Will I be able to ski?’ When they said yes, I figured it wouldn’t be too bad,”
Diane says.

Her accomplishments were an expression of her spirit.

“All of us on the U.S. Disabled Ski Team were missing one body part or another. For some it was a leg or two, others an arm.
Some were paraplegic. We all became quite casual about body parts. We knew that the fullness of our lives had little to do
with the form of our bodies and had a great deal to do with the spirit.”

This attitude was tested again on New Year’s Eve in 1992. A biopsy was performed on her right breast. She had cancer again
and would require a mastectomy. Again, her sense of humor and positive attitude prevailed. “Considering what I had seen, losing
a breast wasn’t such a big deal. Sure, I’d be a little lopsided, but so what?”

A week later the doctor recommended a biopsy on the left breast because of some concerns in the report. “It’s probably nothing,”
he said, using the same words as the first test. “Just to make sure.” Diane grew to hate those words. The results came back
positive, and a double mastectomy was scheduled.

Soon after that surgery, during an annual gynecological exam, the doctors recommended a standard surgical procedure for what
they said “was probably nothing,” and she awoke to, “We had to remove your uterus.” How much is too much?

I include Diane as a Companion in Courage for many reasons, one of which includes my understanding of the dark place the mind
can go when our physical well-being is threatened. Diane remembers, “For the first time the bravado of ‘Hey, a couple of breasts,
and they weren’t that big to begin with …’ wasn’t working.”

I know that feeling. I remember after my concussion in Buffalo how the pep talks to myself didn’t work. My frustration intensified.
Life seemed to be unraveling and the fears were increasing. I couldn’t sleep at night and my mind became a very scary place
to go. For Diane it was depression and a suicide attempt. She wrote:

Do they laugh

that they ripped her into half

of who she was before?

A gross game

of tug-of-war. They made sport until

she danced

No more and laughed no more

and dreamed no more Oh, the Great Gods’

tug-of-war

Whatever for?

When I write of Diane’s courage, my words cannot always describe the full pain of the battle. Her therapy, her falling in
love and marrying Steve Brosnihan, her dog Midnight Sun, and her return to the ski slopes are all stories within themselves.
But the profound result of her loving and being loved have brought Diane to a place where she states, “I’m as happy as I’ve
ever been. And this right now is more important—even in the eyes of those who care about me—than whatever sadness might someday
come.”

Most of us do not live as if death has called on us so often. It makes a difference in how each day is lived. To live with
love creates a boundary of protection from the vulnerability of despair.

It’s all downhill from there.

I
never thought of a vitamin pill as some sort of miracle drug. But then I heard about Zoe Koplowitz and now I’m a believer.

The funny thing is, taking the pill isn’t what helped Zoe. Not being able to—that’s what made all the difference.

At twenty-five, Zoe Koplowitz was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Physical frailties changed and complicated her life,
but, like so many who struggle with this crippling disease, she carried on as best she could. A success in business, she was
co-owner of a trucking company by the time she reached her mid-forties. She led a busy life but not one filled with physical
activity. Vitamin therapy and a pair of crutches helped her through her daily routine.

All of the vitamins she took surely did some good. But one day in 1988, the vitamin pill she could
not
take forced her to reexamine her life. What happened? She choked on a vitamin pill.

Anger and helplessness overwhelmed her. So did disgust with her physical limitations. Enough is enough. She chose at that
moment to conquer twenty years of subjugation by a disease. Where could she even begin to climb such a mountain? Believe it
or not, Zoe chose the most outrageous goal possible. She began to train for the marathon.

This was not your typical training program. She did not need a watch for timing the mile breaks. Nor was speed of the essence
or the purpose.

In 1991, Zoe ran in her first marathon—the biggest and best of them all, the New York City Marathon. What a thrill. While
she finished last, some twenty-seven hours after the start, she brought courage and determination across the finish line.
And it wasn’t even the finish line anymore—it had been dismantled and cleaned up hours earlier.