Melissa Stockwell’s 22-month-old son, Dallas, might be under the impression that his mother’s artificial leg has superpowers.
“One of my favorite moments is that recently he started seeing my prosthetic legs around and he says, ‘Momma! Momma!’ ” the Army veteran and Chicago resident said. “He understands that those are mine and I have a special leg. And when I put on one leg, he says, ‘Momma, run!’ and sometimes he’ll say, ‘Run fast!’ “
“With the Olympics being on [TV recently], he sees what I’m doing, and whether he understands it right now, I don’t know, but I think there’s something in his little mind that is comprehending what I’m going to do.”
What Stockwell is going to do, if all goes as planned, is bring home a medal from the Rio Paralympics. The 36-year-old will need the help of “Little Leg,” as she affectionately calls her prosthetic, if she is to earn a spot on the podium in the triathlon Sunday.
“It can be a tragic story, but I feel like I’ve turned the tragedy into triumph and just being able to overcome anything that comes your way that you don’t really expect,” said Stockwell, who lives in Ukrainian Village with her husband, Brian Tolsma, and their son. “I really wouldn’t have it any other way. It’s been almost 13 years and I’m a proud above-the-knee amputee, I’m a proud American, I’m a proud Team USA athlete and I just feel very lucky about how my life has turned out.”
If not for what happened April 13, 2004, you might never know Stockwell’s name, much less that of her artificial limb.
If things had been different, she likely would have gone on to serve a distinguished but largely anonymous military career. Not that she or anyone who puts on the uniform craves recognition.
Instead, Stockwell, then a second lieutenant in the Army, lost her left leg while deployed in Iraq. She and her unit were driving from an airport to the Green Zone in Baghdad when their vehicle was struck by a roadside bomb.
Luck might have kept her injuries from being more serious, but determination is what kept her spirits up through the numerous surgeries that followed, in addition to inspiring her Paralympic aspirations.
“Obviously, losing my leg was a traumatic event, but I had the power to choose how I went on from there,” the three-time paratriathlon world champion said. “So I chose to accept the loss of my leg, to be resilient through it and to make my life what I wanted it to be.”
This year marks Stockwell’s second Paralympic berth. In 2008, she became the first Iraq War veteran to qualify for the Paralympics; she competed in swimming and carried the American flag in the closing ceremony. Her profile extends into the commercial universe, too.
She counts 13 corporate sponsors among her supporters and will gladly rave about how much she loves Smuckers products (“We are very much a family that eats many Uncrustables”). Stockwell also has appeared in a handful of ads that have aired since the beginning of August, was featured in a documentary called “Warrior Champions” and twice has been nominated for an ESPY award.
Stockwell’s day job involves helping to fit amputees with prosthetics, and she co-founded the nonprofit Dare2tri Paratriathlon Club in Chicago to help athletes with disabilities acclimate to the sport. For those closest to her, however, Stockwell’s celebrity profile is far from her finest quality.
“She never has an attitude of ‘I’m better than everybody else,’ ” said Keri Serota, Stockwell’s friend and one of Dare2tri’s co-founders. “She always has time for anybody and everybody, whether it’s somebody getting on a hand cycle for the very first time or learning to run on a prosthetic after losing a limb, or a youth athlete who has never swam before and is petrified to get in the water, I think Melissa has patience and kindness and genuinely wants to see them succeed. And so I think passing on her love of sport, whether it’s recreationally or competitively, Melissa gives every one of those people the same amount of respect, time and attention and encourages them.”
Although she occasionally has to leave the city to train, most of her preparation takes place in Chicago (“The athletic community is just so incredibly supportive; I honestly don’t know if I would want to train anywhere else”). Every so often, curious onlookers ask for the story behind Little Leg.
“Kids especially are a lot more uninhibited,” Serota said. “Even little kids will look at her leg and say ‘What’s that?’ or ‘What happened?’ or ‘Where did your leg go?’ and Melissa’s really good at explaining it to all ages. She offers to let them touch it and takes that fear away.
“At the adult level, Melissa really shares her story. … She doesn’t focus so much on losing her leg. She focuses more on what she has done since then and what she can still do.”
Competing in Rio presents its own set of well-documented challenges, from the city’s high crime rate to potential water-borne illnesses. Yet she’s far from concerned.
“We’ll just be smart about it,” said Tolsma, who will be in Rio to cheer on his wife. “We’re bringing bug spray. We’re going to bring fake wallets so if we get held up, we’ll give them our fake wallet with a $20 bill inside. Whatever sponsor is hosting us down there is going to have staff to make sure we’re not drifting into bad neighborhoods.
“And the water, it is what it is. She went down for a test event last year and came back with a stomach bug. Was it related to that? I don’t know, but it was hard for four days. She’s worked so hard that she’s not gonna let a little stomach bug get in the way.”
At this point in time, it’s Stockwell whose extensive training has earned her the right to represent her country on the world stage. Someday, it might be an athlete from Dare2tri. Or a fellow veteran. Or someone who simply found her story inspiring. Maybe even her son.
“Hopefully he’ll be proud of me and want to go and tell his friends that his mom with one leg did this and this, and here’s her medals from the Paralympics,” Stockwell said. “I joke around that he’s going to think that all mothers have one leg and he’ll be surprised that his friends’ moms have two legs. I think he’ll grow up seeing other athletes with physical disabilities doing these amazing things, he’ll see that they’re unstoppable even with their physical disability and he’ll realize that he can be unstoppable, too.”
ALL KINDS OF SPEED
The Paralympics begin Wednesday in Rio with the opening ceremony and conclude Sept. 18. NBC Sports will feature 70 hours of coverage, and TeamUSA.org will live-stream some events.
The Paralympic triathlon, in which Ukrainian Village resident and Iraq War veteran Melissa Stockwell is a strong contender for a medal, takes place Sunday in Rio de Janeiro. Competitors must complete a 750-meter swim, 20-kilometer bike ride and 5-kilometer run.
In addition to demanding that she maximize her speed in those three disciplines, paratriathlon requires skill in another aspect.
“I do not swim with a prosthetic,” Stockwell said. “[But] I have a biking-specific prosthetic, and I have a running-specific prosthetic. I switch my legs after my bike and after I run, so that transition time is a big part of the race.”
THE DIGIT
52 days
That’s how many days it took Melissa Stockwell to take her first steps on a prosthetic limb after losing her left leg while serving with the Army in Iraq in 2004. She later was awarded the Purple Heart and a bronze star for her service.
@redeyesportschi | chsosa@redeyechicago.com
