Amputee Abroad: Solo Woman on a Single Leg

by Wendy Belk (United States of America)

A leap into the unknown Nicaragua

If there is one place to weep uncontrollably in an airport, it is at least in a first-class lounge. Lucky for me, first class flights to Nicaragua were marginally the same price as a bus ride to Milwaukee, so there I was: lounge in Houston, bawling my eyes out, pretending I was reading but lets face it, no one sobs over complimentary Us Weekly. Enroute to Central America for a surf camp (slightly researched. Whoops), where, presumably the warm water, empty waves, and video analysis would have me the next Kelly Slater is just under ten days. What I had NOT informed the camp (assuming, of course, there is a camp. Fingers crossed I have not inadvertently signed up to be an unwilling drug mule but I digress) was that I would be unlike any camp member before. Which, was largely why I was crying, uncontrollably...what if I can't do it? What if I injure myself again in the middle of the jungle and there is no air medivac this time? What if its a bunch of couples and....me...and I have to watch a dozen other people making out after my boyfriend of 2 years just left me? What if they don't even LET me surf? What if ultimately I keep trying and trying and trying and I am just incapable?? Two years prior and I would have NEVER even considered the idea. I could do anything. Kiteboard on my first try? Sorted. Summit 12,000 ft peak ON SNOWSHOES while hung over? Pssssh done twice. Snowboard, wakeboard, triathlon, ping pong bar champion, I mean, you name it- I could do it. With style and finesse and usually better than my compatriots but now....now stairs were challenging. As was pretty much everything else known to man. So how will I POSSIBLY learn to surf? The moment I walked out of the airport in Managua, Nicaragua, as luck would have it given my anxiety level of Code Bloody Red, I could not find my driver. I did, however, stumble across another couple going to the retreat same as I, and before I could even properly introduce myself I had a beer in hand and two friends I will probably have for life. Eventually, the driver found us, along with one of the surf instructors who was also arriving that day- a bespectacled Italian British stud who would later become part of the reason I come back to Nicaragua. But that's another story. I did learn to surf. In fact, I was standing on the first day. And there was only one couple at the camp...along with my roommate of whom I would go on many more adventures with and become the absolute bestest (its a word, calm down) of friends, 3 Swiss fellows that, in broken English, had me laughing until I cried, a Norwegian yoga instructor, Spanish group leader, British youngster surf instructor, and needless to say everything I assumed about the camp turned out to be exactly the opposite of what I experienced. I never felt helpless, but rather empowered. I was not the odd-man out but rather another person in a group of oddities and we bonded like nomad wanderers are apt to do. I came to Nicaragua lost and empty, used up and jaded, broken externally and out....and when I left one week later I felt unstoppable. One year prior to this trip, I was fitted with my first prosthetic. Fresh out of an accident in Mexico where, while off-road racing, we rolled our car and when I exited our accident, I was run over by a fellow competitor. Three days in hospital in Mexico on life support after being airlifted out of the desert, 2 botched surgeries, resuscitated upon being driven to the air medivac with my brother in the ambulance, 18 more surgeries while 2 months in hospital in California where I was recovering after a broken leg, two dislocated knees, 3 herniated discs in my neck plus multiple other injuries... and an amputated right leg. And now, here I was. Surfing. My broken body and my broken heart come alive again. And, 3 months later, I would be back. But again, that is another story.