Paralympic Champion Swimmer At WOTC: Don't Let Fear Stand In Your Way

Your life can change in a single moment, whether it's a simple moment, one of triumph or one of deep tragedy.

Mallory Weggemann (pictured) knows this firsthand. In January 2008, the then 18-year-old was getting epidural injections for back pain when, suddenly, she was no longer able to feel her legs.

"In that moment, everything I knew changed," Weggemann said at this week's 2016 Women of the Channel West event in Napa, Calif. She has been a paraplegic since, with no feeling below her belly button.

In that situation, Weggemann said she could either cave in to her fear, or choose to make the best of a bad situation. She told the Women of the Channel executives that everyone has that choice, both in life and in their career.

"No one can get around [fear]. But, we also always have a choice … When we have the courage and bravery to lean into our fears, that is the difference between reaching our full potential and always settling for a little bit less," Weggemann said. "We all have that choice."

Weggemann got that choice when the Paralympic trials for the U.S. swimming team for the 2008 Beijing Olympics came to her home state of Minnesota. It was a snowy Saturday in the first week of April, she said, shortly after her 19th birthday, when she headed down to the local university to watch the trials. The former swimmer decided that in four years she wanted to try out for the team.

However, Weggemann said she was afraid. She remembered being a swimmer before the accident and was scared to get back into the pool. She said she put that aside, though, and, on April 8, 2008, went to her first swim practice since the accident.

"For the first time in nearly two and a half months, I felt free. I wasn't confined to four wheels … In that moment, everything else disappeared," Weggemann said. "It saved me. It brought me back to life. It allowed me to realize that I can do anything that I used to do, I just might have to do it a little bit differently."

Weggemann told the Women of the Channel attendees that every person battles some form of disability, whether it's physical, mental, emotional, financial or fear-based. What matters is how they deal with it, she said.

"The only way your disability disables you is if you allow it. But, you can always press on and move forward from that," Weggemann said.

For Weggemann, pushing though her disability and her fear has led her to multiple Paralympic games and world championships, where she has repeatedly won gold medals and broken world records.

"Those little moments we all have – those moments of tragedy – they're just moments. That day for me was a split second in time. It doesn't define me. It's just simply a moment. It's what I chose to do after that moment that defines who I am," Weggemann said. "It's all about the choices we make, the people that we chose to be and where we choose to go when we move forward."