00:00 (dramatic music)
00:01 Being born without legs hadn't stopped me
00:03 from doing the things that I wanna do.
00:05 - Well, people would just, they'd make fun of me
00:06 'cause I didn't have legs.
00:07 - The best way to deal with haters
00:09 is to use the hate to lift yourself up.
00:12 Haters are your biggest fans, so use that to your advantage.
00:15 (upbeat music)
00:19 My name is Zion Clark.
00:25 I was born with a rare condition
00:26 that caused me not to have legs.
00:28 I was born with caudal regression syndrome.
00:30 It is a very rare disease.
00:32 One out of every 100,000 kids are born with it each year.
00:35 Caudal regression syndrome is a rare disease
00:38 that can cause a number of abnormalities in a baby.
00:41 Like, it can be you have a portion of your spine missing,
00:44 or in my case, I was born without legs.
00:48 I lived most of my life through foster care
00:50 up 'til about 16.
00:51 - He came into my life when the caseworkers
00:54 had reached out to me and said that they needed
00:57 a replacement for a young fellow.
00:59 They bring Zion to my home some weeks later.
01:03 Then it came to a point to where I just knew he was mine
01:06 and I just was so in love with him.
01:08 And I approached him one day on the couch,
01:11 and I said, "Zion, I know that I'm not
01:14 "your biological mother."
01:16 And I asked him if I could get to be his mom.
01:20 He said, "Yes, I want you to be my mom."
01:23 I was like, "Well, let's do this.
01:25 "Let's do it."
01:26 (gentle music)
01:29 - The relationship with my mom is fantastic.
01:32 She is the greatest woman I know, you know?
01:34 And she wants what's best for me.
01:38 She wants what's best for me and my sisters.
01:40 She never once was gonna give up on me.
01:43 - I mean, I was a troubled kid during school,
01:46 so I mean, anything, any little thing would make me mad.
01:50 I just got in trouble for punching lockers
01:53 or just back talking to teachers, you know?
01:55 Well, people would just, they'd make fun of me
01:59 'cause I didn't have legs,
02:00 so they'd think I couldn't do something,
02:01 or they'd be talking to me saying I wouldn't do something,
02:05 and in turn, I'd do it and get in trouble.
02:07 But then, after a while, I just got tired of it,
02:10 so I stopped reacting and I just let 'em talk.
02:13 And eventually, they started leaving me alone.
02:16 (gentle music)
02:18 School wasn't the greatest time for me,
02:20 but by the time I was a senior,
02:21 I was able to turn it around
02:22 and get to college and start doing everything I wanted to do.
02:26 - I started wrestling in second grade.
02:29 I could just go wrestle for a couple more hours,
02:31 waste all my energy, and go home and just go to sleep.
02:34 When I was really little, the first few matches,
02:37 I didn't know what to do, and neither did my opponent.
02:40 Some kids were scared to wrestle me.
02:43 I was scared to wrestle them.
02:44 I didn't know what I was doing.
02:46 I adapted my wrestling by a lot of trial and error.
02:51 I spent years figuring out what would work,
02:54 what didn't work, and there's a lot of things
02:56 that don't work, but the things that do work,
02:58 drill 'em over and over and over again
03:00 'til they're completely flawless,
03:02 until somebody might know I'm doing it,
03:04 but I'm gonna do it anyways, whether they want me to or not.
03:07 (gentle music)
03:09 I am feeling great about a match.
03:14 I train about twice a day, every single day,
03:17 about six days a week, and it's an everyday thing.
03:20 It's a grind, it's a lifestyle.
03:22 Zion was a very special athlete
03:24 because he had perseverance,
03:26 and his determination was second to none.
03:28 It was very easy for me to coach him
03:30 with qualities like that.
03:32 Very good takedown.
03:33 Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's get the breakdown.
03:36 He has no legs, so he doesn't have any power
03:38 for the bottom half of his body,
03:40 which puts him at a great disadvantage for wrestling.
03:43 I noticed that because of his willingness
03:46 to do the things that he needs to do to win,
03:48 that I knew that we could come up with something
03:50 to make him successful.
03:52 How proud am I, Zion?
03:54 Give me a Z, Z, you got your Z, you got your Z.
03:58 I am proud, I'm his number one cheerleader.
04:01 I told you, I am the executive director of his fan club.
04:06 I am very proud of him, how at first he was just so angry,
04:11 but how he learned is each time to rout that anger
04:16 and to make it into something positive.
04:19 Being born without legs hasn't stopped me
04:21 from doing the things that I wanna do.
04:23 The best way to deal with haters
04:24 is to use the hate to lift yourself up.
04:28 Haters are your biggest fans,
04:29 so use that to your advantage.
04:31 My dreams and ambitions, one day to make the Olympic team
04:36 be one of the best freestyle wrestlers in the world.
04:38 I wanna be able to go back home,
04:40 tell my mom, like, "Mom, number one, there's nobody better.
04:43 "I'm gonna try to keep getting better from there.
04:45 "I just wanna be the best."
04:47 The biggest lesson I've had to learn
04:49 is that things will not always go your way,
04:50 but you have to work with what you got,
04:53 and once you're able to work with what you have,
04:56 multiple doors will start to open.
04:57 (upbeat music)
05:00 [BLANK_AUDIO]
