Wyatt Fulton - Vires acquirit eundo

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Wyatt Fulton - Vires acquirit eundo

Sometimes you don't realize how hard something is until you make your way through. My life has been one rollercoaster after the other. From abusive parents to the tragedy of losing my best friend, I've lived a life that most 19 year olds wouldn't be able to say they've even thought was possible. But despite the trials I have been subjected to over my short life, I cannot deny they have made me a better person. Marcus Annaeus Seneca was quoted with saying, "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end." Life is but a series of happenings that stack upon one another. While one sets the foundation for the previous - it does not define what that next will bring.

I have faced hardship through every year of my life. My father was an abusive drunk, my mother a meek woman that would take her frustrations with my father out on me emotionally, and I spent much of my early life hiding from the other people in my school. I was labeled the poor kid. I was mocked and laughed at for not having the trendy clothes or fancy shoes. But all of these trials only elevated me to a different plane. My skin would toughen until it was near steel and I looked inward to find my true strength. Without these trials I would not have been able to reach where I am now. What everyone needs to realize is that you enter this world surrounded by others, but you leave it completely alone. Trust nobody but yourself. Build your inner strength and all else will come.

“Don’t depend too much on anyone in this world because even your own shadow leaves you when you are in darkness.”
~Taqî ad-Dîn A?mad ibn Taymiyyah



I was 14 when I first started playing football at Fossil Ridge High School in Fort Collins, Colorado. I was a tall lanky kid, maybe just pushing 5'10 at the time. I knew that I had a few more inches in me as the years passed and so did the coaches. These men pounced on me like vultures upon roadkill. I was immediately put on a diet to increase my muscle mass and my coaches made sure I spent at least an hour each day before school in the weight room. You really have no idea how difficult it is for a fourteen year old boy to get up at 5am every morning and ride his bike down to the high school weight room. Forcing myself to lift until around 6:30. All I wanted to do was sleep but if I didn't do what the coach said, well, my father had threatened me with the belt enough times. So I made time and I made sure to do it right.

As this started to become my daily ritual for two years, I began to grow into my body. As a 16 year old, I was 6'2" and pushing 210lbs. For being only sixteen, I was a physical specimen. I had become one of the started Defensive Ends on my Fossil Ridge and was tied for the sack lead in the Colorado 5A division. Things seemed to be going great. I finished the year as one of the leading sack artists in the entire league and was starting to garner interest from big school. I often would see men sitting in the stands with the patches of Alabama, Clemson, USC and Miami. These men were here to watch a sixteen year old play football. Seemed a little silly for me but that didn't stop my heart from pounding every time I took the field.

But one day these visits stopped. Everything came crashing down again.

The day was October 9th, 2015. We were playing #1 Pomona High School. I had been on fire for the entire game. I had two sacks and 3 rushes on the opposing quarterback, Erik Ouellette. Man I hated Ouellette, I had played against him in the previous season and he was a fast son of a bitch. He knew how to use his feet and avoid pressure better than any other high school player I had ever faced. His crooked smile before every play just lit my fuse and I wanted to get this kid more than I wanted anything in my life.

We had backed Pomona back up to their own 12 yard line and it was 3rd and 18. They knew they needed to convert this to keep the pressure on us during the game. I knew i had to stop them at any cost. As the ball flew with it's tight spiral back to Ouellette - I had read the snap count perfectly and was rounding their behemoth 18 year old tackle. That's when I felt it. POP! And my lights went out from the pain. The next thing I know is waking up with the most intense pain of my life in my right ankle. I reached down and I couldn't even touch the ankle. The stadium was quiet and everyone around me looked concenred - even Ouellette.

This was the day that the visits stopped.

What I heard from the doctor later that day seemed like a death sentence to my football career. I never knew if I would become a pro player but I did dream. I was told that I had ruptured my posterior tibial tendon and that I needed surgery. The doctor's prognosis was that I would most likely be able to walk again but it was unlikely that I would be able to play football again. And even if I would - it would never be at the level I once did. For all intents and purposes, my football career was over. The doctors said that the surgery went smoothly and everything would be fine for me, at least in terms of walking. But what they didn't know was that Wyatt Fulton wasn't the type of person to take whatever they said as the law. Wyatt Fulton knew that the only one he could trust was himself. After about 9 months of letting my ankle slowly heal, I was ready to get some work done. Rehabbing my ankle was one hell of an experience. I fell many times and the pain many nights was unbearable. But I kept telling myself that if I ever wanted to play college football, I would need to go above and beyond.




"It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop."
~Confucius


I will finish up PART TWO tomorrow!

















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[RavensFanFromOntario]

You already know this, but damn you can write incite

[princekyle]

Very nice read, two thumbs up