This story originally appeared in our "Women We Love" series in the 2009 MarchstApril issue of DiversityInc magazine.
Marla Runyan is an inspiration to every woman who has ever been told she couldn't or shouldn't aspire to be something out of the ordinary. Diagnosed at the age of 9 with a disease that would make her legally blind, she was told she would have reduced educational and athletic abilities and should severely limit her expectations. Instead, she became a perfectionist, working around her disability to become a world-renowned athlete and the first blind track athlete to compete in the Olympics. She also succeeded academically, earning a master's degree in special education. She gives back to those who need it as a teacher of deaf-blind children.
When I was first diagnosed at age 9, my mom told me a list of things the doctor said I wouldn't be able to do. He told her I'd struggle to get C's in school, would probably never go to college and couldn't even think of being an athlete. He painted this picture of what he thought my life would be. He had the right intentions, based on my visual acuity, but he didn't consider my resiliency and my attitude and who I was as a person.
I was driven to prove him wrong. I became an excellent student because I was overly meticulous and I was obsessed with being perfect. I spent tons of time on my schoolwork because it took me so long to read. I changed schools in the fifth grade and they had a service for the visually impaired, so I was in a regular classroom but I had special equipment--access to closed-captioned TV and a monitor to see the chalkboard--but it was slow going. I learned that in order to be successful, I was going to have to work twice as hard as everyone else. It just takes so much more effort and twice as much time to do anything academic.
My vision loss helped shape my personality and my attitude. I wanted to show everyone what I could do. I could have gone either way. Why didn't I sit on the couch and say, "Well, I can't do anything. I can't see"?
My mom had me in gymnastics and swimming. Then I played soccer before my vision began to change. I went out for track freshman year in high school. I was not scholarship material; I didn't even make it to the state meet. I was all done. I was going to focus on a career in college.
At the very last minute, I was contacted by a coach at San Diego State and was recruited. I went through four years of college track, high jumping, running, and in my junior and senior years moved into the heptathlon. But I was never on a track scholarship and was never an all-American, which most people find shocking.
I made it through the '96 Olympic trials but I was still very far from being a top-in-the-nation athlete. All my success happened long after college when I moved to Eugene, Ore. In '99, I had a new coach and changed my lifestyle; I became more of a distance runner and really concentrated on lifestyle, diet, sleep. I went from being a nobody to being ranked second in the nation. Then I earned a spot on the 2000 U.S. Olympic team.
My attitude always was that being blind is no excuse for a bad race. My husband was my coach, starting in 2002. He's been a major support. He's always there for me.
I had my daughter in 2005 and still competed in 2006. I have several injuries that are unfixable, including a major back injury, and I can't run at that level again. So I got my teaching license reinstated.
When I was younger, my mom had given us the Helen Keller story, and in high school, I babysat a boy who was deaf, and I learned sign language to communicate with him. Being visually impaired does limit my way to work with the deaf because they every visually oriented. But I did a graduate program to learn tactile sign language, signing into somebody's hand. I felt that my visual disability could be something I could use as a resource and asset because I have a perspective a lot of other people don't have.
I've been a communicative-disorder specialist serving kids with moderate to severe disabilities, such as speechstlanguage communications, autism and Down syndrome. I go to four schools and work with kids. And I've been a volunteer ambassador for the Perkins School for the Blind, where Helen Keller was educated. I'd like to get back into working with deaf and blind children and especially with blind athletes. I'm also enjoying motherhood--when you're a mom, you're a mom first, and everything else comes second.