MY HEALTH EXPERIENCE: I’ve often thought what it
would be like to have two arms, says CATHAL MILLER
I WAS born without a right arm below my elbow. I can only speculate why,
but my father, Charles Miller, who is originally from the Bronx, was an
American soldier in Vietnam in 1965 and 1966 and he was exposed to Agent
Orange.
There are numerous cases of the children of Vietnam veterans being born
with disabilities.
One-armed people are not that common in Ireland, but the world is full
of them. When I walked into the athletes’ village in Beijing in 2008 there must
have been 1,000-1,500 arm amputees. I was in awe of that fact. I am part of an
independent race of human beings.
I’m originally from Clontarf. I was very lucky growing up. I was in the
sea scouts down on Bull Island. I discovered I had an ability to play rugby.
For me to get to where I was on the team, I had to be fitter than everybody
else. I would run five or six miles every evening and do extra weight sessions
just to make up for my disability. I just adapted to it.
I was lucky in that I had good hand eye co-ordination. My ball-handling
skills with one arm were quite good.
I played rugby in primary schools and then I went to school in St Paul’s
in Raheny where I played in a Senior Cup semi-final at Lansdowne Road in 1986.
Simultaneously I played with Clontarf under-18s in rugby and got junior
player of the year in 1989. I had a couple of run-outs with the senior team
too.
I went from Clontarf to another club to play open side wing forward and
I was quite good at that. I had a good arm and a half. I really enjoyed it.
I’m lucky that my mother is a qualified physiotherapist so from the age
of three or four I was doing exercises. I started canoeing when I was eight or
nine in the sea scouts and that developed me on both sides simultaneously.
I have got an artificial arm and I use a split hook. Some people have an
artificial arm for aesthetic purposes, but in my opinion you are better off
having something that works rather than something that looks good.
I would be in the school of “suck it up, who cares what other people
think. So what if people stare. They’ll get over it.”
Using the hook, I can repair my bike, I can play with my children, I can
carry the shopping and drive the car. For me, practicality is much more
important than aesthetics.
I always cycled my bike and a friend of mine, Michael Delaney, who is
another Paralympian, approached me and asked me if I would pedal a tandem with
him for a National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI) sports event in
2005.
We were third. One of the teams we beat had been at the Paralympics
games in Athens the year before.
Between us we purchased a tandem and we ended up doing the Tour of Belgium
on a tandem which would have been in May or June in 2006.
Between us we had three arms, four eyes and three and a half ears (Mick
is partially deaf) and we came in the top 30 among the best tandem riders in
the world. We were chuffed with that.
It became apparent that Mick was very good in the back, but my skills at
the front were not quite as good. I was okay on the straight, but it was
difficult to corner when I could use only one brake so Mick got a new partner.
I was approached by the Paralympics squad and asked would I race a solo
bike so I agreed.
I did the European Championships in 2006. It was not an auspicious
start, but I joined a cycling club called Obelisk and I met three guys, Mark
McCabe, Ger Madden and Robert Kehoe, who started training me and in 2007 I went
to the Paracycling World Championships in Switzerland. I got three top 10
finishes.
I represented Ireland in the Paralympics in Beijing in 2008. The whole
experience was fantastic although I had bad luck in the road race.
I was fifth in the pursuit and missed the ride-off for medals by three
or four seconds. I was ninth in the time trial, seventh in the kilo (one
kilometre race) and crashed out of the road race.
I was asked by my coach if I would do it again and I immediately said
yes.
It was an incredible experience.
In 2010 I got the medal ride-off in pursuit of the World Championship.
In the last two world championships I’ve missed the ride-off by a
second. It is about time I had a little bit of luck.
The entire Paralympian squad voted for who would carry the flag and
luckily they chose me.
I’m under pressure because I’m carrying the flag for the Irish team. How
am I going to emulate Katie Taylor? Somebody said to me that I can’t let a girl
beat me.
I am married to Anne and I have a seven year old, Aaron, and a 12 year
old, Saoirse. They are going to see me in the velodrome on September 1st and
2nd and they might see why I couldn’t take them swimming or cycling on a
Saturday morning for the last while.
I’m looking forward to London and I’m looking forward to having my
family there.
I’ve often thought what it would be like to have two arms. Sometimes it
gets frustrating. There were times in rugby when there was a try scoring pass
on that I dropped the ball and I would say, “if I had two arms I would have
scored it”, but I am what I am.
I work for the Revenue Commissioners and have received fantastic support
from my work colleagues. I’m very lucky. I’ve had a very lucky life. I have
great family, great support and great friends. From that perspective I look to
the positives.
Lots of people have wished me well. I look to the positives rather than
the ifs or the buts.
I think we are going to do better than in Beijing when we won five
medals. We have competitors like Jason Smyth, the double Paralympics champion,
Mike McKillip, Catherine Walsh and James Scully who are all fantastic athletes
and who train very hard.
A lot of people look at the Paralympics and say, “aren’t they fantastic
for what they can do” and rightly so, but people do not appreciate that there
are a lot of things they can’t do, but they compensate for them in other ways. In doing so, it makes them even
more superhuman.
The Paralympics
Opening Ceremony is tomorrow night.
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