Estimated read time: 1-2 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
FERRON, Emery County — Nathan Urie is a high school student who views roadblocks as detours.
Since he was a baby, life's smallest and most mundane tasks were simply puzzles he was determined to solve.
Nathan isn't comfortable with being labeled an inspiration. Maybe it's because he's been fighting the stigma that always accompanies labels all his life — special needs, disabled, handicapped. Maybe it's the pressure of trying to live up to the expectations of other people. And maybe it's just simply that he wants to do what he's never been able to do, and that's to simply go unnoticed.
"He doesn't want to be different," his mother said. "He wants to be just like everyone else."
"But he's not," his father, Wayne Urie, quickly adds. "And he can't change that. People say, ‘He inspires me.' He makes it so nobody should feel like they can't do anything."
The fact that people can see that Nathan is missing most of his left arm makes for some interesting conversations, especially when he's preparing to wrestle for Emery High School.
"We see that look a lot," said Spartan wrestling coach Kirk Christiansen. "They'll go out (on the mat) with almost empathy or sympathy in their mind, and than after that first period that empathy changes to a look in the corner at the coach of, ‘I can't! I don't know!'
"After the match it's a look of total respect, and often times total defeat because he comes out there to wrestle."
Read the full story at DeseretNews.com.
