WHEATLAND – From dictionary.com, the word “inspire” is defined:  “to fill with an animating, quickening or exalting influence: His courage inspired his followers. to produce or arouse (a feeling, thought, etc.): to inspire confidence in others.”

It should really include a picture of Wheatland student/athlete Lucas Resch.

Born without a femur bone in his left leg, the family didn’t find out until birth.

“We found out the day he was born,” said Melissa Resch. “They did do an ultrasound at 19 weeks, but they didn’t see it then. When he was born, the nurse just kept trying to straighten out that leg.”

The nurses then questioned whether the ultrasound showed anything abnormal.

“At the time, they really didn’t know anything,” she said. “It’s a pretty rare disorder. It’s called PFFD. Proximal femoral focal deficiency which is such a rare disorder and affects 1 in 250,000. It also has four different severity levels, so his particular one is the most severe because he has a complete absence of the femur. So, his condition is more like 1 in a million.”

Nobody at Utah Valley Regional Medical Center in Provo, Utah, knew what the condition was at first. But Michelle Resch had some people with valuable information.

Lucas’ dad, Ned Resch, who is the CEO of Platte County Memorial in Wheatland, has just graduated from BYU the day his son was born. The Resch’s both mustered their faith and knew that somehow, some way, it would all work out.

Although there were options such as lengthening, special rotations and even partial amputation, doctors at Shriners Hospital in Salt Lake, Utah, said that everything was working good and anything to augment or correct would just complicate things and cause undue stress and multiple hospital visits for most of Lucas’ life.

Since Lucas’ knee basically is up just below the hip and his ankle and his foot are where his knee should be, his option for prosthetics is limited, but is working fine according to Resch. In fact, she said that when he was younger, he never even wore a prosthetic except to school.

Lucas has adapted to what he has been given. Physically, mentally and spiritually.

Some would say he has been slighted or short changed. Without a full physical body, one would think that he would adapt his path to art or computer science or video game mastering. Although he has learned to play piano, his calling was to compete in athletics as a beacon to all those who have to go through life competing against things against great odds.

Although he has a lack of a femur bone, he has been given a passion for athletics.

He plays football, baseball, he is a skier, he wrestles and he has played basketball. He doesn’t have a passion for one sport, but anything he can master. He plays the games not to just be satisfied to say he made a team in his condition. He doesn’t play to sit the bench. He plays to compete, and compete he does.

Excelling in wrestling, he gives a lot of credit to his wrestling mentor, Colt Goff and Goff in turn has a deep admiration for Resch.

“Lucas is a fierce competitor that really wants to improve,” Goff said. “For his age he has a great
work ethic.”

Another sport he is passionate about is baseball and his coach last year, Malcolm Ervin, was especially impressed with Resch, having him for an entire season.

“He is the single hardest-working, most determined, athlete I have ever had the privilege to work with,” Ervin said. “Lucas refused to use his leg as an excuse and expected to be part of every minute of every drill. He is more than an athlete - he is an ethical leader, positive influence, and all-around incredible human being.”

Lucas said that it didn’t really hit him that things were going to be different for him and just how much of a challenge was ahead of him until last summer.

“When I started getting more into sports and realized that it was different,” he said. “I thought to myself, ‘oh, I can’t run as fast as everybody else. I can’t stretch like everybody else. But for wrestling, I have Coach Goff who has really helped me. He helped me find my own way of wrestling and I’ve adapted to the different ways I can play in all sports.”

His style is different because it has to be. Coaches coach what they traditionally have been taught to coach and how to coach technique. With Lucas, they find the buried treasure of this gifted athlete when they themselves can become creative and step outside their box in their coaching methods.

His Legion baseball coach and former basketball coach Mason Munford says that success comes from working with Lucas to find drills and coaching together with him to make him a better athlete. 

“Lucas is one of the hardest working athletes I’ve seen and he has an incredible work ethic,” Munson said. “He is up at 5 a.m. to work out and then goes to baseball practice. As for an incredible competitor, we were playing up in Douglas last week, he actually dove on the bag to beat the runner to first for the out. He puts his own body in danger for the team.”

Most student/athletes who are 15 years of age are facing enough of life’s challenges just coming up against the normal. Some are given to anger or rage. Resch has a different philosophy and makes his life a conscious choice to excel even with raging adversity staring him in the face.

“I don’t get mad very often,” he said. “If I get mad, it’s mostly at the opponents in a sport. I know that self-anger or pity won’t make me a better athlete, and that’s what I want to be.”

He also sometimes is annoyed at those around him who can’t take athletics seriously or work as hard – especially when they were born with all the tools. Sometimes the sadness comes at how they take for granted the gifts and talents that they do have.

“Actually, one time, I was laying in bed and just mad,” he said. “I kept wondering why I was the kid with the one in a million adversity. But then I just remembered how it’s a gift to play sports and how much fun I have. I then get up and compete. As hard as I possibly can.”

With a different leg, he has had to also have a different mindset. For Lucas, there are no limits. There are no boxes, only mazes. And he has gotten pretty good at navigating to a successful end.

He motivates himself with his work ethic. He encourages himself and reminds himself just how hard he has to work just to be there, much less play the game. He sets the bar high for himself.

“I remind myself that I have to work harder than all the others,” he said. “And sometimes all the hard work doesn’t stop me from coming up short sometimes. In basketball I fell a couple of times because I tripped or sometimes if I am doing my stretches on first base, I actually stretched too far and fell over.”

One thing people need to realize is that his five senses work perfectly. He is not deaf to the comments or blind to the laughter at his expense and so Lucas has had to develop not only a thicker skin than most junior high students, but also a spirit that won’t quit amid the finger pointing and the whispers.

“I was really embarrassed,” he said. “And I was really bugged, and I don’t like that stuff, but I have learned to just get over it.”

When asked the question if he thought that some day, he would be a coach or mentor to athletes with challenges and he realizes that life is perhaps preparing him for that role even now.

“I feel like sometimes I’m already there,” he said. “As a motivator to my own sports team. Sometimes they are all grumpy and trying to give up.”

Some athletes learn at a young age that you have to try to give up just like you have to try to succeed. Trying is not the issue, but the direction and the mindset is. 

“Sometimes when people aren’t getting along, I try to be the one to keep us all together,” he said. “Encouraging them to just push a little deeper instead of giving up. I’m trying to be that bond on the team.”

So he is not only wanting to compete in a sport, but also is vying to set the bar that he uses as a new challenge for his teammates.

He looks ahead even at his young age toward college and what the future holds. He said that if he decides to take athletics to the collegiate level it may be wrestling since he enjoys it and placed third in the state competition this past spring.

His final words of wisdom were to his generation. The generation that he surely will touch hearts unlike anyone else can do.

“If there are those with challenges, they need to realize that they don’t need to be treated entirely different, but not entirely the same either,” he said. “And on days they want to give up, I would tell them just give it another try, you may surprise yourself.” 

Sometimes success comes in the try, not the trophy. Sometimes joy is in the journey, not the destination. Sometimes you come across a young person who has been given as a gift to his generation and such is the case with Lucas Resch.