'Soul Surfer' Bethany Hamilton draws huge crowd for Southeast speech

Bethany Hamilton drew the largest crowd for Southeast Missouri State Speaker Series event, according to university president Carlos Vargas-Aburto, with a large portion of the crowd Monday stretching into the second deck of the Show Me Center.

In front of that crowd, it was clear Hamilton serves as an inspirational figure for a generation of young women.

Freshman Emma Crank talked about how she remembered Hamilton's jewelry line dominating Claire's stores when she was younger, and she had seen the movie "Soul Surfer" many times.

Even after reading everything there was to read about Hamilton, Crank still was awestruck when Hamilton described returning to surfing before she was medically cleared, after her arm had been bitten off by a tiger shark in 2003.

"If that happened to me, I'd never get into the water again," Crank said.

Fellow freshman Kelli Sargent thought Hamilton was inspiring because Hamilton was so upfront about her Christian beliefs.

"I love that she wasn't afraid to hold back," Sargent said.

Hamilton touched on a variety of subjects during her speech Monday and a subsequent interview with Communications Studies instructor Brooke Clubbs. Hamilton recounted the story of the shark attack that happened when she was 13. She had just placed second in nationals and was set on becoming one of the best female surfers in the world. That trajectory shifted that fall.

"I was surfing like any other day. In an instant, my arm was gone, and I was fighting for my life," she said. "I lost 60 percent of my blood that day."

She said God helped her through the pain and recovery.

"I remember thinking it was a miracle," Hamilton said. "I trusted God was in control of the situation."

Hamilton did not realize she could continue as a surfer until she met a man who learned how to surf with one leg after a shark had taken the other. Hamilton's mother tried to convince her to try a different sport or hobby.

"I have the willingness to try," Hamilton said of getting back into surfing. "My fear of not surfing overcame my fear of sharks. I remember thinking I'm no longer the two-armed girl who could do anything. I was still that girl; I just had one arm."

She said she has always had a unique sense of calm about losing her arm, but not everyone in her family felt the same way. She said her father was angry for a long time.

"It was difficult for everyone," Hamilton said. "God is carrying us through this as a family."

Hamilton has been a professional surfer since 2007. She said she wants to continue surfing professionally and feels she has not lost any ability in the water.

Hamilton now has a husband and son, who is eight months old. Hamilton met her husband, Adam Dirks, when he was starting a ministry in Hawaii. They were set up by mutual friends, and the relationship actually began when they leapt off a 40-foot cliff together into the water below.

"It was love at first jump," Dirks said. "We were engaged after a year."

Hamilton also talked about her organization, Friends of Bethany, which helps people who have lost a limb. She holds an annual retreat every year in Hawaii. Clubbs asked Hamilton whether she could go in a time machine and try to persuade her younger self to not go into the water that fall day in 2003. Hamilton gave a conflicted response.

"You know it would be nice to normal and to have a simple life," she said. "At the same time, I wouldn't have been able to help all these people."

Sargent said that help has extended to girls in Missouri. Hamilton visited a girl in Sargent's hometown of Park Hills who had a limb amputated as a part of cancer treatment.

"Most of you know me as a shark attack survivor or as 'Soul Surfer,'" Hamilton said. "I've gone on to do so much more."

bkleine@semissourian.com

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