(ABOVE) Founded by Kauai surfer Bethany Hamilton, the retreats provide support and community for women with limb difference. Hamilton has been an advocate for people with limb difference since losing her left arm during a shark attack in 2003.
Lexi Pshigoda sits on her surfboard, bobbing with the swells, the sun shining on a perfect, cloudless day in Del Mar, California. A set rolls in, and the volunteers in the water next to Pshigoda yell for her to paddle. She pushes her damp hair from her eyes, her blond curls strikingly bright against the dark neoprene of her wetsuit. Once she catches the wave, Pshigoda plants her feet and stands, her hair trailing in the wind. She throws her hands in the air and beams. For the first time in her life, Lexi Pshigoda is surfing. Such a moment would be a victory for anyone catching her first wave, but for Pshigoda, who's doing it on a prosthetic leg, it's a triumph-not just over a wave, but over a tragedy.
Cheering her from the lineup is pro surfer Bethany Hamilton. In the early 2000s Hamilton was up-and-coming; she'd won countless juniors contests and seemed destined to be one of the world's best. Then on Halloween morning in 2003, she paddled out with a few friends at Tunnels on Kauai for a surf session that changed her life.
Hamilton was resting on her board between sets when a twelve-foot tiger shark attacked her, taking her left arm. As blood stained the turquoise water, Hamilton's friends sprang into action, tying a makeshift tourniquet. They got her to shore and into an ambulance. Hamilton did more than survive the attack; she was determined to overcome it. "I was pretty tenacious by nature, and I didn't want one arm to hold me back from trying things," she says. "I didn't know anyone who surfed with one arm, but my friend Mike Coots"-a fellow Kauai surfer who had also survived a shark attack-"surfed with one leg. So I was on a mission." As soon as Hamilton was given medical clearance, she was back in the water. Within the year, she returned to competition.
While surf day is the highlight for most attendees, the retreat activities are designed to support women in mind, body and spirit. “In the gym, the girls are seeing the other girls adapting and moving in rad ways, and it’s inspiring,” says Hamilton. “Overcoming challenges is so much more than just having a positive mindset.”
When Hamilton lost her arm, her community gathered around her, supporting her not only physically and emotionally but financially. In 2007, Hamilton's friends and family launched the nonprofit Friends of Bethany, which used some of those contributions to help other victims of limb loss. With the release of the 2011 film Soul Surfer, based on Hamilton's life, the nonprofit grew. It began hosting conferences for youth, delivering care packages for victims of limb loss and launching its most popular program to date: the men's and women's retreats. In 2021 they rebranded, and Friends of Bethany became the Beautifully Flawed Foundation.
The Beautifully Flawed Retreat and the Forge Retreat are for women and men (respectively) ages 18-25 who live with some form of "limb difference"-the absence or malformation of a limb, whether one is born with it or whether it results from illness or amputation. Or shark attack. The four-day retreats take place annually in California or on Kauai and focus on mental, physical and spiritual health-which for Hamilton, at least, means surfing. Hamilton also credits her strong Christian faith in helping her overcome the loss of her arm, and those values are integrated into the retreat curriculum. "The retreat is designed around my passions," Hamilton says. "A lot of the people who come here are struggling with depression. I really believe nutrition and physical movement can make a big difference."
I've come to Del Mar to meet the twenty-five young women with limb difference from across the country attending the Beautifully Flawed Retreat, joining them as they spend four days eating healthy, home-cooked meals and learning new skills like breath work, martial arts and CrossFit. They paint, string lei, do a photo shoot, sing, pray and share their stories. While the retreat is filled with activities to improve their physical, mental and spiritual well-being, the highlight for most is the surf day. The girls wake to blue skies and sunshine, glassy one-to-two-foot waves and a fleet of volunteers ready to assist. Excited and nervous, the girls wriggle into wetsuits and gather on the beach for a safety briefing. Each has a goal: For some it's to ride prone, for others to get to their knees and, for the ambitious, to stand.
Attendee Emma June Kent powers through CrossFit day.
Like Hamilton, Pshigoda's limb difference is the result of an accident. She was just four years old in 2004, playing on her back porch in Tyrone, Oklahoma, while her dad mowed the lawn. She lost her footing on the porch and slid behind the mower just as her dad was backing up. She lost her left leg just below the knee. To this day, Pshigoda says, she can still hear her mother screaming.
After multiple hospital stays and three blood transfusions, Pshigoda returned home and began to heal. She started school where, for the most part, people were supportive and she felt fairly normal. But in middle school some girls taunted her that she would never get married, that no one would ever love her. "My spirits were broken. My 13-year-old self full-heartedly believed I would never amount to anything," she says, flipping her curls and flashing a wicked grin. "But I married a hunk!"
Pshigoda first heard about the Beautifully Flawed Foundation in 2013, but it wasn't until a recent rough patch that she finally decided to apply. "I dreamed of meeting Bethany and young women just like me," she says. "It's been very healing for me. This is probably the most relaxed I've been in a very long time. I'm so much at peace, and I've gained friends that will last a lifetime." As Pshigoda catches her last wave of the day, she raises her arms, throws shakas and lets out a whoop of joy. When she reaches the beach, the women rush down to greet her-some run, some hop and others wheel-and pull her into an embrace. "Standing up on that board, shredding the wave, was the coolest, most freeing feeling," Pshigoda says. "I feel like I really, truly can do anything I put my mind to."
Plier was born with tibial hemimelia and had her legs amputated when she was fourteen months old. She got her first set of “kicks”—prosthetic legs—at seventeen months. Here, she tries jumping with an adapted jump rope for the first time. “It was awesome getting to do a jump rope with the middle not connected,” Plier says. “But my favorite thing was meeting these beautiful women and hearing their incredible stories.”
While Pshigoda is in the water, Sydney Marshburn is on the beach anxiously awaiting her turn. The women surf in three groups to ensure that each has a minimum of three volunteers supporting her. For Marshburn, it will be her first surf since she lost her leg in 2021.
Marshburn first heard of the Beautifully Flawed retreat when Soul Surfer was released and has been a fan of Hamilton ever since. After four long years of surgeries, pain and infections, Marshburn's left leg had to be amputated above the knee to save her life from a complex regional pain syndrome-induced infection. Like Hamilton, Marshburn is undaunted and finds the positive in every situation; for her, a silver lining of losing her leg, she says, is being able to attend the Beautifully Flawed retreat.
Although Marshburn has surfing experience, this is the first time she's paddled out since losing her leg. She removes her prosthetic (she can't surf with it) and wheels to the water's edge, where she is assisted the rest of the way by her support team. Once she reaches the board, she turns to look at the women on the beach, and a smile lights up her face: She is ready.
When a set rolls through, Marshburn gets into position, and her team pushes her into a gentle wave. She slowly rises to her knee to get a feel for riding on one leg. On the next two waves she tries to stand, laughing as she falls and comes up sputtering. On the fourth wave, Marshburn pushes herself to standing and rides all the way to shore. Like Pshigoda, when she hits the beach, she's engulfed in hugs.
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Lydia Day (LEFT) had never tried surfing before the retreat and didn’t know what to expect. Something she’s learned from having a limb difference, she says, is “that it’s okay to fall, and it happens to everyone. In the beginning it was slow, but soon afterward I lost count of how many waves I stood up on.” (RIGHT) Nan McMahan tries the adaptive jump rope on CrossFit day.
The girls gather in prayer.
"Before that day I had never seen an above-knee amputee surf standing up without a prosthetic," Marshburn says. "I didn't think it was logistically feasible. But just like Bethany's motto, 'I don't need easy, I just need possible,' I quickly found out that surfing with one leg is unorthodox but is 100 percent attainable." For Marshburn, it's just the beginning. She hopes to qualify for Team USA in the 2028 Paralympics to see just how far one leg can take her.
Nan Anne McMahan traveled from Atlanta to attend the retreat. She has bright blond hair, a prosthetic leg and a smile so luminous you can't help but mirror it when you see it. When she first introduced herself to the group, she proudly announced that her entire name rhymes and burst into a big belly laugh. Now, as the third group of women are suiting up, McMahan awkwardly pulls her prosthetic through the leg of her wetsuit and then draws her newfound friends into a hug.
Despite McMahan's sunny disposition, the past three years of her life have been anything but light. In 2019, the summer before her senior year of high school, McMahan was at her family's lake house when she and her dad went for an early morning ride on their jet skis. As they came around a blind corner, the father and daughter collided head-on. Four days later McMahan woke up in a hospital room to find that she had lost both her leg and her father.
Andrea Zavala, seen above feeling the stoke, lost both legs below the knee, one arm above the elbow and the other arm below the elbow to sepsis in 2021. Last year she attended the Beautifully Flawed retreat barely able to walk. This year, she walked in on her prosthetic legs and conquered surfing, made friends and smiled—often.
For most, senior year of high school is a time of closure and resolution, but for McMahan it was a year of firsts. The first time she slept in her home without her dad. It was the first time she got a prosthetic leg. The first time since the accident that she walked without a wheelchair. The first time her friends carried her down a flight of stairs so she could partake in a basement Halloween party.
Now, three years later, McMahan is experiencing more firsts at the retreat. The first time she got to be around girls her age who'd had similar experiences and limb differences. And it's her first time surfing-a simultaneously frustrating and rewarding experience. At first she struggles to stand with her prosthetic, but with the support of her friends and the surf assistants, she adapts and rides three waves, standing-a memory that she will always treasure.
"A few years ago I would have told you that I was OK and I didn't need a new community," says McMahan. "Now I get to make new best friends who can relate to me in such a unique way, and I'm so proud to be a person with a disability."
All of the women have a story. Emma June lost her leg to cancer but is celebrating a year of being cancer-free. Devyn was born missing part of her right arm yet is an incredible softball player. Andrea had double-leg and partial-arm amputations to save her life from sepsis and is currently relearning walking. Cathy lost her hand in a drunken-driving accident and is now a retreat leader. Ashley lost her leg in a train wreck and now works as a therapist.
"A lot of the girls don't share a life with anyone who has a limb difference," says Hamilton. "Not having that camaraderie can be hard-you feel like no one understands you or gets your challenges. A lot of girls are so encouraged by being around other girls who get them and get their struggles. It's encouraging to know that my life is having a ripple effect in a really beautiful way."
