Coming Full Circle
April is Limb Loss Awareness Month! Based on a recent study, there are more than 5.6 million people living with limb loss and limb difference in the United States. Of that ~5.6 million, there are ~2.3 million people with limb loss and ~3.4 million people who were born with their limb difference. And every year, there are approximately 185,000 amputations in the US.
We are honored to support this community through our faith-based retreats. Through the years, we have met so many inspiring overcomers, and we know that each of their stories has a special opportunity to touch the lives of others. As we embark upon Limb Loss Awareness Month, this April we will be sharing many powerful, moving, and inspiring Stories of Hope from some of the remarkable young men and women with limb difference we’ve met over the years at our retreats!
We have a saying at Beautifully Flawed — it’s the filler we see between a prayer and a miracle, just as God changes the page from tragedy to triumph — and it is “But God.” “But God” moments follow a time of despair or crisis, signifying a pivotal change brought about by divine intervention. They reveal God’s ultimate authority and transformative power in seemingly impossible situations. When we feel hopeless, He is still writing our story.
In our 10th year of retreats, one of the most beautiful “But God,” stories came from Andrea Zavala, a quad amputee who lost her limbs during COVID due to sepsis. What was an already hard season for so many of us, became almost unbearable for her.
Andrea first heard about our Beautifully Flawed Retreat while she was in the hospital when a friend of Andrea’s sister reached out to share about our organization and retreats. Her family contacted us and we immediately mailed Andrea a care package. Within the days following, we were able to talk to her family and encourage them in the midst of some very dark hours.
Due to the sepsis, Andrea had lost both of her legs below the knee, one arm above the elbow, and the other arm below the elbow. The family did not know what would become of Andrea and were unable to be by her side due to strict COVID restrictions. When they reached out to us, Andrea was still gravely ill and the grief of loss laid heavy on them.
We believed in our hearts God was going to pull Andrea through. We shared with the family that even without limbs she would live a full life. We shared stories of some of our past attendees who faced sepsis and multiple limb loss who are living a life full of faith and so much purpose. Those can be some pretty bold words in the midst of so much loss, but God does not waste our pain. His promise is that He is always with us and that even in the times we do not understand what He is doing, He still has a plan of good, and not evil and that plan leads us to a future and hope (Jer. 29:11). There are moments we need to be gentle hearers in walking with others through their pain, but there are also moments where we need to stand firm in faith and believe the promises God gives us.
We believed in our hearts God was going to pull Andrea through. We shared with the family that even without limbs she would live a full life. We shared stories of some of our past attendees who faced sepsis and multiple limb loss who are living a life full of faith and so much purpose. Those can be some pretty bold words in the midst of so much loss, but God does not waste our pain. His promise is that He is always with us and that even in the times we do not understand what He is doing, He still has a plan of good, and not evil and that plan leads us to a future and hope (Jer. 29:11). There are moments we need to be gentle hearers in walking with others through their pain, but there are also moments where we need to stand firm in faith and believe the promises God gives us.
The family clung to the bold faith, and when they were able to speak with Andrea, they shared with her about what they had learned about the Beautifully Flawed Foundation. Getting her to the retreat became her first milestone marker — a goal together they would work towards.
Andrea joined us at her first Beautifully Flawed Retreat in October 2021. When she arrived, she was in so much need of a community who could sympathize with and care for her. Although Andrea had prosthetic legs, she was just learning to use them and was mostly wheelchair bound. Within hours of the retreat’s start and for the first time since she lost her legs, Andrea had conquered walking stairs. The beautiful thing was that she had a team of retreat attendees working to help her, those who themselves at some point also had learned to do the same. Every time she needed to go up or down the stairs, there were girls to help guide her, encourage her and teach her how to walk successfully up and down the stairs.
As she smiled through each difficult step, we saw the example she set, challenging the other attendees who were new to their limb loss to do the same. Conquer the tasks that feel impossible! In just a few days’ time at the retreat, God had begun to remind her that He wasn’t done with her, He was still working in her life.
“The 2022 retreat gave me so much encouragement and motivation to put my legs on. I came home and realized I want to move forward and live a full life. I feel I could not have gone through what I’ve gone through without God. My faith is important to me. In everything I have gone through, I have the assurance that God has a plan. There is something greater that is going to come from this.”
Andrea Zavala, 3x Beautifully Flawed Retreat Attendee
We had Andrea back at the retreat in 2022 knowing there was still healing needing to be done. Despite all the strength she had gained in that year, she had a lot of complications with her prosthetic legs which kept breaking on her when walking, challenging her mobility. What she did not know is that in partnership with WHILL, a company who specializes in making high-tech mobility chairs, we were gifting her with a brand new, modern mobility chair at the retreat to help aid in her accessibility.
Delivering Andrea’s chair to her new house two weeks before Christmas was a beautiful moment. She was so thankful. Jeff from WHILL not only delivered the chair to her, but took the time showing her all the specs of the chair, and connecting the chair to her smartphone for easy use. The chair can even make its way to Andrea through its GPS in the event she can’t get to it.
“Having this chair, I can say it has helped move around my house freely and be able to be more independent. I can only imagine how much it will be able to help me become more independent in the future. I am beyond grateful.”
A few months after receiving the mobility chair, Andrea shared with us how things had shifted and she was going through a really hard time, feeling weighed down by anxiety and depression. She had faced so much and the waves of emotions can be really raw at times. We began praying for her at the organization, asking God to get her through the hard season she was in. When we saw her 2023 retreat application come in, we were elated!
At our 2023 retreat, we had three quad amputees, and Andrea being the most seasoned one, quickly became the source of strength for the other two. Andrea shined at the retreat, showing the other girls how she overcame the hard things in the gym, how she was able to get out in the water to surf, and shared her tips and tricks of making life work. She had come full circle in her own story and was now seeing God use her to help others along in their journeys. When facing a question about how to do something, the other girls would ask Andrea how she did it, and she gracefully showed them. It was so empowering to see. We watched her come into her own as she helped the other two throughout the entire retreat! Together, there was no obstacle too great to overcome.
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