Fourteen years after losing her arm and nearly dying in a shark attack, professional surfer Bethany Hamilton is pregnant and teaching her two-year-old son how to surf.
In several photos she posted to Instagram last week, Hamilton is seen teaching her son, Tobias, how to stand up on a board and ride the waves.
Hamilton, whose attack and decision to compete professionally once again is portrayed in the 2011 film “Soul Surfer,” recently announced she and her husband of four years are expecting their second child.
Last year, Hamilton withdrew her name from consideration from receiving the ESPY award for best female athlete with a disability, saying that it would set her “back to square one.”
“It didn’t even occur to me that I was going to be placed in the disabled division,” she told The Guardian. I don’t surf disabled or compete in a disabled category.”
“I think disabled is a very degrading title for athletes,” she said “I feel like I’m an incredibly abled person…If anything, I encourage ESPYs to. . . change the category to Best Adaptive Athlete, so athletes that have adapted to unique situations in their life. I would have been stoked to be in the category if that was what it was called.”
On the anniversary of the attack, she posted a photo with a caption thanking God for turning pain to beauty.
“Today I’m thankful to be alive!” She wrote earlier this month. “I look back and would not change that day otherwise. God can truly turn pain into beauty. We can grow through our hard times and overcome. Happy stumpy day to me.”