Life is not a linear path. Ask anyone who’s dealt with setbacks and heartbreaks. Perspective comes with a cost: through time and trials. And as we get hit with life’s roadblocks, it’s fascinating to see when acceptance and even a change of heart comes into play for an individual.
Kelly Gorman was dealt a disability at birth that some doctors said wouldn’t allow her to ever walk, and yet she has not let it stop her from playing a non-adaptive sport, lacrosse, in high school at an extremely high level while capturing six golf club championships as an adult..
Now that’s embracing what life has dealt you.
Gorman, from Pelham, N.Y., will compete in her first U.S. Adaptive Open beginning Monday at Woodmont Country Club in Rockville, Md., in the division for those with lower limb impairment. The William & Mary grad was born with a clubfoot and arthrogryposis, a condition that causes joint stiffness and underdeveloped muscles. To this day, the 31-year-old still has no control of her toes and feet, which are much smaller than most.
Despite undergoing five surgeries on her feet and knees as a child, the second youngest of five active kids got intensely connected in sports, learning golf from her grandfather and, most notably, playing goalie for her Hackley High School lacrosse team in Tarrytown, N.Y., that won three state championships.
“Playing sports is how my family and I bonded,” Gorman recalls with a smile.
“Kelly never saw herself as any different than her siblings,” Gorman’s mother Lorri says. “Whatever she didn’t have in speed she made up for in grit and found another way around it.”
Lacrosse was a way to toughen up with twin sister Trish.
“Trish was the center, I was the goalie and it worked out well because she would shoot on me and I would practice my saves and, man, we were lucky to be a part of amazing teams together,” Gorman says.
How does someone with a disability in their legs even find a way to play on a traditional lacrosse high school team?
“Lacrosse is uniquely situated for it because it doesn’t require you to move far distances,” Gorman says. “It’s only three steps across a goal, so that worked for me. … I’ve always had excellent hand-eye coordination and have had a ton of upper body strength, and I would be able to throw it to the midfielders at half-field to give us a leg up on offense. My strength and accuracy in my throw are the same things that allow me to excel at golf.”
Kelly Gorman was the lacrosse goalie for three state high school championship teams. (Courtesy of Gorman family)
Gorman experienced immense support in Pelham through middle school, but in high school and college that understanding from her peers just wasn’t there. The first time Gorman walked down the halls at Hackley High with her fore-arm crutch, the whispers began.
“It was scary, it really shook me,” she says. “I was like, ‘wait, that’s not who I am.’ And honestly, from that day on, I was, like, ‘I will not be known as the girl with the crutch.’ But I also didn’t want anyone to feel bad for me.
“I didn’t want anyone to go and beat someone else up. Like, no one was being mean. and they just didn’t know better.”
After high school and two years into her time at William & Mary, Gorman encountered another situation she wasn’t ready for: a diagnosis by doctors that she should use a wheelchair. She was only 19 and already experiencing anxiety about being the only disabled person in her college classes.
The idea of being constrained to a chair in front of her peers hardened Gorman’s heart toward her situation, and she rejected using a wheelchair.
“I’d never seen someone in a wheelchair be active and enjoy their life. I’d only seen in a hospital, like when you’re close to death,” Gorman recalls. “I wasn’t even 20 and I was like ‘my God I have so much life to live.’ I don’t wanna be confined to a wheelchair and deal with a lot this stigma.”
Who doesn’t want to make their grandparents proud? Kelly Gorman is playing her 1st @usga U.S. Adaptive Open next week.
But she’d be the first to tell you this transpired because of her grandfather’s belief in her, starting golf at age 8, and because of that she believes in… pic.twitter.com/EExOCOjEiC
— Garrett Johnston (@JohnstonGarrett) July 4, 2026
But three years ago, Gorman’s eyes were opened to a new, refreshing outlook. This came through sled hockey and an inspiring individual named Stefon Stillwell DeSantis, the captain of the Capital District Sled Warriors, a program of Stride Adaptive Sports.
“In a lot of ways, he was that older-brother figure that I needed to show me that a wheelchair is liberating,” Gorman says. “I was, like, ‘wow, I’m kind of a punk for never seeing it that way before.’ I really needed that nudge.
“Sled hockey and the adaptive community has really helped me develop a different relationship with both my disability but also using a wheelchair as a tool for a more full life. Choosing it can be really empowering, and I think that’s a narrative that’s not out there at all in society.”
Gorman, the director of the office of health promotion at the University of Albany, has enjoyed getting beers and wings with her new community after sled hockey games, and the close-knit adaptive competitors she experienced at her U.S. Adaptive Open qualifier in Akron, Ohio, were a thrill for her as well. She earned medalist honors in the competition by shooting 82.
“To meet more people in the adaptive community here at this championship is something that I’m really excited about,” Gorman says of this week.
A young Kelly Gorman (in yellow) poses with family members, including her twin sister Trish and grandfather, Don Gorman. (Courtesy of Gorman family)
Gorman’s grandfather, Don Gorman, introduced her to golf at the age of 8 at Wethersfield Country Club, where the two wore out the range and practice green. Grandpa and Kelly teamed in matches against her eight cousins and the two loved to drive the tree-lined fairways in a cart together.
“Grandpa just really believed in his Kelly,” Gorman’s cousin Jimmy Hughto said. “She was his pride and joy and watching her and the other cousins succeed at shared passions with him like golf gave him the biggest smile.”
So, what would grandpa think of his Kelly qualifying for the most prestigious Adaptive championship available at this week’s U.S. Adaptive Open?
“He would be tickled pink to know that I’m playing in a USGA championship,” she said. “Golf was really his life passion, and his big dream was that one day I’d win a club championship. I’m really proud to say I’ve now won six.”
Say Hughto, “If grandpa knew that Kelly was playing in the U.S. Adaptive Open, it would be the first time in his life that he would be speechless.”
Gorman also was nearly speechless the moment she qualified for the championship on May 7. She called Hughto, and knowing he has a 2-month old daughter at home and is short on time, she still felt compelled to ask him to caddie in the biggest golf championship of her life.
“He cut me off before I could finish and said yes,” Gorman recalls.
“It was a no-brainer for me,” Hughto says. “It’s the honor of a lifetime caddieing for my cousin in this championship.”
It’s fitting that these two get to share this stage at Woodmont because for so many family vacations they were the two cousins who skipped the beach and teed it up at sunrise at whatever local course they could find, scarfed down a quick breakfast, and then completed another 18 or 27.
Gorman now drives a cart on the course and uses a forearm crutch to steady herself approaching every shot. She then lays the crutch down and swings while standing on both feet, with drives between 200-210 yards and a mean draw.
Gorman’s mother Lorri feels a deep satisfaction watching her daughter compete on this stage. When asked the emotions she anticipates feeling this week, Lorri answered not with words of this moment, but with an anecdote from Gorman’s infant years that resonates deeply about her life’s potential.
When Kelly was five weeks old, numerous doctors in the New York area told Lorri and her husband Matt that their daughter would never walk with her condition. However, Dr. Stephen Burke at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City told Gorman’s parents that no one can tell you for certain that she’ll never walk. Instead, he encouraged them by saying he knew “she will make you very, very proud.”
And that’s the overwhelming feeling Lorri has for Gorman at Woodmont.
As Gorman continues her deep reading of Bob Rotella’s books on the mental side of the game, the competitor in her is also feeling an incredible sense of gratitude as she gets set to begin this championship.
“It’s amazing how meaningful this experience is and how grateful I am to have the opportunity to even be preparing for a championship like this right now,” Gorman says. ”I’m like a kid in a candy shop.”
This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
