It was 2:30 in the morning when the announcer finally called on Angela Fuller (B.S., ’03) to run the American Ninja Warrior obstacle course. Despite the late hour and frigid 38-degree temperature, Fuller couldn’t have been happier. Not only because she was set to fulfill a dream of running the course after four years of trying to get on the show, but because only 12 years earlier she had been on disability in chronic pain and struggling to even walk.
“A few months after graduating [from Colorado State University] I was in a terrible car accident and, in the blink of an eye, the life I had known was over,” Fuller explained, her voice hoarse from a weekend of cheering on her teammates at the National Association of Intercollegiate Gymnastics Club Nationals meet in Albuquerque, New Mexico. “I was an athlete my entire life, but after the accident, I didn’t know who I was anymore.”
Before the accident, Fuller had spent most of her life in the air flipping and flying as a gymnast and cheerleader. Born and raised in Littleton, all it took was a visit to see her sister who was studying at CSU to know Ram Country was the place for her.
“CSU was the only school I applied to, and thank goodness I got in,” she said with a big laugh. “I studied marketing in the College of Business, which was so great, and was in the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority, but I would say the highlight of my time at CSU was being a cheerleader.”
Fuller has a series of “firsts,” including being the oldest woman from Colorado (at 42 which, for the record, isn’t old) to compete on American Ninja Warrior, and those series of milestones kicked off for Fuller at CSU where she was part of the first all-female cheerleading squad.
“I loved being on the field and feeling the energy of being so close to the game and the excitement from the crowd,” she said. “It was so magical, especially during the Rocky Mountain Showdown at the old Mile High Stadium when we beat CU Boulder.”
Fuller’s time at CSU was “the best years” of her life, and things were all looking up when she accepted a job right out of college doing sales, marketing, and recruiting. It all came to a screeching halt the day she got into the accident. In the hospital, Fuller was faced with compression fractures, pinched nerves, spinal degeneration, and herniated and bulging discs, not to mention nerve damage that made it unbearable to walk. Her situation was exacerbated during her pregnancy with her second son, which resulted in two more herniated discs and severe postpartum depression. Unable to even sit at desk, Fuller quit her job and, despite becoming a devoted mother and focusing on her family fulltime, felt lost.
“They wanted to fuse my spine, and I said no to that because I knew that would really be it for me,” she said. “When you get a diagnosis like that, it’s very easy to leave the doctor’s office and give up. It was a hard time for me and I hit rock bottom.”
For the better part of a decade, Fuller struggled as she realized the joy she’d experienced as an athlete was probably gone forever. Then her best friend, Chanda, received an even worse diagnosis of stage 4 terminal breast cancer. Watching Chanda valiantly fight through her diagnosis and subsequent treatment gave Fuller her fighting spirit back, and that’s when she decided to stand back up.
“I wanted my life back – to live the life I was to meant to, and I was meant to flip and fly,” she emphasized. “I got a physical therapist and a nutritionist, got back in the gym and into the best shape of my life. I was healed.”
It was a miraculous recovery and, with Chanda cheering her on every step of the way (as well as inspiration from other moms in their 40s who she met at the gym or saw on TV), Fuller set herself three big, seemingly unattainable goals. The first was to compete on American Ninja Warrior, which she did in mid-2023. It was a quick, 30-second moment, but life fulfilling nonetheless, especially because Chanda was able to be there on the sidelines.
“I wore pink in honor of her and everyone said how I was the happiest person to be there they’d ever seen, and I really was. It wasn’t about winning, but about showing everyone you can do it, too,” she said.
Her second goal was to get back into gymnastics, which she was able to do through the NAIGC – an organization that supports adult college and community club gymnastics teams in the U.S. In mid-April at the Nationals Meet in Albuquerque, she was able to complete another first: the oldest woman (at 43 again, not old) to complete the gymnastics decathlon (10 men’s and women’s events, including vault, uneven bars, balance beam, women’s floor, men’s floor, pommel horse, rings, vault, parallel bars, and the high bar.)
“I didn’t even know you could do gymnastics as an adult until I saw another mom do it, and the coolest part is, when I was little, doing a national and international competition wasn’t even possible because you had to be so amazing. To compete as an adult is pretty incredible,” she said.
Fuller excelled so well at the Nationals meet that she will be representing the United States at the 2024 Masters Gymnastics World Cup in Boston, Massachusetts, in June.
“Anyone who is a mom knows it’s the hardest job in the world, and to be able to be a mom and an athlete is the ultimate for me,” she said.
Fuller’s third dream she set herself when life was at its bleakest was to return to the CSU field as a cheerleader. Not just to prove that she could still stunt, flip, fly, and soar like she used to, but because when she was stuck in a chair wondering where she would find the strength to get up and cross the room to care for her children, the one thing that brought a smile to her face were memories of her CSU cheerleading days.
“It’s so hard to explain the feeling when you’re flying through the air and cheering on your team, but I always wanted to get back and feel that again. I didn’t even know it would be possible until the coach invited me to come back and not only cheer, but stunt and tumble as well,” she said.
In 2019 during Homecoming and Family Weekend, Fuller was literally walking on air as her cheermates lifted her up into the “liberty” position on the field in Canvas Stadium.
“I cried,” she said, the emotion from that day still fresh in her mind. “It made the comeback complete.”
Despite fulfilling those goals, Fuller isn’t stopping anytime soon. In between her mom duties, evening trainings, being a fitness instructor, and all the other responsibilities of a full, active life, Fuller is also a motivational speaker determined to show women, especially “older” moms, that life isn’t over until it’s over, and that it’s never too late to set and achieve a dream.
“It’s hard to dream big, but that’s where all the joy, excitement, and good stuff in life lives,” she said. “I think a lot of us have childhood activities like sports and you think, ‘there’s an expiration date on that. You’re too old and you have to move on.’ Nothing expires. If you miss it, go back. Sign up. It’s never too late and you can’t give up. There is no expiration date on your dreams.”
