Meet Adaptive Athlete: Byron Biggins

Byron Biggins was raised between Dallas and Gladewater, Texas. Growing up, he was active in little league football, baseball, and basketball, building early teamwork and athletic drive. In high school at David W. Carter (class of 1985), he shifted focus to marching and jazz band, mastering alto, tenor, and soprano saxophone plus clarinet. After graduation, he carried that competitive spirit into the military, where he played flag football, tackle football, and basketball on base teams, while enjoying timeless games like dominoes and cards - hobbies he still cherishes today.

Byron enlisted in the Marine Corps on July 16, 1985, serving until March 31, 2000, and rising to Staff Sergeant (SSgt), where he led Marines in various roles. He began in supply, became a marksmanship instructor, and finished as a purchasing and contracting specialist.

Multiple injuries marked his time in service and beyond. In the 1990s, he fractured his left ankle during an on-base flag football game, strained his back on a 10-mile force march in full gear, dislocated his right shoulder in a basketball game, and underwent left knee surgery. Later, as a city letter carrier in Dallas from 2001 to 2019, he endured ten more surgeries: four on the shoulders, two each on left wrist/forearm and right knee, one more on the left knee, and one on the right ankle. Recovery was brutal, involving substances, prescription pain killers, and alcohol use, jail stints, bar fights, family alienation, massive weight gain to over 300 pounds, and a dark moment facing a bullet meant to end it all. Hitting rock bottom sparked change: counseling, daily Bible study and reading, sobriety from trouble, moderated drinking, weight loss, and renewed community focus through volunteer work with The Mission Continues and Travis Manion Foundation, plus coaching little league sports. He earned a bachelor's in Marketing (2016) and master's in Global Management (2019) along the way, and plans to start his doctorate this fall at an HBCU.

Today, Byron is a self-described work in progress - resilient, reflective, and forward-looking. Physically, he aims to complete a 5K or 10K walk/run (as even a block hurts now), bench press his body weight, and rebuild leg strength to leg press 400–500 pounds. Mentally, he wants to recenter under life's pressures by slowing his heart rate and mind, regaining calm and clarity to stay grounded in what matters most.