Even as a teen mom, Judy Robles never let her son think he couldn’t be a champion
Judy Ochoa’s mom sat by her side as the doctor broke the news.
The doctor reassured Becky Ochoa that her 16-year-old daughter was not sick. Her teenager was eight months pregnant.
The memory is a blur for Judy — whose last name is now Robles — but not because some 25 years have passed.
She would like to forget that she was to blame for the tears that spilled from her strong-willed
mother’s eyes. Even today, the recollection caused Robles to catch her breath and hold back her own tears.
“I just remember sitting in a room, where there was a big desk. I don’t know, I guess I don’t really want to think about that whole thing,” Robles said as she pressed her hands into her lap and took a deep breath.
“It was intense. My mom was crying and honestly, I don’t know how long we were sitting there,” she said. “I don’t remember what happened after that.”
Finding she was pregnant at 16 was not a Hallmark-card Mother’s Day moment.
Robles was from a traditional Catholic family, and went to Catholic school. She could have given her baby up for adoption; her parents said the decision was hers to make. Judy never considered adoption; she wanted to keep her baby, though she knew the challenges would be big.
But when her son was born, she would face a challenge she never imagined. He had one leg.
“His other leg was perfect, his face (was perfect), just his other leg was gone,” Robles remembered thinking as she cradled her son for the first time. “He was my baby.”
Robles named him Anthony Marc: Anthony after her mom’s favorite saint; Marc after her dad.
At 24, Anthony Marc Robles is known to the world as a three-time AllAmerican wrestler, the 2011 Division I NCAA national champion and a member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. He tours as a motivational speaker, and in September published his autobiography, “Unstoppable — From Underdog to Undefeated: How I Became a Champion.”
And at 41, Judy Robles is the mother of five children — next year will be the first since Anthony was a toddler that she’ll have only one at home — and is the director of parent and family engagement for Arizona State University’s Preparatory Academy.
Judy’s story of motherhood is filled with details that are still painful for her to recall. But she hopes other families, other mothers, know there is always a chance to beat the odds.
‘It was scary’
Judy met Anthony’s biological father at a party during her junior year of high school. When a friend of Judy’s told him Judy was pregnant, he wanted nothing to do with her or the baby.
Judy gave birth on July 20, 1988. Her parents were the ones who told her that he didn’t have a right leg. Judy asked to see her son.
“It was scary,” she said. “My parents were there for a little while and then they left and I got to be alone with him.”
She counted fingers, toes, arms and a leg.
“I just remember opening his blanket and taking a look at him and then that was it,” she said.
“I was like, ‘OK. He’s
‘‘ Sure, we had some rough patches. ... It’s made me who I am.”
Wrestling champion sure he knew that.
“I told Anthony, ‘I don’t see you as disabled. I’ve never treated you that way. I see you as Anthony with a single leg.’
“There’s a difference here because Anthony missing a leg is going to figure out how to go about life missing a leg.
“If I treat him as if he’s disabled, I’m kind of making him lean on me, but I want him to be independent of me.”