A Tullahoma man confined to a wheelchair by cerebral palsy set out to break stereotypes by jumping out of a plane from 16,000ft. in the air.
Even though he has never been able to walk, Terry O'Brien has never been one to go through life bound by limits.
"We treated him like a normal child," his dad Bill O'Brien said.
From the moment his son was born, Bill thought he knew what life might be like.
"You are trapped, his mind is trapped in a body that won't work," and that he said has taken so much away from his son.
Cerebral palsy has kept Terry confided to a wheelchair for 47 years but he has always found a way to standout even if he couldn't stand on his own. Picture show a young Terry water skiing, driving a golf cart even going to his high school prom.
"And he's tough," Bill added.
So it came as no surprise to Bill a few weeks back when he got a text from his son saying he wanted to go sky diving. With the help of nurses at Life Care Center in Tullahoma, Terry found a way to break free of life's limits.
"I wouldn't jump out of a perfectly good airplane for anybody, but it's something he wants to do," Bill said about his son's latest adventure.
If Terry was nervous at all his smile hid it well.
Sky diving instructor Dan Roberts met Terry at the Tullahoma airport on Wednesday and showed him the harness he would use to strap Terry to his chest.
"The harness allows us to take him up even though he can't use his legs to land," Dan said.
Then at 16,000 ft. Terry O'Brien took a leap of faith. He's never walked a day in his life but on Wednesday he felt what it is like to fly.
For ten minutes the weight of living 47 years with a debilitating disease, drifted away.
"Being handicap don't stop him," Bill said as he watched his son fall weightlessly from the sky.
Without his wheelchair, the sky was the limit.
