MACKINAW — Just days after the 2016 Olympics kicked off in Rio, some athletes are already looking ahead to the 2020 games.

Told she'd never walk again, Ashley Green may seem an unlikely Olympic hopeful, but the 26-year-old amputee has never given up on the goals she set for herself as a teenager — even when others said they'd be impossible to reach.

"I had doctors telling me I would be lucky to walk again or ever do this again or whatever, and at first you let that sink in and let it take over, but I've always been the type of person that you can't tell me 'can't' because I don't believe in it. If I find I can't do something, then yeah, I'll accept it, but I'm not going to let somebody else just tell me that I can't," she said in a recent interview.

Green is a member of the Paralympic A2 sitting volleyball team, a training team for athletes that might compete on Team USA. Eight years ago, she'd harbored ambitions of playing volleyball at the University of Illinois, but repeated surgeries and complications made it clear that was an opportunity she'd likely never have.

"I honestly thought eight years ago when I didn't get the college opportunity that (my volleyball career) was over," she said.

But now, she's determined to get back on the court and create the life she's always wanted for herself.

'It just kept spiraling'

Eight years ago, Green was a junior and two-sport athlete at Peoria Notre Dame with aspirations to take her volleyball game to the collegiate level. A series of ankle injuries left her with only a fraction of the ligaments in her right ankle intact. The few that remained were snapped during a car crash, and doctors said she'd need ligament reconstruction surgery after nearly a year of physical therapy didn't help.

"It was supposed to be six to eight weeks recovery," the Mackinaw native said, "and it just didn't turn out that way."

Green made the decision to sit out of sports for her senior year of high school, hoping she'd recover in time to try out for the volleyball team at the University of Illinois.

"I have seen lots of people who had the same procedure that she’s had, so I certainly had expectations that she would return to normal function and normal sports," said Bre Reynolds, a physical therapist at Rock Valley Physical Therapy who has worked with Green during her recovery. "Even after her next couple of procedures, I still had the expectation that she was going to return to full function."

But while Green and her family were following the advice of doctors and hoping for the best, the function of her foot and ankle seemed to be getting worse, not better.

"It just seemed like it was one surgery after another but we weren't making progress. We were actually (regressing)," said her mother, Gayelynn Green.

Ashley Green would have eight surgeries in six years trying to repair the original damage to her ankle and then to reverse the effects of surgical complications.

"I think about that third surgery is when me and my parents both realized that things were really wrong," she said. "It just kept spiraling."

Eventually her ankle was so contorted her foot was fixed into a point, "almost like I was doing gymnastics," with toes curled. She hadn't walked without the aid of crutches for years when doctors made a shocking recommendation.

"About three years ago they finally basically said it was either going to be decide to amputate my leg or they could try to fuse it but I'd be on crutches probably for the rest of my life without a functioning ankle," Green said.

Green's right leg was amputated below the knee at Cleveland Clinic in March 2015.

An athlete again

Having an amputation was far from an easy decision for Green to make for herself, but even harder was accepting a life that meant she'd always walk with crutches or, at best, a limp, and likely never run or play sports again. She saw her best path forward without the foot that so many surgeries had rendered useless.

It was time to move on.

"If I stayed looking back at those eight years, I'd just be angry at the surgeon who messed up and different things that have gone on," Green said.

While the amputation offered new opportunity, Green's years on crutches had caused its own damage to her shoulder, back and spine, making her already unique situation even more complicated.

Not using her right leg for several years left her bones and muscles weak and atrophied. Even with the help of a prosthetic, the leg can't support her full body weight, so she continues to use crutches.

There aren't very many young amputees in the Peoria area, Green knows, and even experienced professionals are often untrained to work with someone like Green.

"Everybody I ever went to, whether its physical therapy or training or whatever, because my case is so unique, they were almost afraid of it," Green said.

She still had a love for volleyball and though she knew she was far from being able to step back on the court, she went to the RiverPlex Recreation and Wellness Center last summer to watch rec league games, where she was introduced to trainer Justin Bolkema.

A sports performance and personal training coordinator at the RiverPlex, Bolkema works with collegiate athletes to improve their strength and conditioning. Never before had he worked with an amputee, but he opened the lines of communication with her physical therapists and medical team who gave him the insight he needed to be confident in their customized workout plans. Because of Green's complicated injuries and chronic pain, Bolkema makes frequent adjustments to her workout routine based on input from Green or from her medical team.

"We'll just try to find other creative ways to push her. If we need to scale back on the weights, then we'll try to do something a little more intense in the pool so she still gets the mental (challenge) that every athlete craves," Bolkema said.

"It's very understood by all of us that it's going to be a two steps forward, one step back approach, but making sure that we don't take two steps forward and three steps back because we do too much."

Their goals are for Green to walk unassisted, and, one day, run. She wanted to get back on the volleyball court, whether competitively or just for fun.

But mostly she's working toward a quality of life and independence that she lost during her years-long struggle, and to feel like herself again.

"I'm still not totally back to myself, but I'm starting to notice I'm definitely back to my — and he'll admit it — my smartass self, which anybody in my family would have told you for the last eight years that was nonexistent," Green said. "I was pretty much walking through life. I wasn't enjoying it."

'Comeback kid'

Just more than a year since her amputation, Green has made major improvements, but when she was first encouraged to try out for the Paralympic Games sitting volleyball team, she wasn't sure she was up to the challenge.

Other amputees who'd had longer to adjust to the loss of limb, she thought, would be much better, but with encouragement from her family, trainer and physical therapist, she tried out, and made the second-tier team for Team USA.

"I definitely learned that it's a lot more demanding than standing volleyball, which I never would have expected," Green said.

Sitting volleyball is played much like its conventional counterpart, but on a smaller scale. The net is about 3 and a half feet high and the court is 10 meters by 6 meters. Players must keep one "cheek" on the floor anytime they make contact with the ball.

Because you're using your hands to help you move across the floor, players must be quick to get in position before they get their hands up to hit the ball, meaning accurate passes and sets are a must for a team to be effective.

The experience training with other Paralympic athletes has been eye-opening for Green, not just revealing what she's capable of post-amputation, but also the impressive feats of other amputees.

One woman on the team, she says, is an expert setter despite having only one hand; another, with one leg removed above the knee and the other below, can beat Green's times in their mobility drills.

Green still has daily struggles in her recovery, and in covering expenses for both her medical and training appointments and her travel to the Olympic and Paralympic training site in Oklahoma, where the sitting volleyball team meets every few months to train. She's trying to find sponsors, but she's never given up on the goals she set for herself as a teenager. She's just adapted her definition of success.

"No matter what injury you encounter, if you want something, you keep going for it. You just have to know your limitations and what you can and can't do, then find a way around that,"

She's got a playlist of uplifting songs she turns to for encouragement, including songs by Sanctus Real and Gym Class Heroes.

A current favorite is "Comeback Kid" by The Band Perry, which includes the lyrics, "Don't know why bad things happened, but they did / I don't think I deserve the hurt I get, but I'm made for it / It's not the end, no, it's not the end / I'm a comeback kid."

The journey, her mother says, has been an "emotional rollercoaster." They've experienced sadness and anger, yes, but now they've moved on to happiness and success. Ashley's now training for the Paralympics, tutoring and coaching young girls and working toward her college degree. She hopes to become a physical therapist.

"She sees there is life after, and great things could happen. Did I ever think Paralympics? Absolutely not. That's just icing on the cake," said Gayelynn Green.

Those nine long years, Ashley says now, have taught her that the only limitations are the ones we put on ourselves.

"If you want something, you can achieve it," she said. "There's always ways around it, but it's up to you to find the different way."

Laura Nightengale is the Journal Star's health and lifestyle reporter. She can be reached at 686-3181 or lnightengale@pjstar.com. Follow her on Twitter @lauranight.