The sun was setting over the mountains in Colorado Springs when Nick Noland strapped into a pair of blades where his feet used to be.

The local man was a runner before his highly publicized disaster three years ago on a 14,000-foot peak. Thanks to these sturdy, bouncy prosthetics, he’s a runner again.

“When my accident happened in 2019, one of the first things I thought of was whether or not I’d be able to run again, because it has been such a big part of my life,” he says.

Three years ago, he didn’t think he’d be back on the trail like this, moving with these steady, methodical strides that always moved him through hard times. The husband and father of two didn’t think he’d find this kind of fulfillment again, this relief.

The school teacher didn’t think he’d be teaching again. He is. Now he has a message for his young students.

“A lot of them come from disadvantaged places in life,” says his mother, Susan. “And, you know, they can look at him on two prosthetic legs, and they can see he made it. He has rallied.”

Three years ago in that hospital bed, another thing Noland didn’t expect was for his story to become so public. One reporter called about that night on Mount Shavano, then another.

“At that point I just decided I was going to document this pivotal moment of my life,” Noland says. “I’m glad I did.”

He was glad to be a cautionary tale, he wrote in an essay published by Outside Magazine. “I don’t mind being the person someone thinks about when they consider the risks of climbing,” he wrote.

Now, he’s telling another side of the story.

For as much as his recovery has been physical, it has been equally, if not more, mental.

Three years ago, just as he left that hospital to navigate life as an amputee, he left with a diagnosis that would change everything even more.

“I was really struggling even before the accident. … It was a struggle for months leading up to the accident,” Noland says. “And it turns out, that was the bipolar.”

That was the diagnosis in the days after surgery. His behavior leading up to it prompted doctors to call in a specialist.

“I just broke down in tears,” Noland says. “It immediately made sense.”

Those sleepless nights and days where he could not will himself out of bed. The ups and downs all his life. The depression he tried to shake that late afternoon three years ago, when he decided to drive to Shavano. His wife insisted he stay home.

“I think I really just wanted to feel accomplished or successful at something,” Noland says. “That’s part of the impulsivity side of it. Not thinking about the consequences or precautions you’re supposed to take.”

Big mountains were nothing new to him; they were what brought him to Colorado in 2011. Getting up Shavano was no problem. He reached the summit and watched the sunset.

Getting down was the problem.

In the darkness, Noland realized he was off trail. He found himself in a deep, steep valley covered with snow and downed trees. It was October. It was cold and windy.

Search and rescue advised he stay put. He did for a while, curled up and shivering beside the timber. He thought he would die there. He thought about his wife, his two boys. He thought about friends he had lost in recent years, victims of substance abuse and suicide.

“I started thinking about them and the life they didn’t get to live,” Noland says. “It motivated me to push on.”

He pushed on, however numb his feet. Miraculously back at his car, he discovered they were discolored and mangled. He was rushed to the hospital.

“It’s all kind of a blur now,” Noland says.

Later, in his wheelchair in front of a psychiatrist, time seemed to stand still.

The bipolar diagnosis “was a lot at once,” says Noland’s mother. “I think it really opened our eyes to just being aware of your total health. So much of it does depend on your mental wellness. And so as hard as that news was, it was a relief.”

A relief, Noland agrees. Now he didn’t have to hurt so much. He’d go to therapy and start medication.

It’s strange to think, he says now. But “because of my accident, I was able to get treatment, and a lot of things in my life started to make sense.”

Months later, time slowed again amid the COVID-19 lockdown. It’s strange, maybe terrible to think, Noland knows. “But I’m thankful in a way, because it put the whole world on pause, and I was able to recover on my own at my own pace. … It gave me a chance to evaluate my entire life.”

And he could evaluate the world around him, a larger population he didn’t know about before. In the U.S., nearly 1 in 5 adults live with a mental illness, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.

Without his feet, Noland came to realize people treated him different. They were kinder, opening the door for him and whatnot. If only that larger population got the same kind of treatment, he thought.

“There’s plenty of people who have an invisible disability that affects their life, maybe even worse than something like an amputation,” he says.

Amputation posed no small adjustment. During the pandemic lockdown, Noland’s family could be there every step of the way. Before the steps on an initial set of prosthetics, there was a lot of crawling. There was a lot of pain.

There was a lot of wishing. He wished he could run again, as he did since his high school cross-country days. Those first prosthetics weren’t right for it.

“There’s nothing like getting into a groove on a trail and kind of forgetting about everything else,” Noland says. “I always liked running because you have to focus on it. It kind of takes over your consciousness. It’s relaxing in a way.”

It’s possible again thanks to the blades by Levitate, the brand started by an amputee with a vision to make “durable, athletic gear for those who want to get back out there,” according to the company website.

Noland is back out there. Not long ago, he ran his first 5K on the blades. People cheered on the sidelines, people who only saw what they saw, only the physical.

“I heard people say things like, ‘Hell yeah! Look at that guy!’ I got a lot of high-fives,” Noland says. “I’m grateful I get that. I’m fortunate. I feel like everyone deserves that.”