Eliseo Villanueva on why golf is his therapy
Being a Paratrooper, Eliseo Villanueva was more equipped than many to handle adversity. The US Army veteran explains: “In the airborne community we say, ‘Adapt and overcome, and continue on with your mission’.” Well practised in taking the ultimate leap of faith, Eliseo has made 120 parachute jumps out of aircraft for his country.
The severe injury to his dominant left arm on the training ground in 1993 was a potential long-term blow. The 26-year-old thrived on the pressure of serving his country as a member of the 82nd Airborne Division (known by many as America’s ‘Guard of Honour’). A surgeon operated to try to re-attach the radial head in the elbow but a year later this had still not healed correctly and had to be removed.
But Eliseo was a tough individual. A veteran of numerous journeys into military combat zones, including tours in Panama, Iraq and Afghanistan, he knew he would find a way to adapt. No more of his beloved basketball perhaps with the arm the way it was, but Eliseo insisted on maintaining an active role in combat to support his colleagues.
Physically speaking Eliseo, or ‘Eli’ to his friends, could still punch above his weight. Mentally, things would later change.
Eliseo tells us: “My injury did limit my abilities to perform certain activities and tasks, and it took me a while to finally accept it. Having done this, I tried to live my life as normally as possible. I resumed all activities as a soldier, including airborne operations and combat deployments. I did not complain nor make excuses for my injury.
“For me it became the ‘new normal’, I just did some things a little differently from before. I can also say that the phrase ‘Adapt and Overcome’ has become a big part of how I live my life today.” Eliseo is now 57 and married to wife Juvilee (they have sons Christian and Andrew) and they live at Fort Liberty (formerly Fort Bragg), in North Carolina.
The present is good, the past more challenging. A darker legacy around Eliseo’s feeling of duty in serving on the front line came when he and a number of his fellow Paratroopers developed post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). For this thoughtful family-orientated man, developing PTSD came not through one specific incident “but was a case of a combination of many different dangerous operations”.
Life was no longer lived with the confidence borne out of training and operational service alongside close comrades. Something was needed to help him cope with feelings of anxiety, and Eliseo will reveal that taking up golf as a 36-year-old became a game changer.
“I can say that golf has been a lifesaver for me… a unique basis for physical and mental recovery from my injuries during my time in the Army,” he says. Eliseo had always loved the basketball court. He couldn’t move the basketball well with his injured arm but he would find a way to control the golf ball with genuine skill to play off a 1.4 golf handicap.
“Today, golf is a form of therapy for me. I love the competitiveness, the challenge and camaraderie. It has also provided many opportunities to meet different people and opened many doors for me as well.”
Eliseo adds: “Golf has been a big part of how I deal with post traumatic stress. It’s a great de-stressing activity. It calms me down, it makes me focus, it drives me to get better, and it has enhanced my life in so many ways.”
He is a serious golfer in terms of his skill level, a competitive player in high level amateur tournaments, and leading most recently to qualifying for selection via the World Ranking for Golfers with Disability to play for Team USA in the G4D Tour @ Betfred British Masters (26-27 August, 2024) at The Belfry, in England’s West Midlands – this series of events run by the DP World Tour and supported by EDGA being seen as the pinnacle in ‘G4D’ (golf for the disabled).
Having mentioned his tournament golf, Eliseo revealed that just earlier that same day he had shot a 75 and missed the playoff by just two shots for a spot in the US Senior Amateur Championship.
“I was happy and very proud with my score,” he says. “The course was set up at 6,756 yards and played even longer with the amount of rain that we had. I competed in a field of 69 with some of the best senior amateur golfers out there, and to finish tied for 9th overall and as the only adaptive golfer in the field, this was a huge accomplishment for me.”
Grit, determination, these seem to be a part of what makes Eliseo tick. Where did that come from if not the Army?
He was born in a small town near the city of Valencia in the Bukidnon region of the Philippines. His family’s later migration to Hawaii and the island of Kauai in 1980 when Eliseo was 13 is a remarkable testament to a man’s determination and vision. Eliseo’s father Corazon DeJesus Villanueva travelled to Hawaii alone at first to provide for his wife and five children; he became a US citizen and eventually petitioned for the rest of the family to join him – “two at a time”.
Eliseo explains: “My two oldest brothers first, then my other elder brother and I, and finally my mother and sister. A process that took almost 20 years for all of my immediate family to be together again. My father worked for a sugar cane plantation and we lived in one of multiple plantation houses in the middle of the sugar cane field in various locations.”
Eliseo continues: “Was it hard? I didn’t think so growing up. We made do with what we had. We had vegetable gardens, went along with my Dad fishing, and did what we had to do to help with anything and everything. It reminded me of growing up in the Philippines where I remember going out fishing with very limited equipment (we used bamboo as poles), and ‘jigged’ for frogs after a good rain. I worked some in the backyard vegetable garden just so I could help my Mom and have something to prepare for a meal. I also remember my late mother and I at a very young age going out to work at a neighbour’s cornfield from sun up to sun down for 10 Pesos for the whole day, the equivalent of less than $1.70.”
After graduating from high school in 1985, Eliseo had chosen to enlist in the US Army soon after. He worked through ‘jump school’ (learning to parachute), and then served in Logistics for the 82nd Airborne at the front line.
Training took him to different US bases before making Fort Liberty in North Carolina his real home with Juvilee and the kids and today he plays most of his golf at Fort Liberty Family & MWR’s two courses. He was deployed for combat first in Panama, then served multiple combat tours to Iraq and Afghanistan. “I spent my last 11 years of active duty in a special missions unit within the United States Army Special Operations Command,” Eliseo explains. “There was always a great camaraderie between us, whether we were doing training, airborne operations, or in combat.”
After retiring from active service after 22 years, Eliseo continued to serve the US Army for another 16 years as an Army Civilian, and again retired at the end of March, 2024.
During this transition period golf started to become a central passion.
He explains: “I learned how to play golf with my injured elbow around 2003. Two family friends who were also in the military kept asking me to go play with them for a long while, then finally one day, I took them up on their offer, and that was the beginning of my golfing career (if you want to call it that).
“Initially, I simply enjoyed the fun of playing with my friends and then my competitive nature drove me to try and get better. After I would get off duty, I would go to one of the three nearby golf courses and practise on the driving range and putting area before I headed home. I didn’t know it back then, but golf was actually becoming a form of therapy and de-stressing all at the same time.”
Happy to share his thoughts on the value of the game for its players, Eliseo reiterates how feelings of stress can slide away once on the fairways and greens. For a man who has endured symptoms of PTSD, his experience of golf has been both calming and life-affirming.
“I would say give golf a try… just like me, it took me a while to finally give it a go and I am very grateful to my friends to this day.”
Eliseo is content to combine his key amateur events with testing himself in G4D, or adaptive golf as it is known in the US; one of his highlights has been to qualify for three successive USGA US Adaptive Opens. “This has been so awesome. I would never have expected an opportunity to play in a USGA championship, so this was a dream come true for sure.”
Other feathers in his cap include being men’s overall winner of the 2022 USDGA Championship, and the Inaugural Florida Adaptive Open (2023).
“I am now very much looking forward to the G4D Tour event at The Belfry and representing Team USA. My wife Juvilee will be travelling with me as my caddie and all our friends from my club and Fort Liberty will be cheering me on during the event.
“I would like to take this opportunity to say thanks to EDGA, the G4D Tour and the DP World Tour for providing opportunities like this to the adaptive golfers from around the world. I am very grateful and very thankful that I’m getting this chance not only for myself but also for being able to represent my country.”
Eliseo will be adding The Belfry to the list of the great golf courses he has played, including Pinehurst No: 2 (Payne Stewart won the US Open there in 1999), Arnold Palmer’s Bay Hill Club, Royal Lytham & St Annes (the venue of many Open Championships), and Shinnecock Hills Golf Club which has hosted five US Opens.
Eliseo still relishes sociable golf with his friends and his quick sense of humour makes him a popular figure, but not one to bet against too hastily.
When we push him he says: “I would say my golf strengths are my short game, keeping the ball in play off the tees, being pretty consistent and somewhat accurate, and it’s the perseverance and mental attitude. I still have the never-give-up attitude I learned with my comrades.
“Today I play with my regular group (all veterans), and when they make a very good chip or pitch from around the greens, they will say: ‘Oh, I did an Eli..’ I might not react but I do like to hear that from time to time.”
Eliseo adds: “Encouragement from my friends for me to try golf came at a crucial time to help me with my wellbeing. Golf was so important. I just love to play, whether that is in the sunshine and breeze of my home course at Fort Liberty or in 40-mile winds at a famous links course like Royal Lytham & St Annes in England. It’s a game everyone should try if they can – even if you just have a chip and a putt to start – because it can make you feel good about life and its possibilities.”
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