EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) — An El Paso native is making strides after summiting Mount Everest.
Kayla Perez was born in the Sun City.
Growing up surrounded by one of the country’s most renowned places for climbing, Hueco Tanks, one might think she picked up the sport here. But it wasn’t until Perez moved to Las Vegas, Nevada, that she began mountaineering four years ago.
“I wanted to challenge myself and tackle something that could help me grow as a person, and as a human,” Perez said.
But first, she had to overcome her first obstacle.
“I was actually deathly afraid of heights, and I thought that climbing would help me overcome my fear and catapult me into a direction of self-discovery, and self-growth,” Perez said.
The 35-year-old climber could not stop once she began climbing. Her first peak ascent was Mount Shasta in Southern California, and since then she has been conquering some of the tallest mountains in South and Central America, pushing herself to even greater heights.
“My first Himalayan peak was Ama Dablam. This mountain is particularly terrifying because it is pretty vertical and exposed,” Perez said.
Ama Dablam is located in the eastern Himalayan range of the Koshi Province in Nepal. The 22,349-foot mountain is considered the third most popular Himalayan peak for permitted expeditions.
Perez then developed a pulmonary edema.
“A condition developed at high altitude, it involves swelling of the lungs, and if you don’t descend in 24 hours, you can die,” Perez said.
Perez called it quits, and after numerous other attempts, she decided to see a specialist to help her properly acclimatize to the high altitude.
“When I was in Nepal, I said, why not just go for the highest mountain and try it out?” Perez said,
That is exactly what Perez did. On May 26, she summited the tallest peak in the world, standing at 29,035 feet above sea level, and known for being one of the deadliest too.
Thousands of people attempt to reach the summit each year, but many are faced with the harsh climate, altitude sickness, low oxygen levels, fatigue, among other challenges.
“It can take a person about 10 weeks to climb Mt. Everest, due to the numerous breaks that climbers take at each base to adapt to the altitude,” according to the National Center for Biotechnology Information.
It took Perez seven weeks to reach the summit. Despite her health obstacles, she persisted.
“Every day was a constant battle. But I learned to work with the mountains and not against them,” Perez said. “I learned to develop a really strong mindset and keep going, preserve and allow these struggles to teach me rather than me fight them. And before you know it, I was on top of the world.”
Perez describes the feeling at the top as “surreal.”
“There was this overwhelming gratitude that the mountains allowed me to stand foot on top of it and all of the struggles, not just in the mountains, but in life, because this mountain was with so much more than a mountain. It was a metaphor for me. It was something that it was a breaking. It was the breakthrough for me,” Perez said.
Perez is already planning her next big conquest, Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, for this upcoming December.
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