SACO — At 17, Saco’s Adam Baillargeon was enjoying life. He was a three-sport athlete at Thornton Academy, competing in soccer, track and baseball, and like a lot of kids from Maine, he enjoyed skiing at Sugarloaf and Sunday River.

Then his life took a cruel turn when doctors diagnosed him with Synovia cell sarcoma, a rare form of cancer.

“It was devastating,” Baillargeon said recently, while sipping on a cup of coffee at a Dunkin’ Donuts in Biddeford. “My world collapsed around me.”

Baillargeon, now 29, underwent surgery to remove the tumor and went through five months of chemotherapy and radiation. In the fall of 2001, after he had recovered, Baillargeon was granted a ski trip through the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which ultimately changed his life.

The trip was a chance to ski with professional skier Shane McConkey on Squaw Mountain in California ”“ and it turned out to be an adventure that would lead him to positively changing lives.

In October 2007, after graduating from the University of Southern Maine with a degree in media studies, Baillargeon returned to Squaw Valley, where he took a marketing job. That’s where, a few months later, he met Roy Tuscany, who was trying to get his grassroots, nonprofit fundraiser off the ground. The two talked and Baillargeon started attending weekly meetings with Tuscany concerning the fundraising foundation.

It wasn’t long before Baillargeon took over the marketing duties for Tuscany’s High Fives Foundation in Truckee, Calif. The foundation is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) that is the preeminent foundation of its kind in skiing. It’s a staple of the Tahoe, Calif. area, raising money and awareness for athletes who have suffered a life-altering injury while pursuing a dream in the winter action sports community.

As of August 2012, the foundation had raised $900,000 in its three-year history, thanks to the efforts of Baillargeon, Tuscany and employee Steve Wallace.

The three share equally tragic stories that led them to where they are now. In 2006, Tuscany, who is from Vermont, broke his back on Mammoth Mountain terrain park in California after over-jumping a step-up jump. He was told he would never walk again.

“A radiation specialist told me that,” Tuscany, 31, said. “I was like, ”˜I’m not going to listen to you. You’re not my doctor.’ I was defiant that I would walk again.”

Not only is he walking today, he’s also skiing.

A day after Tuscany’s accident, the Sugar Bowl Ski Team Foundation set up an umbrella fund called Roy’s Recovery Fund. Supporters raised $25,000 in the first week following his injury and $85,000 over two years. The money went toward physical therapy, and disability and adaptive ski equipment.

Tuscany said he wanted to return the favor and help athletes who sustained life-altering spinal injuries reach their goals, of which Baillargeon said he wanted to be a part.

“I really agreed with the awesome work they were doing,” he said. “I went through a devastating part of my life and I wanted to be a part of something that would help people who went through something similar to what I went through.”

Still, Baillargeon almost didn’t take the marketing job with High Fives. He said he was concerned that he wouldn’t survive financially at a start-up, nonprofit company.

Tuscany wouldn’t take no for an answer, however, and the next day secured $250,000 from a donor to pay for management and the cost of running the foundation. Baillargeon agreed to come aboard full-time and the move has paid off.

Baillargeon and Tuscany, along with Wallace ”“ who also returned to skiing after breaking several vertebrae in a fall ”“ have now helped 40 athletes meet their goals and overcome their debilitating injuries.

One of those athletes is Jake Hickman. While skiing at a U.S. Freestyle team selection event on Dec. 22, 2011, Hickman caught the edge of his ski going off a jump. He landed on his back on the ice and sustained a compression/burst fracture to his T7 and T8 vertebra, which compressed his spinal cord and left him numb from the chest down. His goal at the time was to make the U.S. freestyle ski team and ski on the World Cup Circuit.

“I was extremely close, but all of a sudden I was paralyzed,” Hickman said, via email. “The big question at the time was if I would be able to walk again, let alone ski. After the surgery, I was blacked out for a week, but I remember being told that High Fives was going to support my recovery.”

Being able to enjoy skiing again was Hickman’s new goal, which has come true thanks to the High Fives Foundation.

“I got a call from Roy Tuscany ”¦ and I think it’s safe to say that was the most positive conversation of my life,” Hickman said. “Without High Fives, I feel like I would be struggling to find my passion for skiing again, but instead, I am surrounded by a group of people that have helped me back to the same spot I was at before I got hurt.”

Both Baillargeon and Tuscany were recently in Maine, where they spoke to students at C.K. Burns School in Saco and Thornton Academy Middle School about High Fives and achieving goals.

In November 2012, Baillargeon, Tuscany and Wallace were featured in a five-page spread in “Powder” magazine, a leading worldwide skiing publication. Tuscany and Baillargeon wanted to tell the students at the two schools about achieving the goal of making it into the pages of “Powder,” which Tuscany thought would never happen after his ski accident.

“My goal before the accident was to get a photo into the magazine as a professional skier,” Tuscany said. “After I broke my back, I didn’t think that was going to ever happen, but not only did it happen, I got a five-page spread. I wanted to tell the kids that story so they know that whatever happens in their lives, their dreams can still come true.”

Baillargeon and Tuscany have goals for the organization, too, such as raising more than $4 million to help injured athletes achieve their goals, which can range from competing in the Olympics, to simply skiing again with one’s fiancée.

They also want to expand the foundation to the East Coast.

“I was really excited to be back in Maine,” Baillargeon said. “We are excited to bring Maine into the High Fives Foundation scope.”

— Contact Al Edwards at 282-1535, Ext. 323.