An archer from Great Britain participating in the Paralympics in Paris competed while seven months pregnant and took home the bronze.
Jodie Grinham won in the women’s individual compound on August 31. She told The Guardian that she made adjustments in her training to accommodate for the fact that she is seven months pregnant, but noted she feels empowered to have been able to compete with her little one on board.
View this post on Instagram
“The baby hasn’t stopped [moving], the baby is saying, what are you doing? It’s been a real honour to know that the baby is there and that little support bubble I’ve got in my belly,” she said.
“It was really starting to worry me that the baby was going to move when I was at full draw and it was going to affect my shot, but my coach and I spent a long time doing little pregnancy prep with her moving me and the bump so I could get used to that feeling. Even during matches today up at full draw I acknowledged it, mummy loves you, I’ll cuddle you in a minute, then carried on doing my processes. Then I gave him a little stroke afterwards and said it’s all fine, I know it’s a lot of noise, a lot of heartbeat.”
READ: Doctors and neonatal nurse save life of 25-week preemie born on flight to Beijing
In a previous interview with the International Paralympic Committee, Grinham said that the road to the Paralympic Games hasn’t been easy, but she was committed to doing her best at her sport.
“I’m going to do everything I can to compete and shoot. Being disabled and being pregnant is hard enough, being an athlete and being pregnant is hard enough, combining all of it… It’s been it’s been a journey. It’s been eventful,” she said. She also described previous fertility issues that made her journey to motherhood difficult.
“I’m not going to hold off having a family anymore for the sake of my career,” she said. “I should be able to do both. And that is exactly what we decided. Here I am seven months pregnant, competing.”
“I want to be a mother and an athlete,” she added. “I’m not willing to sacrifice either of them but at home I am mummy.”
Grinham is not the first pregnant Paralympian to take home a medal. American floor volleyball player and mother of four Lora Webster took home silver during the 2012 London Paralympics while pregnant and gold in the 2021 Tokyo Games while pregnant.
