AElena Semechin’s wish list already includes a trip to Lisbon, the legendary Burning Man Festival in Nevada, a parachute jump, a diving license and eventually children. But that can wait a bit, because in the midst of her one-year chemotherapy the swimming Paralympic champion has made her sporting comeback. “It was my first competition in my new life and it felt like my first ever. And I haven’t forgotten it yet,” said the 28-year-old, who had a brain tumor removed at the beginning of last November, the German Press Agency on Friday.
At the International German Championships in Berlin, she finished second in the national classification on her parade distance of 100 meters breaststroke in 1:18.54 minutes. “I didn’t have any strength on the second lane, but I like to push things to the limit,” says the visually impaired swimmer about her first competition 212 days after her triumph in Tokyo. In the lead-up she even swam 1:16.84 minutes on Thursday and was only three seconds ahead of her Tokyo time. She also overcame her fears, because “it could have gone wrong. But I wanted to face the truth.” On Saturday, if her strength allows, she also wants to start in the 50 meter breaststroke.
Last October, Semechin, who won gold in Japan under her maiden name Krawzow nine weeks earlier, was diagnosed with a brain tumor. The heavy operation followed on November 3rd. After six weeks of radiation therapy, which began in late December, her chemotherapy started in late February. The second cycle only ended last Sunday. And unlike the first one, it really blew her mind.
“It was like you imagine a shitty chemo, it didn’t work at all. It was also difficult mentally, how am I supposed to keep going ten more times?” says Germany’s Para Athlete of the Year. But she fights, doesn’t want to give cancer too much space. The chemo, for which she takes pills five days a month, ends in February 2023. “I know what I’m going through. I have to go through that.”
Her big goal is to start at the World Championships in Madeira from June 12th to 18th. “The World Cup as a goal gives me a lot of support and distracts me. I don’t think so much about cancer anymore,” says Semechin, who can only see up to two percent due to the insidious onset of Stargardt’s disease.
“I realized that I’m not going to get that old”
The Berliner knows that according to doctors, the tumor will probably come back in ten to 15 years. “That’s when I really realized that I’m not getting that old,” says Semechin, trying to draw mostly positive things from the bad diagnosis. “I have to live in the now and can’t put things off until later. I have become much more relaxed, enjoy every day and still live very happily.”
She wants to continue until 2024 in Paris. “Then we’ll see. Then would also be the time when the body is detoxified from the chemo and when you could have children. I would try that then,” says Semechin. Until then, she will certainly check off one or two items on her wish list.
