One of the American Paralympians competing in Paris on Saturday has a grim backstory she wants the world to hear. Tracy Otto is a 28-year-old archer who was paralyzed from the chest down during a brutal attack by an ex-boyfriend in 2019, reports the BBC. Otto also lost her left eye when her ex shot it out with a pellet gun. It was during her recovery that she took up archery. “I have always wanted to leave an impact on this world, and be a light,” she says. “There is so much darkness and hate, I can’t justify not talking about and being an example for people hurt like me.”
The Florida resident is supported through all this by boyfriend Ricky Riessle, who is with her in Paris. The two of them were asleep that night in 2019 when Otto’s ex broke in, stabbing both and shooting them at close range with the pellet gun. Riessle survived with a collapsed lung. “She had a smile on her face the second the tubes came out,” he recalls of Otto, per the AP. “Just her determination and drive was amazing.” Their attacker is now serving a 40-year prison sentence.
“I never thought that my life would rise from the ashes as it has,” says Otto, who was an aspiring fitness model before the attack severed her spinal cord. Among the challenges she contends with: “My diaphragm is paralyzed as well, my body [also doesn’t] regulate its temperature anymore.” Meaning, she can’t sweat and runs the risk of heatstroke if she’s in the sun too long—a big risk in archery competitions. It’s why Riessle is usually by her side with an umbrella and spray bottle. (More Paralympics stories.)
