- Star won two gold medals at the Paris Olympics
- Some shocking news put her career into perspective
Olympic swimming champion Ariarne Titmus has opened up about the cancer scare that changed how she thinks about her body and left her convinced that what she does in the pool is ‘irrelevant’ compared to becoming a mother.
Titmus’ achievements have placed her among the elite ranks of Aussie swimmers in Olympic history.
She is the first woman in nearly a century to defend the 400m freestyle title successfully, and the first Australian woman to win consecutive Olympic titles in any swimming event since Dawn Fraser, who claimed the 100m freestyle at three consecutive Olympics from 1956 to 1964.
Gold medals in the 200m and 400m freestyle events, including ‘the race of the century’ against American Katie Ledecky on the opening night of competition in Paris have cemented her as one of the all-time Olympic greats.
However, the 24-year-old almost didn’t make it to the Paris Games after scans revealed two benign tumours on her ovary during a scan for an injury.
The prospect of infertility reminded Titmus that having a family was much more important to her than a swimming career and changed her relationship with her body.
‘It put a lot of things into perspective for me. My body isn’t just a vehicle to train, my body’s purpose, really, is to carry a child one day,’ she said on Inherited.
‘And that really hit home to me, it made me realise how much I want to be a mum, and it made swimming almost seem a bit irrelevant at the time.
‘But then it also made me think, ‘You know what? I’ve got prime position going into these Games, I’ve got a red hot crack here at defending my titles and coming home with gold medals. Bad things can happen in life all the time and stump you, so make the most of this opportunity’.
‘I think after that operation I just went crazy.’
Titmus now has a different outlook on life and says her future family is much more important than the Olympic gold medals she has won.
‘I’ve always wanted to be a mum, but it (the health scare) probably made me realise how much I want it,’ she said.
‘I would give up every gold medal I’ve ever won to have a child.
‘I just have such maternal instincts, and I think the fear of potentially that becoming harder by the prospect of losing the ovary was really tough.
‘I’m so lucky that I’ve got the best mum in the world, and I just want to be that one day.’
