Photo: Warren Little/Getty
Paralympic champion Marieke Vervoort, recipient of a gold medal in wheelchair racing, died through legal euthanasia in her native Belgium on Tuesday. She was 40.
The Olympic athelete lived in constant pain due to an incurable, degenerative spinal disease, and also suffered epileptic seizures, theAssociated Pressreported.
“It can be that I feel very, very bad, I get an epileptic attack, I cry, I scream because of pain,” she told theBBCin 2016. “I need a lot of painkillers, valium, morphine. A lot of people ask me how is it possible that you can have such good results and still be smiling with all the pain and medication that eats your muscles. For me, sports, and racing with a wheelchair – it’s kind of a medication.”
The athlete later toldThe Telegraphin 2017 that she had trouble sleeping at night, and had nearly lost her eyesight.
Vervoort received approval for euthanasia, or assisted suicide, in 2008, a decision she said gave her “a lot of peace of mind,” the AP reported.
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“I have those papers. If I didn’t have those papers, I think I’d have done suicide already,” she said. “I feel different about death now than years ago. For me, I think death is something like they operate on you, you go to sleep and you never wake up. For me it’s something peaceful.”
Vervoort retired from competing in 2016 after it became too difficult on her body and spent much of her time with family, friends and her service Labrador Zenn, who was able to sense when she was about to have a seizure,CNN reported.
“Marieke ‘Wielemie’ Vervoort was an athlete tough as nails and a great lady,” her family said in a statement, according to AP. “Her death touches us deeply.”
Euthanasia was legalized in Belgium in 2002, according toReuters. Other countries where it’s legal include the Netherlands, Colombia and Luxembourg.
source: people.com
