Jean Mitchell was the fittest she had been when a throbbing feeling in the back of her neck flipped her world upside down.
Jean Mitchell was the fittest she had been. The year was 2016 and the then-teenage rower had just returned home from competing in the Henley Royal Regatta in the UK after a belter of a season in Australia in which her school team claimed the national title for a second year in a row.
Within days, Mitchell was having surgery to remove the tumour. Two weeks later, scientists in the United States confirmed the mass was a medulloblastoma, a type of brainThe diagnosis started a two-year medical journey for Mitchell, who had to pause exercise and full-time study to focus on getting through radiation and several rounds of chemotherapy, including a year of oral medication.
“Chemotherapy does live up to its name. At the time, I couldn’t even say the word without bursting into tears,” she said. “At the start of the season, it seemed like a bit of a stretch because I hadn’t made the senior team in 2023, but in the back of my mind I knew that 2024 could be the year for me and if I performed the way I knew I could perform, then I could make the team, which I did,” she said.
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