What happens when a perfect Florida swim turns into a fight for your life from a 9-foot alligator grabbing onto your arm? In this riveting encore episode, Masters Swimmer Rachael Lilienthal takes us stroke by stroke through her 2015 alligator attack, the breath that steadied her in a death roll, and the unlikely chain of strangers who became heroes with a kayak paddle, a firm grip, and a medical-grade tourniquet. From river chaos to a trauma bay within an hour, the details are visceral, human, and unforgettable.
We talk about the kind of resilience that isn’t a poster—slow exhales, clear commands, and small choices that compound into survival. Rachel opens up about the ambulance regret, the angry nights, and why saying this is too hard can be the bravest move in the room. Then the story pivots to rebuilding: occupational therapy hacks, ditching zippers for simplicity, adaptive tools that return dignity, and the decision to keep swimming. Watching Paralympians changed her technique; masters coaching refined her form; breath set the rhythm. The result: a gold medal in the 200-meter butterfly and a body that moves with purpose instead of force.
We also explore the quiet scaffolding, or was it Angels?, that made “luck” possible: lifeguard instincts, community readiness, and a deputy who fought to put tourniquets in patrol cars years before this day. Rachel’s mindset is a masterclass—silver linings as daily practice, spirituality as fuel, and service as a responsibility. She even launched a simple YouTube channel to share easy raw-food recipes, betting that one healthier meal a week can shift someone’s trajectory. And she leaves us with a clear warning: don’t feed wildlife. When animals lose their fear of humans, everyone loses.
If this story moved you, share it with a friend, leave a quick review, and follow the show so you don’t miss what’s next. Your support helps more listeners find real tools for mindset, health, and performance.
Check out Kelly's latest book an investigative journalistic book on a denied global health epidemic at https://www.False-Cure.com
Email us at HELLO@ChampionsMojo.com. Opinions discussed are not medical advice, please seek a medical professional for your own health concerns.
Check out Kelly's Books at www.KellyPalace.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:01):
The alligator didn't budge.
He just sat there with my arm inhis mouth, not moving.
So I thought I needed to beaggressive and I punched the
alligator as hard as I couldwith my left hand.
At that point, the alligatorstarted thrashing me around and
rolling me around underwater.
(00:23):
The first time he rolled mearound, I did not know how long
that was going to last.
I did not know if I was evergoing to come up for air.
And I thought, is this the wayI'm going to die?
SPEAKER_02 (00:36):
Hello, friends.
This is Kelly Palace, host ofChampions Mojo, your place for
better health, resilience, andmaster swimming.
I'm taking a short break fromrecording new episodes of
Champions Mojo for two excitingreasons.
First, I'm launching my latestbook, False Cure.
It's a whistleblowinginvestigative journalism book
(00:59):
about a denied health epidemic.
If you'd like more informationon that, it's in the show notes.
The second and most compellingreason I'm on a break is here at
Champions Mojo, we're preparingfor the January 2026 reboot of
powerful new weekly episodeswith expert guest interviews,
(01:21):
inspiring topics, and tips totake your mindset, health, and
personal performance to the nextlevel.
We will be announcing someincredible partnerships with the
show, and I guarantee what wehave in store for you will
empower you and keep your mojostrong in the new year.
While I'm preparing some of thisgreat stuff, we've selected some
(01:45):
of our best shows ever for anEncore series.
My hope is that if this is yoursecond time listening to this
episode, you'll take away evenmore insight and motivation.
Or if it's your first time,you'll love this episode as much
as everyone else did.
So settle in and enjoy thisEncore presentation in its
(02:06):
entirety.
Today we have a show that is socompelling that we almost
guarantee you will be glued toyour listening device.
It's riveting.
I just had lunch with my brotherand sister-in-law and told them
I'm getting ready to record ashow that's so riveting.
It's going to inspire you and itmay even terrify you.
(02:29):
So we're going to be talkingwith Rachel Lilienthal, a master
swimmer who was attacked by anine-foot alligator while
swimming in open water in theWaukiva River near Apopka,
Florida, in 2015.
Rachel lost the majority of herright arm in that attack and
almost her life.
(02:51):
Maria, can you tell us a littlebit more about this brave
champion?
SPEAKER_01 (02:55):
Sure, Kelly.
It's been six years sinceRachel's alligator attack and
the loss of her arm.
But that didn't keep her fromwinning gold recently in the
200-meter butterfly in the RowdyGaines short course meters
masters classic meet.
Besides being a talentedswimmer, Rachel's a Spanish
professor at Rollins College.
(03:16):
And we've got lots of questions.
We want to hear Rachel's story.
So let's get started.
Again, Rachel, welcome to theshow.
We're so glad you're here.
SPEAKER_00 (03:23):
Thanks so much.
I'm happy to be here.
SPEAKER_02 (03:26):
Yes, yes.
So, Rachel, just a littlebackground for our listeners,
because as I introduced you andI and I told you before, we we
have a lot of people on theshow, but none that are like
really good friends.
So I heard your story when wewere in a swim meet together
several months ago.
And at first I thought you werejoking me that you had lost your
(03:46):
arm about an alligator with analligator.
So we're gonna hear all thedetails on that.
But regarding this Rowdy Games200 meter butterfly, I want to
tell the listeners a littlestory about I was on the deck.
And if you don't know the RowdyGames uh short course meters
masters classic, it is one ofthe premier swim meets in the
(04:07):
US.
People come from all over, itwas very well attended.
This was just a few weeks ago.
And Rachel is swimming the200-meter butterfly.
And after she swam, I was I wasat the end of her lane cheering
for her while she was swimming.
And I she did a fantastic job.
And as I'm going past theannouncer, or I'm sorry, the
(04:31):
starter for the whole meet, Iwalk past him and he taps me on
the shoulder and he said, Isthat your friend?
And I said, Yes.
He said, Was she a swimmerbefore she lost her arm?
And I said, Yes.
He said, Well, my goodness, uh,she must have like her butterfly
(04:52):
is so beautiful as it is.
I can't even imagine what itlooked like before.
So it you got everybody'sattention at that meet.
You swam this amazing race.
Um, so Rachel, we want to hearevery detail of how this event
occurred.
And yet leave us a littlebreathing room because I know we
(05:14):
will have questions.
So make a few pauses becausewe're probably gonna know that
our listeners are going, butwhat about that?
But what about that?
So um, yeah, like you said, youwant all the details.
I said yes, please.
The same details you were on thedate, the new bathing suit.
We want it all.
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (05:33):
Well, thank you, Kelly, for that wonderful
introduction and also for thekudos that I hadn't heard yet
about that master's meet.
And thank you for cheering me onbecause that was a hard event.
So I was a swimmer in my heart,but I was not a competitive
swimmer until about a year ago.
(05:55):
When I was a small child, I wasa competitive swimmer and then I
stopped swimming competitivelyat age 12.
But I loved it.
It's something that I did for myphysical health, for my mental
health, for my emotional health.
And so on that fateful day,August 8th, 2015, when I was
swimming with my friend, I wason a date, and I was swimming
(06:15):
with my friend for a fewminutes, like two, maybe five
minutes, before he said, Oh,okay, let's get out.
And I, the swimmer, said, Well,I just got in.
And the water was fresh andclean and cool.
And it was August in Florida, itwas hot outside.
I was very, very happy in thewater.
(06:37):
So we came to the agreement thathe would get out and I would
stay in.
So I was in a main swimming areawith many people, children,
dogs, plenty of people, music.
It was a party atmosphere.
And all by myself, I felt kindof silly once my date got out of
the water.
(06:57):
So I decided I would swim offand get some exercise.
I will never forget the feelingof going through each and every
one of those strokes.
I did a little freestyle, I dida little breaststroke, I did
some butterfly, and I even didthe backstroke.
And I decided, wouldn't it be agreat idea to swim to where I
(07:21):
had canoeed or kayaked in thepast, to where the springs
start.
So I was at Wokaiba Island,which is just a short distance
from the start of the WokaibaRiver at the Wokaiba Springs.
And I thought, oh, I'll swim allthe way to the beginning.
And I didn't actually get nearthat far when I realized the
(07:43):
water was getting a lot uh tooshallow for my comfort.
And so I turned around and I wasswimming back.
Luckily, I wasn't that far fromWokaiba Island where all the
people were, when I felt analligator come across my back.
Now, I I did not believe it wasan alligator at first.
In fact, I just felt a scrapingon my back and I thought it
(08:04):
might have been a canoe notlooking where they were going.
So I turned around, fullyprepared to yell at somebody to
watch where they were going, andsomething clamped down on my
arm.
I still didn't believe it was analligator.
In fact, I thought I couldn'tthink of any other logical
(08:24):
explanation of what it might be,but it couldn't be an alligator.
No way.
I had just told people that Iwasn't afraid of alligators.
I had just told people, no, no,no.
Alligators are afraid of people.
Alligators feed it and right.
Alligators only bother you ifyou bother them.
SPEAKER_01 (08:41):
I'm fine.
I could have said the same thingto my kids.
SPEAKER_00 (08:45):
I had literally just said that.
So I took a moment, I was stillpretty calm, and I touched
whatever was on my arm, and itfelt reptilian.
So if it was reptilian and itwas in a river in Florida, then
it had to be an alligator.
There was no denying it.
And so now what?
(09:07):
Rachel.
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (09:09):
So there was, if I recall when I when you first
told me this story, tell usabout the boys that teased you
about an alligator and youthought you would turn around
and then tell us that littlepart of it, because I think that
played a little bit in yourbravado.
SPEAKER_00 (09:27):
Absolutely.
My ego had taken over.
I wasn't really sure how far Iwas going to swim when I left my
date when he got out and Istayed in.
I thought it would just be for alittle while.
And I swam up to a bridge, whichis in view of the main swimming
area.
And I thought, well, maybe I'llturn back.
But then I thought, I lovebridges.
(09:50):
Let me go under the bridge.
And as I was going under thisbridge, I felt a little bit
icky.
A little bit, I couldn't reallyidentify what it was.
But I said, well, I'll just gounder the bridge and then decide
if I'm going to continue furtheror not.
And a canoe with two boys cameunder the bridge, and one boy
(10:11):
said, You know, we saw a bigalligator not too far away.
And I turned around just as fastas I could, and I started
swimming fast.
I had been swimming for pleasureand I was swimming for speed,
swimming fast back towards themain swimming area.
Then the other boy said, Oh, hewas only kidding.
(10:32):
There's no alligator.
And at that point, I thought, ofcourse not.
It's a crowded day.
There's millions of peoplearound.
There's not going to bealligators right now, right
here.
And my ego took over.
I completely forgot about thatfeeling I had been sensing.
(10:55):
I hadn't fully digested it.
I hadn't fully analyzed it, butI completely forgot.
Actually, I forgot until monthslater when I first sat down to
try and write down the story.
That is when the memory came up.
And I was like, oh, right.
Somebody warned me.
But then somebody turned aroundand said, it's not true.
And I was, I was angry at theboy, and I just said, Oh, I will
(11:16):
swim.
And that's when I actuallythought, oh, swim to the
beginning of this spring.
So I felt this alligator comeacross me, grabs my arm.
SPEAKER_01 (11:27):
Can I interrupt you for a second?
So were you between the bridgeand the swimming area at that
point or beyond the bridge?
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (11:33):
I had passed the bridge.
SPEAKER_01 (11:35):
Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_00 (11:35):
And I had already turned around and I was coming
back towards the bridge.
SPEAKER_01 (11:39):
Okay, but you hadn't gotten back under the bridge
yet, though.
SPEAKER_00 (11:42):
No, the bridge was in view.
Okay.
So I pet this alligator.
I tapped it gently and I wastrying to communicate through my
gentle caress.
It's okay.
This is all a mistake.
No hard feelings.
You let me go, I'll swim back.
We'll both go on with our days.
(12:02):
And it didn't make sense.
I'm not gonna die in the room.
I'm not saying drowned.
I'm a swimmer.
I'm not gonna drown.
But I was still quite alarmed bygetting thrashed around under
the water.
And I decided not to hold mybreath, which I think was a
crucial element of my survival.
I decided to slowly exhale,slowly blow bubbles while he was
(12:26):
thrashing me around.
Now I didn't know I could holdmy breath longer than I could
slowly exhale, but I feel thatthat slow exhale helped me keep
my cool enough and always, whenin doubt, breathe.
So I breathed.
And he let me up for air and Ibreathed.
It was a wonderful gasp of air.
(12:46):
But again, he's still on my arm.
So what do I do?
I hit him again.
And I'm not sure how many times,maybe two, three times, at one
point I felt and I heard my armbreak.
And then I knew, okay, this is athis is a big deal.
This is, I'm not getting out ofthis on my own.
So I called for help.
And I can't believe I didn'tinitially call for help, but I
(13:08):
didn't.
My first response was, I'm gonnaget out of this on my own.
And then when I realized Icouldn't, I called for help.
There were some canoeers alittle bit ahead of me in the
river, almost at the bridge.
They turned around, they sawwhat was happening, and they
tried to turn around and cometowards me.
(13:29):
But they weren't very skilled atcanoeing, and I think they were
having a hard time.
So they decided instead to goahead and blow their whistle and
alert people that there was aproblem.
I was desperate in that in thatmoment.
I was full of despair.
I really didn't think anyone wasgoing to help me.
I had completely forgotten ofthe congestion on the river
(13:51):
ahead of me.
I'd completely forgotten thatthere were, in fact, there was a
traffic jam of canoes and kayaksat the place where the Rock
Springs Run meets the WakaibaRiver.
SPEAKER_01 (14:02):
Can I ask you another question here?
Sure.
How when the because none of ushave ever been twirled by an
alligator.
SPEAKER_02 (14:09):
It's called isn't it called a death roll?
Yeah, it's a big thing.
Yeah I I've I've heard that'show alligators kill their prey,
is that they take a death roll.
SPEAKER_01 (14:19):
So my question is my question for you is you know, he
he's twirling, you're it's yousound amazingly calm.
And uh, but you get anoccasional breath of air, you
know, that where you're up andyou had enough time, of course,
to call for help.
Is that is that lasting asecond, a millisecond, 10
(14:40):
seconds?
SPEAKER_00 (14:41):
How long was those little pauses?
That is an impossible questionto answer because I know my time
perception is way off here.
It seemed like quite some time,but when I spoke with the
rescuers, it all happened in aninstant.
They were very close to meactually when this happened.
Being thrashed around, it feltlike a very long time.
(15:01):
But after I was let up for airand then thrashed again, I
realized that he wasn't going tothrash me around long enough for
me to drown.
I was gonna get air again.
Each I didn't doubt after thatfirst time, I didn't doubt, I
don't think, if I was going toget a breath or not.
(15:22):
He didn't actually thrash mearound again until I hit him.
So it was, I'm sitting here withmy prey caught.
I'm chilling on the river.
And then I punch him and hethrashes me around.
I breathe, I rest, he rests, Ipunch him again, he thrashes me
again.
So I had felt this despair thatthese people who I saw were not
(15:45):
going to come to my rescue.
And immediately thereafter, Iheard a voice saying, What's
going on?
Get in the kayak.
And it was this young womannamed Krista Carlson who sped
ahead when she saw that therewas a problem or she heard my
cry for help.
She sped ahead with her verystrong boyfriend in the back of
(16:06):
the double kayak and her in thefront.
She happened to have been alifeguard, so she had that
instinct and that desire to helpand that athleticism that made
her and her boyfriend able torush to my aid.
So I explained there's analligator.
And I think it was Krista thatsaid, hit the alligator with the
(16:28):
paddle.
So the boyfriend hits, and theboyfriend's name was Casey.
The boyfriend hits the alligatorwith the paddle, and the
alligator rolls me around evenworse than the first time.
I think that my puny little fistwas no match for that paddle,
the extension of this strongyoung man.
(16:50):
So he thrashed me around more.
And it this happened a fewtimes.
Again, it was hit the alligatorwith a paddle, punish Rachel,
rest, repeat.
At one point, the alligator toreoff half of my bathing suit.
So I'm I'm aware now that my newbathing suit has been ruined,
(17:10):
and I'm wearing half a bathingsuit.
Pause, breathe, rest, thrashagain, repeat.
And this time, the alligatortakes my entire bathing suit.
And I'm completely naked.
And I believe it was at thatpoint where we were all thinking
this is futile.
This is maybe we need more help.
(17:32):
This doesn't seem to be goinganywhere.
And so Krista had the idea ofhitting the alligator between
the eyes.
So she told her boyfriend to tryand hit the alligator between
the eyes, which worked.
The alligator swam off, and Iwas in bliss for a nanosecond
when I realized that my arm wasgone with the alligator.
(17:53):
And I was spewing blood, littleps sperm, little little spurts
of blood coming out of my arm.
The nerve, the nerves visible,this yellow tube kind of thing.
Just like in a cartoon that yousee when a limb has been
severed, there's these littletubes that come out, and there's
this spewing blood.
(18:14):
So that's when I kind of lost mycool.
At that point, Krista's motherand father had arrived on the
scene.
And they took over the effort oftowing me, and Krista and her
boyfriend went ahead for help.
I don't think they knew aboutthe canoe who had already gone
ahead for help, but they alsowere able to give more details
(18:35):
about what was happening.
So the mother and fatherrecruited some other people on
the river.
There happened to be an EagleScout with his girlfriend on the
river that day.
So knowledge about the canoe,again, athleticism.
And the mother, Haley Carlson,actually held my arm tight to do
(18:59):
her best at giving me atourniquet while they towed me.
So I was being towed, I had myarm here, and she had my arm.
She was holding my arm, and herhusband, Jeff, was paddling.
And then in this other canoe,the young couple, uh, the woman
in the front was paddling,paddling, and the man in the
(19:20):
back was paddling at the sametime as calling 911.
And so they towed me to safety.
They towed me back to the dock.
And it was a long time.
It felt so long.
At one point, I thought I canget there faster myself.
Because it was quite difficultto coordinate these two vessels
with not full paddling power andthis burden of me in between.
(19:44):
It was quite difficult for themto maneuver.
And I thought, I can just swimahead.
And they they said no.
So when I got to the dock, alsoI remembered where the ladder
was, and I thought, okay, well,just a little bit further, and I
can get to the ladder.
But they stopped as soon as theygot to the dock where there were
people waiting, and there wasthis extraordinarily strong man
(20:05):
waiting to get me out of thewater.
He reached down to the water,which was well below the level
of the dock, two or three feet,I think, below the level of the
dock.
He reached down, he grabbed meby my left arm, he pulled me up,
and he laid me gently on thedock.
I think that was an amazing featof strength.
And the fact that he was thereto do that was a mini miracle.
(20:28):
Also, as I had been towedtowards the dock, I saw that
there was someone standing andtriumphantly holding a belt.
I thought it was a belt.
And I'm like, yes, good idea.
I need a tourniquet.
A belt is a good idea.
So I'm now on the dock.
Very quickly, people realizedthat I should be covered.
(20:51):
So people sacrificed theirtowels and covered me up.
And there was a lot of commotionand people talking.
And somebody said, Oh, I'm anurse.
And I said, I saw a tourniquetvery, very quickly.
Probably it was already in theprocess, but very quickly,
someone came, put a tournique atourniquet on me.
And it turns out that it wasactually a medical grade
tourniquet.
(21:11):
The deputy who happened to beworking security that Saturday
at Waqaiba Island, he hadanticipated the need for a
tourniquet a few years prior.
He watched the Boston Marathonbombing and saw how many lives
and how many limbs were lost, inpart because people were using
(21:35):
torn-up shirts and pants andanything they could get their
hands on instead of propertourniquets.
So he had this idea and hepetitioned his superiors in the
Seminole County policedepartment.
He petitioned his superiors toget tourniquets for everybody.
And I forget the number rightnow, but it was, I want to say
$60,000 is how much it cost fora medical grade tourniquet for
(21:58):
every emergency worker inSeminole County.
But he had his in his car thatday.
He was working security.
They don't pay cops enough.
And he had to have a second job.
And in his car, he had his copequipment.
SPEAKER_01 (22:12):
And he's the one who made it happen.
SPEAKER_00 (22:14):
He's the one who made it happen.
And he happened to address itcan't be.
SPEAKER_01 (22:19):
Can I uh ask another question?
So while you're being towed tothe dock, are you talking to the
people?
Are they talking to you?
Are you feeling shocky?
SPEAKER_00 (22:28):
Are you crossed out?
No, I'm not.
I'm lucid the whole time.
I don't remember everything thatI said, but I'm told a few
different things.
One thing that I remember themreporting is that I was talking
about my car.
I believe that we are only givenchallenges that we can overcome.
(22:55):
And I believe that we are giventhe tools that we need when we
need them.
Not long before losing my arm, Ipurchased my very first
automatic car.
I learned how to drive on sixshifts.
I always preferred purchasingsix-shift cars.
I did have one automatic carthat was an old beater that
(23:17):
didn't last very long.
But if it was a new car that Iwas intentionally choosing for
myself, it was manual.
I had in May of 2015, or maybeit was April.
I think it was April of 2015.
I had just the very bestaccident you could possibly
have.
If you're gonna have to have anaccident, nobody's hurt, it's
(23:39):
good weather, the people arepleasant.
My car was damaged enough for meto get a large amount of
insurance money for it to fixit.
And I use that as a down paymenton my new car.
I already had my car for about10 years.
I was thinking about getting anew car anyway.
So it really worked out nicely.
And I happened to choose anautomatic car.
So while I was being towed, thatis one story that I told my
(24:03):
rescuers.
Well, at least I have anautomatic car.
Because how would it drive stickshift?
And how hard would it be to gocar shopping in addition to
everything else while I wasrecovering?
And I'm glad you asked thequestion of the what I was
talking about while being towed,because I have trained my brain
(24:24):
to look for silver linings.
I am an expert silver linerlooker, silver lining looker.
I can find them in kind of theworst situations imaginable, or
I can even imagine what thesilver lining might be.
Some people call me too much ofa Pollyanna for that, too much
(24:45):
of an optimist, but I say it's asurvival technique.
When we approach the dayfocusing on things to be
grateful for, we have a betterday.
And when we have a lot of betterdays, we have a better life.
So I was in the habit of lookingon the bright side and an
(25:07):
alligator ate my arm, but atleast I had an automatic car.
SPEAKER_01 (25:14):
Oh, what about the woman holding your arm?
I mean, she must have I mean,how brave just to stick her
hands right into your bloody,you know, appendage there.
SPEAKER_00 (25:23):
I know.
And she was a medicalprofessional.
SPEAKER_01 (25:26):
Okay, so she knew what she was doing.
SPEAKER_00 (25:28):
A medical assistant, I believe, was her title.
I'm not exactly sure it whatwhat her job function was, but
she said that she asked me if Ihad been tested for, I don't, I
don't know what she was specificabout it.
And I and I and I answered, Iwas, but it hit not since
October.
So this was in August.
And I told her the day of mylast blood work, which was in
(25:49):
October when I had been beentested for a range of things.
I don't recall that, but shesays that she did ask and I did
answer.
So I don't think that she waitedto know.
I think she her instinct was tohelp.
And then while she's gettingblood actually um spurted on
her, she's thinking, oh my God,here's a stranger and I have her
(26:10):
blood.
And then she asked is my is myguess.
Yeah, she was extremely brave todo that.
So another beautiful aspect ofmy rescue is that the emergency
workers, the firemen who doubleas EMTs, they were having lunch
at the shopping plaza twominutes away.
(26:32):
So they got the call and theyarrived almost immediately.
They say that I was probablyfrom the Gator's mouth to the
operating room at ORMC, OrlandoRegional Medical Center, within
an hour.
And that's it, just so happensthat there's an excellent trauma
hospital nearby, near enough.
(26:54):
And there was not crazy trafficon I-4, that we were able to get
there, that everything happenedso quickly that yes, I lost a
lot of blood, but I did not die.
SPEAKER_02 (27:06):
So this has transition I'm sorry, Kelly, go
ahead.
Miracle, miracle, miracle.
And one of the parts that justseems just miraculous to me was
tell us how long you were in thehospital.
Four days, not quite four days.
I mean, that is just that's justamazing.
(27:27):
Um so once they got to you tothe hospital, they do surgery,
and then you're you are at homefive days later.
Right.
Two surgeries.
Two surgeries.
So tell us what your mindset waslooking at this new life.
Like I know one thing, you know,we you know, I can't even fathom
(27:52):
the changes that this has put inyour life.
I found out just one small,small one.
I'm standing there at the meet,and we we get a beautiful free
cap in the Rowdy Games goodiebag, and it's wrapped in
plastic.
And there's my friend Racheltrying to get this cap open.
And you have you have it tuckedunder part of your, you know,
(28:14):
your arm that's left, your rightarm, and your left arm, you're
trying to pluck this, you know,the plastic out of the thing.
And I'm like, can I do that foryou?
I grabbed it, opened it up,threw it at, you know, here's
your cap.
And you were like, thanks.
But it was like you were justcruising on, you were gonna open
that thing, which was hard forme to open, you know.
You isn't it a pain to open halfthe things plastic that we have
(28:36):
to open these days with twoarms, you know.
So that's just like the tiniestlittle thing.
But tell us like how you lookedat wow, my life has changed.
SPEAKER_00 (28:50):
Well, at the very beginning, I didn't understand
how dramatically my life hadchanged.
And I'll use the excuse of beingon morphine in the hospital that
maybe my judgment was soimpaired.
But the semester was supposed tostart in two weeks' time.
And I'm very lucky to have asupportive department where I
(29:12):
work, and a lot of people frommy department came and visited
me.
And the chair at the time, thechair of the department came on
my first day.
It happened, it was a Sunday.
A lot of people came to visit methat Sunday.
And my chair of the departmentcame, and she also hadn't
thought about what implicationsdid this have on my professional
(29:32):
life.
She was just coming to visit mein the hospital because I'll
giterate my arm.
And I told her that I had beenthinking of ways I could get
classes moving, that I couldhave perhaps a volunteer student
be a secretary and write on theboard.
And I had been strategizing howon earth I can teach my class?
(29:55):
And I had some solutions that Ithought of.
I had not thought of how am Igetting.
Myself dressed?
How am I getting into the carand driving across and I had not
thought of those details, butthe actual running of the class,
I was going through my brain andtrying to figure out how was I
going back to work in two weeks'time.
(30:15):
After that conversation, I'veguessed my boss talked to HR and
I was not going back to work intwo weeks.
That was absurd, which theyrealized I did not.
And so I was given theshort-term disability and I
ended up taking off thatsemester.
They canceled one class and theywere able to find substitutes on
(30:37):
the at the very, very lastminute, they were able to find
adjuncts to teach three classes.
So yes, I did not go to go backto work, but I thought
immediately, how can I modifythings to still do what I need
to do?
I think that the idea of givingup was just never on the table.
It never really occurred to methat I could just give up.
(30:59):
Now, certain things, as I wasrecovering, certain things that
I asked for help with, I didn't,I didn't know that I'd ever be
able to do them.
For example, opening up things.
I had an occupational therapistwho came to my house a few times
a week, I think, maybe maybe twoor three times a week for the
first few weeks while I was athome, while I was homebound,
(31:21):
just to get my get myself uhfunctional, really.
And one of the things wasenvelopes.
And I said, you know, should Ijust have somebody else?
Should I wait for somebody elseto open up my mail?
And she said, Oh no, you'regonna have to learn to do that
yourself.
And when I was struggling withsome other thing, I remember her
saying, Well, right now youcan't use it, but you will be
(31:43):
able to use your right arm,which to me sounded unthinkable
because I was in so much painand it was, you know, bandaged
up and swollen, and there wasthere was no way I could use it
at that time, which sheacknowledged, but I would be
able to.
Oh man, I can use it now for somany things.
So, in terms of opening up thatcap, having it in my uh armpit
(32:04):
and trying to open it with theother hand, that would be the
first attempt.
And second attempt, if I reallywanted to open it, would be use
my teeth, although I try not todo that in public and I try not
to do it too often just becauseGod forbid I break a tooth.
And in terms of figuring outother things, it takes time.
At the beginning, I wasincapable of putting a pillow in
(32:26):
a pillowcase.
I could make the rest of thebed.
I could put the fitted sheet on,I could put the top sheet on, I
could throw the blanket, I coulddo all of that.
But putting a pillow in apillowcase was out of the
question.
Absolutely impossible.
And now I can do it.
It takes a lot of effort.
And I still sometimes ask forhelp if help is easily
available, but I can put pillowsin a pillowcase now.
So little by little over time,I'm becoming more dexterous, I'm
(32:49):
becoming stronger, and I'm ableto do almost everything.
And then the other things thatI'm maybe not able to do, I have
let them go.
Like what?
For example, a flat iron for myhair.
I was very, I was very happy togive that away.
(33:09):
I gave away my curling iron, myflat iron, one hairdryer.
I still have one in the housefor guests.
Because I don't need to.
I do not need to do that.
That is absolutely not anecessity.
And actually, no, I'm seeingthat there's this tool that
looks like a hairdryer with abrush attached to it that I
might be able to use one-handed.
But the tools that I had backthen, I don't believe I could
(33:32):
use one-handed.
And why should I try?
That is something super easy forme to let go.
Another thing is zippers.
Zippers are awful.
And pants with zippers, maybe Ican get them on.
Buttons and zippers, I can getthem on.
Do I want to take the time andeffort every single time I go to
the bathroom?
I don't, I don't want to.
(33:52):
So yoga pants.
Yoga pants, elastic weights, andpants.
Why would I struggle withbuttons and zippers when there
are yoga pants?
SPEAKER_01 (34:06):
I feel the same way, and I have both hands.
Hey, so you know, your everyinterview we've we've watched of
you, and of course during thisinterview as well, you had this
just incredible, you know,positive attitude.
Did you tell me there was a fewmoments where you were like, you
know, this is hard and you criedor or whatever?
SPEAKER_00 (34:29):
Plenty, plenty.
So when I was in the ambulance,after I was safe, when I was
being saved, I realized that Ialmost died.
There was a very short momentwhere when I thought I might die
at the very beginning with thealligator dashing me around.
But then I was in survival mode.
And once I was in the safety ofthe ambulance on the way to the
(34:53):
hospital, I realized that I hadan easy out.
And I regretted not taking it.
I don't think that I would doanything differently, but I
realized at that point how hardthe road ahead was going to be.
And just that thought of, oh myGod, I had an opportunity to
step out of this struggle, whichlife is beautiful, but life is
(35:17):
also a tremendous challenge.
So I did have that moment of, ohmy God, I had an out and I
didn't take it.
Then in the hospital that night,I believe I was out of the
surgery maybe seven to nineo'clock at night, something like
that.
It was already dark out, if I'mnot mistaken, or getting dark by
(35:38):
the time I was in my hospitalroom.
And I was very angry with myselffor swimming outside of the
group, swimming where in a riverwhere I do know that there are
alligators in the Wakaiba River,obviously, it's Florida
freshwater.
And I forgot the fact that I hadswum on multiple occasions in
(36:00):
that river without gettingeaten.
But I was really being hard onmyself.
Then the next morning, one of myfirst visitors was a friend of
mine who I do a lot of outdooradventuring with.
And the first thing he said was,it could have been any of us.
(36:22):
It could have been any of us.
In other words, the fellowadventurers, the Florida
canoeers and kayakers and hikersand campers, the people who put
ourselves at the mercy ofFlorida nature.
And then I just felt so muchbetter after he said that.
And he's he said he didn't knowwhy he said it.
(36:43):
He was just compelled that hehad to tell me that.
Not, oh, how are you feeling?
Or just it could have been anyof us.
And yeah, it could have.
And it's not the first time thatI have swum in a river.
It just was the unlucky time.
So that was way back at thebeginning.
As I moved through life,sometimes things are just too
(37:06):
hard.
Sometimes I'm I may be trying todo something that I could do
with relatively ease, withrelative ease, or perhaps with
difficulty if I had my two arms.
And I'll say to myself, or I'llsay out loud, hopefully the
neighbors don't hear, this istoo hard.
This is too hard.
(37:26):
And usually at that point, I'llrealize, yeah, this is too hard.
Leave it.
Someone will fix this later.
You don't have to do this.
You don't have to do everything.
Recently on trash day, the trashcan had, I don't know what the
sequence of events was, but bythe time I got home, trash can
(37:46):
had water in it and was on itsside on the ground.
So I tried to lift it up, butbecause of the weight of the
water, I was not able to.
And so what I did was drag itout of the street and leave it
in my driveway.
And don't you know, someone sawthat and someone lifted that
(38:09):
garbage can up.
I don't know who it was, just akind neighbor who saw something
that could be fixed and fixedit.
I didn't even have to ask forhelp, but certainly I could have
waited till there was someonearound and asked for help with
that.
And that's what I do.
I ask for help for things.
And I've found so many assistivedevices that help me get through
(38:31):
my day.
So I use, for example, a fabriccutter to open up packages at
home.
It's not for plastic and paper,but it works.
SPEAKER_01 (38:43):
So hat how about the swimming?
You're a champion swimmer withone and a half arms.
SPEAKER_02 (38:50):
And I don't really feel like a champion swimmer.
Oh, Rachel, your butterfly isbeautiful, and you beat several
people in the 200-meterbutterfly.
Yeah, I want to I you knowyou're not going in circles, so
you're doing something right.
SPEAKER_00 (39:04):
I can't do one stroke.
Well, when swimming was actuallyquite easy.
I thought it might be hard, andI thought I would do the one
arm, the one arm butterfly.
I thought I would swim with myarms extended, and this one
would just stay put, and I woulduse my left arm only.
That's what I envisioned.
But then I watched the videos ofthe Paralympians who are so
(39:26):
inspiring, and they're usingtheir both arms.
If however much arm you have, goahead and use that.
And I now know that your body isvery important in the stroke.
It's not just your arms and yourlegs, it's your whole body.
So by using both arms, thenyou're using your shoulders and
you're using your chest andyou're using your abs in a more
even way, and that's beneficial.
(39:47):
So, my butterfly, thank you forsaying that it's beautiful.
It is more beautiful now than itwas five or six years ago
because I've been getting a lotof help.
And ever since I startedswimming with the master
swimmers, I've little by littleI've been improving my technique
quite a bit.
Because remember, I swamcompetitively until I was 12.
(40:08):
I was good, but I was 12.
And after that, I was alifeguard, I was a swimming
instructor, I was a lifeguardinstructor, but I was not a
skillful competitive swimmer.
I swam a lot of distance, but Iswam pretty slow.
So I'm only now learning how toswim fast.
SPEAKER_01 (40:28):
So go ahead, Count, sorry.
SPEAKER_02 (40:30):
Um, so as a breast cancer survivor, um, I remember
when I first got diagnosed,similarly, you know, how hard is
this gonna be?
Can I do it?
You know, my first consult, theywanted to do a you know a double
massectomy, and I'm like, Ican't do that, I'm not gonna do
that.
I'd rather just let it take me.
Um, have you and then I thensomeone told me, oh, you know,
(40:53):
down the road, this is gonna bethe greatest gift you ever had,
you know, getting cancer isgonna be a great gift.
There's a book called Cancer isa gift or the gift of cancer,
one of those two things.
So at this point, six yearslater, which is funny because
you and I are on six yearspost-breast cancer and you're
six years post-do you feel likethis has been a benefit?
(41:17):
Is your life better?
I know that you've met a greatman through this, you know,
through going back to swimming.
Like, what tell us, like, wouldyou would you wish you had given
up?
Or are you is your life better?
Or are you just somewhere in themiddle?
SPEAKER_00 (41:34):
There are so many what ifs and who knows that it's
really hard to say from thisevent.
I can concretely say that I gotangels.
I I I have the knowledge ofangels protecting me and being
(41:56):
with me through life.
They were always there, and nowI am aware of them, I'm
conscious of them, and I uhsometimes remember to thank
them, sometimes call on them,whereas I never did before.
So that was something veryconcrete, very clear I got from
this event, and that was becauseof the belief that the person
(42:16):
who got me out of the water wasan angel.
It turns out he's a real human,but for a minute, he was nobody
knew who he was, nobodyremembers seeing him.
He was just there, he helped,and he left.
And it turns out he was justshy.
He didn't want to be part ofthe, he didn't want to be in the
limelight.
And at that time, a friend ofmine said, Well, it was an
angel.
Just so matter-of-fact, soconvinced himself that I'm like,
(42:39):
oh, well, that makes senseactually.
And when you look at my rescue,it's too hard to believe that
that was all coincidental.
So the event most definitelyenhanced my spirituality and my
connection with the divine andmy knowledge that there is a
(43:05):
force out there protecting meand hopefully guiding me in the
direction I'm supposed to begoing.
Now, the fear is, or the wonderis if my rescue was planned, was
the attack also planned?
And it's impossible to know.
(43:27):
So, one of the things youmentioned that I'm I have a
great man, which I absolutelydo, and I had met him about 10
years ago when I was not readyfor him, and he was probably not
ready for me.
And having something in commonof this traumatic loss and huge
(43:48):
illness to overcome, I thinkthat that's something that we
connect on now that I definitelydidn't have 10 years ago.
But also, I was on a date with apretty great guy.
The guy that I was on a datewith on that August 8th, 2015,
he was a good catch.
And I was trying to catch him.
There was a lot I did like abouthim, and maybe he wasn't my
(44:10):
mate.
Maybe this alligator, and hedidn't just disappear when the
alligator ate my arm oranything.
He he showed up at the hospitaland he he tried.
And we did not survive thealligator attack and the
recovery thereafter.
Oh, it was our third date.
It was our fifth meeting and ourthird date.
So uh you can imagine how howchallenging it would be to start
(44:32):
a relationship off that way.
But I I don't I can't say if itwould have worked out with him,
and then I would have been withnot the right guy for me.
Who knows?
There's so many who knows.
Um I kind of forget the originalquestion.
I went off on a tangent.
SPEAKER_01 (44:49):
Well, well, I I would like to just sort of,
yeah.
The question was was this goodor bad?
Who knows, right?
But do it over.
Yeah, I I I I certainly believethat God knows what he's doing.
And but anyway, but that's notwhat I'm my question.
Is I'm sure many people havetold you that you're an
(45:10):
inspiration, and you know, howdo you how do you accept that or
do you accept that?
And you know, what do you dowith that?
SPEAKER_00 (45:21):
I have had to accept that at first it was very
uncomfortable, and sometimeswhen people say I'm inspiring,
it's they don't know the yearsof effort that went into it.
So, for example, in yoga class,oftentimes people say I'm
inspiring there, and maybe it'stheir first class or their first
(45:43):
year of class.
And so they don't they don'tknow that I already had a
background in yoga before losingmy arm, and they don't know how
absolutely essential yoga was tomy healing, and how if I didn't
have the yoga, I wouldn't havethe balance necessary to do
(46:04):
certain things with my seat thatI need to do now.
So they they find thatinspiring.
And okay, when you see somebodyin a crazy yoga posture, which I
don't, I'm not doing the crazyyoga postures, but it is, it can
be inspiring.
And so I I can kind of acceptthat a little bit more easily.
Or when somebody sees me swim,long distance fly.
Long distance fly is hard,everyone agrees upon that.
(46:26):
That's there's no debate, butit's something that I have been
doing all my life, not fast.
I'm only recently trying tolearn fast, but the long
distance aspect of it, it's whatI do, but it's not something
everybody can do.
But sometimes people areimpressed with very silly things
like my reading.
(46:48):
Oh my god, you can use a forkwith your left hand.
Yep, that was not a challenge.
That that yes, that was so itdepends on I think what they're
looking towards.
But it the idea, oh my God, youcan do your job even though you
lost your arm.
Well, thank God I'm not awaitress anymore.
(47:09):
Yes, I do have a job that onecan perform with one hand,
luckily.
And I don't really appreciatethat aspect.
I feel like, well, what do youexpect?
I'm not, I'm just going throughday.
I'm eating my day, I'm eatingand I am working and I'm doing
the best that I can.
So that's that's a little bitawkward when people are inspired
(47:32):
by those little things.
At the same time, we have toacknowledge that just going
through life is a challenge.
And if you add another challengeto it, like an invisible
challenge such as breast cancer,which I don't know from personal
experience how that would be togo through it.
And there must be times when athere are times when a cancer
(47:54):
patient is visibly ill, butthere's a lot of times when it's
a silent and invisible struggleto the outside world.
We don't know what people aregoing through.
So I have a visible impairment.
I have a visible challenge and Ihave a traumatic story that
grabs people's interest.
So one thing that I am hoping todo with it is to take that
(48:18):
platform and help people live ahappier and healthier life.
So I happen to have a lot oftools prior to my attack.
I had a lot of tools that I hadbeen developing over years and
some that I had just recentlyacquired that helped me get
(48:41):
through the recovery.
So one of my goals is to sharesome of those resources, some of
those tools with others thathopefully you can learn to live
a healthier and happier lifebefore you have a traumatic
event.
So that you're not learning toget by and also all of a sudden
(49:04):
learning how to take care ofyour own health and wellness.
That that's one challenge.
Actually, I just today, inspiredby going on this podcast, in
fact, I started a YouTubechannel and I posted one video.
It is not a great video.
(49:24):
I have been paralyzed, I guessis the word, where I've been
held back is a is a better word.
I've been held back from postingvideos because they're not
great, because the lighting'snot good, because I don't look
good, because I didn't say theperfect thing.
And so I've tried to make videosa few times in the past and I
never went, I never did anythingwith it.
(49:45):
And so just I created thechannel, I posted a video, and
it is one healthful and easyrecipe.
And my idea of what I want toshare is if I can do it, you can
do it, raw food videos.
Because it takes time and energyto create any kind of healthful
meal in the kitchen, whetheryou're cooking or whether you're
(50:08):
preparing raw food, it takestime.
And a lot of recipes that youfind are very complicated.
And I've simplified, I'vesimplified things, and I'd like
to share my solutions.
And if it means that one personhas one extra healthy meal in a
week, then that's a small help.
SPEAKER_02 (50:29):
That's beautiful.
I love that.
Yeah, Rachel, that is justfantastic.
Well, we we have a little funround that we play at the end of
uh each show with each guest,but before we go to the fun
round, is there anything that wehave not asked you that you
would like to share with ourlisteners?
And maybe it's the name of yourYouTube channel.
(50:50):
I don't know.
SPEAKER_00 (50:51):
Well, the name of the YouTube channel is Rachel.
My name is uh spelled with anextra A R-A-C-H-A-E-L, raw food.
Rachel raw food.
Pretty simple.
And I do hope to be adding morevideos to it.
There is one thing that I don'tknow for sure if it has any
(51:12):
relevance to this particularstory.
But a word of uh caution andadvice to people in the world
out there, don't feed thewildlife.
There's no way to know if thisalligator had been fed, but it
is a hypothesis because it wasin an area where there were a
(51:34):
lot of people at a bar, a lot ofdrunk people, a lot of tourists,
people doing stupid things likefeeding alligators.
And alligators should be afraidof people.
But if they associate peoplewith food, they leave that, they
lose that fear.
And again, I have no idea ifthis alligator was fed.
There's no way to know that.
But in general, it's a bad ideato feed wildlife.
(51:56):
And even a bird, if a bird isdependent on you for food, what
happens when you're not therefeeding it anymore?
So that's something that Ibecame aware of after this
attack and just uh a suggestion,especially seagulls at the
shore.
Please don't feed those.
SPEAKER_02 (52:11):
I I couldn't agree more.
I there's a beautiful park thatI walk in, and people feed the
squirrels so often now that itruins my walk around the park
because the squirrels chargeyou.
Like they literally you have toshoo them away because they're
crawling up your leg to getfood.
Yeah, and and then another oneuh there's a beautiful mountain
(52:32):
called Beach Mountain in NorthCarolina, which is overrun with
deer because people are justfeeding the deer and they're
developing a weird disease fromeating human food, and the
people think they're doingsomething great for these deer,
and they're actually being, youknow, it's causing something
called blue nose and um orsomething, something along those
(52:53):
lines.
But it's it's those are just twoexamples directly in my life,
and I'm I'm a city girl, so um,so yeah, I totally agree with
you.
SPEAKER_00 (53:02):
That's terrible, and human food is not very healthy,
as natural and good food.
So let the animals eat theirnuts and their berries because
that's much more helpful forthem.
SPEAKER_02 (53:11):
Yeah.
Rachel Raw food is healthythough.
SPEAKER_00 (53:13):
So it is.
SPEAKER_02 (53:15):
It is this is awesome.
All right, so we have a quicklittle little round of a few
questions, and um, it's just forour listeners to get to know you
better and maybe connect withyou on some other parts of your
life.
So these are one-word answers.
Cat or dog?
Cat.
Red or blue?
(53:37):
Blue.
unknown (53:39):
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (53:39):
Milk chocolate or dark chocolate?
If I'm making it, dark.
Kickboard or no kickboard.
No kickboard.
Mountains or beach?
Both.
I love it.
Football or baseball?
Neither.
Okay, we get that one.
(54:00):
iPhone or Android?
iPhone coffee or tea?
Both.
Morning person or night owl?
Morning person.
Okay.
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (54:12):
Favorite pizza topping.
Pineapple and ham.
Favorite vegetable.
I mean onion.
Favorite place to swim.
SPEAKER_00 (54:32):
Lake Quicocha in the mountains of Ecuador.
SPEAKER_01 (54:37):
Wow, that's a great answer.
SPEAKER_00 (54:39):
Actually, it's pretty cold.
It's actually very cold.
That's not a good answer.
SPEAKER_01 (54:43):
Well, there's no alligators up there, I don't
guess.
SPEAKER_00 (54:45):
True.
True.
How do you relax?
With breathing if I need to.
On the fly, if I need relaxationwith breathing.
What's your shoe size?
SPEAKER_01 (54:58):
Eat.
Okay.
What's your favorite Star Warscharacter?
Or Harry Potter, whichever.
Oh boy.
Hun solo.
He's so sexy.
Uh I know you can cook.
Uh, what's your favorite thingto cook?
Or not cook, prepare, I guess,in your case.
(55:19):
Chocolate.
What word comes to mind when youdive in the water?
Free.
SPEAKER_02 (55:26):
Wow.
Beautiful.
Rachel, this has just been soincredible.
We're just really grateful foryou spending so much.
Oh, thank you.
SPEAKER_01 (55:35):
It's been a pleasure.
That's so beautiful.
And your whole you know being isjust beautiful.
Thank you very much.
SPEAKER_02 (55:41):
Thank you.
Take care.
You too.
It's now time for the takeaways.
Our takeaways for RachelLilienthal.
Attacked by a nightfuck gator.
Yeah.
Loses the majority of her rightarm and she was right-handed.
Uh, just just what a story, whatan inspiration.
(56:01):
So much there.
I'm so inspired by it.
What's your first takeaway?
SPEAKER_01 (56:05):
The first one, I one of one of the things she said is
that she she looks for silverlinings.
And when you listen to her inthe interview, you'll get the
impression this is a woman whoreally tries to see the positive
in things.
Um, but but her littleexpression was uh if you look
for silver linings, your day isa little better.
And if you have a lot of littlebetter days, then you have a
better life.
(56:26):
That's like, I think that's sogood.
I mean, gratitude, it's soeverybody says it, but she lives
it.
You know, she had every reasonto be to be annoyed, to be
bitter or to, you know,whatever, but she she's not.
Listen to her.
She's grateful and beautiful,like gorgeously beautiful from
the inside out, just beautiful.
(56:48):
So I love that.
Look, look for silver liningsand put a whole bunch of them
together and you're gonna have abetter life.
SPEAKER_02 (56:53):
Yeah, even as she realizes she's lost her arm,
right?
It's splurting, spurting bloodand her nerves are out, and
she's being dragged to you know,be rescued the doc.
She's thinking, gosh, I'm soglad I just bought an automatic
cat.
I mean, talk about uh lookingfor a silver lining.
(57:16):
Like that's just amazing.
So yeah, she she I love thesilver linings part.
So I loved uh this part whereshe said, you know, life is hard
no matter what.
Right.
You you may see someone like shesaid, I you know, I she visible
visibly has a disability withher arm being gone, but people
(57:36):
are walking around with allkinds of I mean mental health,
we talk about that all the time.
Right, you can't see what peopleare suffering from always.
Sometimes you do, sometimes youdon't, right?
But that life is hard.
And so she said she sometimesgets people when she's in yoga
class, like, wow, I can'tbelieve you're so good at yoga.
She's like, I was really she shewas really good at yoga before
(58:00):
she lost her arm.
And so this goes, you know, thisthis I relate to so much with my
breast cancer that be ready forlife to be hard.
Be ready, have your mentalskills, have your body in shape,
have your mind in shape, haveyour life in shape.
Because guess what?
Life is gonna throw really hardstuff at you.
(58:22):
It's not a matter of if, it'sjust a matter of when.
We lose people, things happen.
If you are ready, you will getthrough things so much better.
And I, you know, I just youknow, think about my breast
cancer where I was in reallygood physical shape.
And so I returned to really goodphysical shape.
(58:42):
And of course, I was mentallytough from swimming.
I mean, I think I thinkathletics makes you mentally
tough.
And so it wasn't something thatjust knocked me to my knees
because I was prepared andRachel was doing yoga, she was
eating right, she was seeing thesilver linings, and so she has
this you know horrible thinghappen to her, and she's you
(59:06):
know, gonna use it to be evenmore amazing than she was.
So I love that.
SPEAKER_01 (59:12):
Yeah, that's a really, really great point
because as you say, it's not ifit's when.
unknown (59:18):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (59:18):
So and and my next takeaway kind of is a piggyback
on that.
When she was telling the storyof being twirled by the
alligator, she said she made thedecision to exhale rather than
hold her breath, you know,whether that was, you know, the
right thing or not to do.
I think that was really symbolicof, you know, how what do you do
when that bad thing happens?
(59:40):
You know, if if your firstinstinct is to just panic and
fight, and you know, then thenthen it's gonna not necessarily
go well for you.
So she she exhaled, she blewbubbles.
And I thought I think that's sosymbolic for how we can handle
and be prepared to handle thebad things.
The tough things that are comingour way that are, you know,
(01:00:03):
around the block.
I remember I was in a um kind ofa car wreck with my sister and
Jenny, who the one who's who'swho passed away from brain
cancer.
But we were as as the car wascareening around, she says very
calmly, you know, and I'mwrestling the car, she says,
okay, Jesus.
(01:00:24):
And she just said, and Iremember just thinking, oh yeah,
exhale.
Just okay, you know, this ishappening, let let's just
exhale.
And I, you know, I I want tohave that in my bag of tricks
for the next thing that comesalong.
I want to exhale, and I want tosay, okay, Jesus, too.
SPEAKER_02 (01:00:42):
Yes, yes, that's a beautiful one.
Um, my second one is when shesaid, sometimes, you know, and
this is a great example.
We don't, we she's not alwayslooking, you know, she's not
always seeing silver linings,and sometimes she said she just
screams out, this is hard.
(01:01:02):
I love that.
Letting, letting go.
Thanks so much for listening tothis Champions Mojo Encore
episode.
If it inspired you, please shareit with a friend and consider
leaving a quick review.
It truly helps.
I'll be back in January 2026with all new episodes to help
you live well, swim well, andkeep your mojo going.
The alligator didn't budge.
He just sat there with my arm inhis mouth, not moving.
So I thought I needed to beaggressive and I punched the
alligator as hard as I couldwith my left hand.
At that point, the alligatorstarted thrashing me around and
rolling me around underwater.
(00:23):
The first time he rolled mearound, I did not know how long
that was going to last.
I did not know if I was evergoing to come up for air.
And I thought, is this the wayI'm going to die?
SPEAKER_02 (00:36):
Hello, friends.
This is Kelly Palace, host ofChampions Mojo, your place for
better health, resilience, andmaster swimming.
I'm taking a short break fromrecording new episodes of
Champions Mojo for two excitingreasons.
First, I'm launching my latestbook, False Cure.
It's a whistleblowinginvestigative journalism book
(00:59):
about a denied health epidemic.
If you'd like more informationon that, it's in the show notes.
The second and most compellingreason I'm on a break is here at
Champions Mojo, we're preparingfor the January 2026 reboot of
powerful new weekly episodeswith expert guest interviews,
(01:21):
inspiring topics, and tips totake your mindset, health, and
personal performance to the nextlevel.
We will be announcing someincredible partnerships with the
show, and I guarantee what wehave in store for you will
empower you and keep your mojostrong in the new year.
While I'm preparing some of thisgreat stuff, we've selected some
(01:45):
of our best shows ever for anEncore series.
My hope is that if this is yoursecond time listening to this
episode, you'll take away evenmore insight and motivation.
Or if it's your first time,you'll love this episode as much
as everyone else did.
So settle in and enjoy thisEncore presentation in its
(02:06):
entirety.
Today we have a show that is socompelling that we almost
guarantee you will be glued toyour listening device.
It's riveting.
I just had lunch with my brotherand sister-in-law and told them
I'm getting ready to record ashow that's so riveting.
It's going to inspire you and itmay even terrify you.
(02:29):
So we're going to be talkingwith Rachel Lilienthal, a master
swimmer who was attacked by anine-foot alligator while
swimming in open water in theWaukiva River near Apopka,
Florida, in 2015.
Rachel lost the majority of herright arm in that attack and
almost her life.
(02:51):
Maria, can you tell us a littlebit more about this brave
champion?
SPEAKER_01 (02:55):
Sure, Kelly.
It's been six years sinceRachel's alligator attack and
the loss of her arm.
But that didn't keep her fromwinning gold recently in the
200-meter butterfly in the RowdyGaines short course meters
masters classic meet.
Besides being a talentedswimmer, Rachel's a Spanish
professor at Rollins College.
(03:16):
And we've got lots of questions.
We want to hear Rachel's story.
So let's get started.
Again, Rachel, welcome to theshow.
We're so glad you're here.
SPEAKER_00 (03:23):
Thanks so much.
I'm happy to be here.
SPEAKER_02 (03:26):
Yes, yes.
So, Rachel, just a littlebackground for our listeners,
because as I introduced you andI and I told you before, we we
have a lot of people on theshow, but none that are like
really good friends.
So I heard your story when wewere in a swim meet together
several months ago.
And at first I thought you werejoking me that you had lost your
(03:46):
arm about an alligator with analligator.
So we're gonna hear all thedetails on that.
But regarding this Rowdy Games200 meter butterfly, I want to
tell the listeners a littlestory about I was on the deck.
And if you don't know the RowdyGames uh short course meters
masters classic, it is one ofthe premier swim meets in the
(04:07):
US.
People come from all over, itwas very well attended.
This was just a few weeks ago.
And Rachel is swimming the200-meter butterfly.
And after she swam, I was I wasat the end of her lane cheering
for her while she was swimming.
And I she did a fantastic job.
And as I'm going past theannouncer, or I'm sorry, the
(04:31):
starter for the whole meet, Iwalk past him and he taps me on
the shoulder and he said, Isthat your friend?
And I said, Yes.
He said, Was she a swimmerbefore she lost her arm?
And I said, Yes.
He said, Well, my goodness, uh,she must have like her butterfly
(04:52):
is so beautiful as it is.
I can't even imagine what itlooked like before.
So it you got everybody'sattention at that meet.
You swam this amazing race.
Um, so Rachel, we want to hearevery detail of how this event
occurred.
And yet leave us a littlebreathing room because I know we
(05:14):
will have questions.
So make a few pauses becausewe're probably gonna know that
our listeners are going, butwhat about that?
But what about that?
So um, yeah, like you said, youwant all the details.
I said yes, please.
The same details you were on thedate, the new bathing suit.
We want it all.
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (05:33):
Well, thank you, Kelly, for that wonderful
introduction and also for thekudos that I hadn't heard yet
about that master's meet.
And thank you for cheering me onbecause that was a hard event.
So I was a swimmer in my heart,but I was not a competitive
swimmer until about a year ago.
(05:55):
When I was a small child, I wasa competitive swimmer and then I
stopped swimming competitivelyat age 12.
But I loved it.
It's something that I did for myphysical health, for my mental
health, for my emotional health.
And so on that fateful day,August 8th, 2015, when I was
swimming with my friend, I wason a date, and I was swimming
(06:15):
with my friend for a fewminutes, like two, maybe five
minutes, before he said, Oh,okay, let's get out.
And I, the swimmer, said, Well,I just got in.
And the water was fresh andclean and cool.
And it was August in Florida, itwas hot outside.
I was very, very happy in thewater.
(06:37):
So we came to the agreement thathe would get out and I would
stay in.
So I was in a main swimming areawith many people, children,
dogs, plenty of people, music.
It was a party atmosphere.
And all by myself, I felt kindof silly once my date got out of
the water.
(06:57):
So I decided I would swim offand get some exercise.
I will never forget the feelingof going through each and every
one of those strokes.
I did a little freestyle, I dida little breaststroke, I did
some butterfly, and I even didthe backstroke.
And I decided, wouldn't it be agreat idea to swim to where I
(07:21):
had canoeed or kayaked in thepast, to where the springs
start.
So I was at Wokaiba Island,which is just a short distance
from the start of the WokaibaRiver at the Wokaiba Springs.
And I thought, oh, I'll swim allthe way to the beginning.
And I didn't actually get nearthat far when I realized the
(07:43):
water was getting a lot uh tooshallow for my comfort.
And so I turned around and I wasswimming back.
Luckily, I wasn't that far fromWokaiba Island where all the
people were, when I felt analligator come across my back.
Now, I I did not believe it wasan alligator at first.
In fact, I just felt a scrapingon my back and I thought it
(08:04):
might have been a canoe notlooking where they were going.
So I turned around, fullyprepared to yell at somebody to
watch where they were going, andsomething clamped down on my
arm.
I still didn't believe it was analligator.
In fact, I thought I couldn'tthink of any other logical
(08:24):
explanation of what it might be,but it couldn't be an alligator.
No way.
I had just told people that Iwasn't afraid of alligators.
I had just told people, no, no,no.
Alligators are afraid of people.
Alligators feed it and right.
Alligators only bother you ifyou bother them.
SPEAKER_01 (08:41):
I'm fine.
I could have said the same thingto my kids.
SPEAKER_00 (08:45):
I had literally just said that.
So I took a moment, I was stillpretty calm, and I touched
whatever was on my arm, and itfelt reptilian.
So if it was reptilian and itwas in a river in Florida, then
it had to be an alligator.
There was no denying it.
And so now what?
(09:07):
Rachel.
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (09:09):
So there was, if I recall when I when you first
told me this story, tell usabout the boys that teased you
about an alligator and youthought you would turn around
and then tell us that littlepart of it, because I think that
played a little bit in yourbravado.
SPEAKER_00 (09:27):
Absolutely.
My ego had taken over.
I wasn't really sure how far Iwas going to swim when I left my
date when he got out and Istayed in.
I thought it would just be for alittle while.
And I swam up to a bridge, whichis in view of the main swimming
area.
And I thought, well, maybe I'llturn back.
But then I thought, I lovebridges.
(09:50):
Let me go under the bridge.
And as I was going under thisbridge, I felt a little bit
icky.
A little bit, I couldn't reallyidentify what it was.
But I said, well, I'll just gounder the bridge and then decide
if I'm going to continue furtheror not.
And a canoe with two boys cameunder the bridge, and one boy
(10:11):
said, You know, we saw a bigalligator not too far away.
And I turned around just as fastas I could, and I started
swimming fast.
I had been swimming for pleasureand I was swimming for speed,
swimming fast back towards themain swimming area.
Then the other boy said, Oh, hewas only kidding.
(10:32):
There's no alligator.
And at that point, I thought, ofcourse not.
It's a crowded day.
There's millions of peoplearound.
There's not going to bealligators right now, right
here.
And my ego took over.
I completely forgot about thatfeeling I had been sensing.
(10:55):
I hadn't fully digested it.
I hadn't fully analyzed it, butI completely forgot.
Actually, I forgot until monthslater when I first sat down to
try and write down the story.
That is when the memory came up.
And I was like, oh, right.
Somebody warned me.
But then somebody turned aroundand said, it's not true.
And I was, I was angry at theboy, and I just said, Oh, I will
(11:16):
swim.
And that's when I actuallythought, oh, swim to the
beginning of this spring.
So I felt this alligator comeacross me, grabs my arm.
SPEAKER_01 (11:27):
Can I interrupt you for a second?
So were you between the bridgeand the swimming area at that
point or beyond the bridge?
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (11:33):
I had passed the bridge.
SPEAKER_01 (11:35):
Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_00 (11:35):
And I had already turned around and I was coming
back towards the bridge.
SPEAKER_01 (11:39):
Okay, but you hadn't gotten back under the bridge
yet, though.
SPEAKER_00 (11:42):
No, the bridge was in view.
Okay.
So I pet this alligator.
I tapped it gently and I wastrying to communicate through my
gentle caress.
It's okay.
This is all a mistake.
No hard feelings.
You let me go, I'll swim back.
We'll both go on with our days.
(12:02):
And it didn't make sense.
I'm not gonna die in the room.
I'm not saying drowned.
I'm a swimmer.
I'm not gonna drown.
But I was still quite alarmed bygetting thrashed around under
the water.
And I decided not to hold mybreath, which I think was a
crucial element of my survival.
I decided to slowly exhale,slowly blow bubbles while he was
(12:26):
thrashing me around.
Now I didn't know I could holdmy breath longer than I could
slowly exhale, but I feel thatthat slow exhale helped me keep
my cool enough and always, whenin doubt, breathe.
So I breathed.
And he let me up for air and Ibreathed.
It was a wonderful gasp of air.
(12:46):
But again, he's still on my arm.
So what do I do?
I hit him again.
And I'm not sure how many times,maybe two, three times, at one
point I felt and I heard my armbreak.
And then I knew, okay, this is athis is a big deal.
This is, I'm not getting out ofthis on my own.
So I called for help.
And I can't believe I didn'tinitially call for help, but I
(13:08):
didn't.
My first response was, I'm gonnaget out of this on my own.
And then when I realized Icouldn't, I called for help.
There were some canoeers alittle bit ahead of me in the
river, almost at the bridge.
They turned around, they sawwhat was happening, and they
tried to turn around and cometowards me.
(13:29):
But they weren't very skilled atcanoeing, and I think they were
having a hard time.
So they decided instead to goahead and blow their whistle and
alert people that there was aproblem.
I was desperate in that in thatmoment.
I was full of despair.
I really didn't think anyone wasgoing to help me.
I had completely forgotten ofthe congestion on the river
(13:51):
ahead of me.
I'd completely forgotten thatthere were, in fact, there was a
traffic jam of canoes and kayaksat the place where the Rock
Springs Run meets the WakaibaRiver.
SPEAKER_01 (14:02):
Can I ask you another question here?
Sure.
How when the because none of ushave ever been twirled by an
alligator.
SPEAKER_02 (14:09):
It's called isn't it called a death roll?
Yeah, it's a big thing.
Yeah I I've I've heard that'show alligators kill their prey,
is that they take a death roll.
SPEAKER_01 (14:19):
So my question is my question for you is you know, he
he's twirling, you're it's yousound amazingly calm.
And uh, but you get anoccasional breath of air, you
know, that where you're up andyou had enough time, of course,
to call for help.
Is that is that lasting asecond, a millisecond, 10
(14:40):
seconds?
SPEAKER_00 (14:41):
How long was those little pauses?
That is an impossible questionto answer because I know my time
perception is way off here.
It seemed like quite some time,but when I spoke with the
rescuers, it all happened in aninstant.
They were very close to meactually when this happened.
Being thrashed around, it feltlike a very long time.
(15:01):
But after I was let up for airand then thrashed again, I
realized that he wasn't going tothrash me around long enough for
me to drown.
I was gonna get air again.
Each I didn't doubt after thatfirst time, I didn't doubt, I
don't think, if I was going toget a breath or not.
(15:22):
He didn't actually thrash mearound again until I hit him.
So it was, I'm sitting here withmy prey caught.
I'm chilling on the river.
And then I punch him and hethrashes me around.
I breathe, I rest, he rests, Ipunch him again, he thrashes me
again.
So I had felt this despair thatthese people who I saw were not
(15:45):
going to come to my rescue.
And immediately thereafter, Iheard a voice saying, What's
going on?
Get in the kayak.
And it was this young womannamed Krista Carlson who sped
ahead when she saw that therewas a problem or she heard my
cry for help.
She sped ahead with her verystrong boyfriend in the back of
(16:06):
the double kayak and her in thefront.
She happened to have been alifeguard, so she had that
instinct and that desire to helpand that athleticism that made
her and her boyfriend able torush to my aid.
So I explained there's analligator.
And I think it was Krista thatsaid, hit the alligator with the
(16:28):
paddle.
So the boyfriend hits, and theboyfriend's name was Casey.
The boyfriend hits the alligatorwith the paddle, and the
alligator rolls me around evenworse than the first time.
I think that my puny little fistwas no match for that paddle,
the extension of this strongyoung man.
(16:50):
So he thrashed me around more.
And it this happened a fewtimes.
Again, it was hit the alligatorwith a paddle, punish Rachel,
rest, repeat.
At one point, the alligator toreoff half of my bathing suit.
So I'm I'm aware now that my newbathing suit has been ruined,
(17:10):
and I'm wearing half a bathingsuit.
Pause, breathe, rest, thrashagain, repeat.
And this time, the alligatortakes my entire bathing suit.
And I'm completely naked.
And I believe it was at thatpoint where we were all thinking
this is futile.
This is maybe we need more help.
(17:32):
This doesn't seem to be goinganywhere.
And so Krista had the idea ofhitting the alligator between
the eyes.
So she told her boyfriend to tryand hit the alligator between
the eyes, which worked.
The alligator swam off, and Iwas in bliss for a nanosecond
when I realized that my arm wasgone with the alligator.
(17:53):
And I was spewing blood, littleps sperm, little little spurts
of blood coming out of my arm.
The nerve, the nerves visible,this yellow tube kind of thing.
Just like in a cartoon that yousee when a limb has been
severed, there's these littletubes that come out, and there's
this spewing blood.
(18:14):
So that's when I kind of lost mycool.
At that point, Krista's motherand father had arrived on the
scene.
And they took over the effort oftowing me, and Krista and her
boyfriend went ahead for help.
I don't think they knew aboutthe canoe who had already gone
ahead for help, but they alsowere able to give more details
(18:35):
about what was happening.
So the mother and fatherrecruited some other people on
the river.
There happened to be an EagleScout with his girlfriend on the
river that day.
So knowledge about the canoe,again, athleticism.
And the mother, Haley Carlson,actually held my arm tight to do
(18:59):
her best at giving me atourniquet while they towed me.
So I was being towed, I had myarm here, and she had my arm.
She was holding my arm, and herhusband, Jeff, was paddling.
And then in this other canoe,the young couple, uh, the woman
in the front was paddling,paddling, and the man in the
(19:20):
back was paddling at the sametime as calling 911.
And so they towed me to safety.
They towed me back to the dock.
And it was a long time.
It felt so long.
At one point, I thought I canget there faster myself.
Because it was quite difficultto coordinate these two vessels
with not full paddling power andthis burden of me in between.
(19:44):
It was quite difficult for themto maneuver.
And I thought, I can just swimahead.
And they they said no.
So when I got to the dock, alsoI remembered where the ladder
was, and I thought, okay, well,just a little bit further, and I
can get to the ladder.
But they stopped as soon as theygot to the dock where there were
people waiting, and there wasthis extraordinarily strong man
(20:05):
waiting to get me out of thewater.
He reached down to the water,which was well below the level
of the dock, two or three feet,I think, below the level of the
dock.
He reached down, he grabbed meby my left arm, he pulled me up,
and he laid me gently on thedock.
I think that was an amazing featof strength.
And the fact that he was thereto do that was a mini miracle.
(20:28):
Also, as I had been towedtowards the dock, I saw that
there was someone standing andtriumphantly holding a belt.
I thought it was a belt.
And I'm like, yes, good idea.
I need a tourniquet.
A belt is a good idea.
So I'm now on the dock.
Very quickly, people realizedthat I should be covered.
(20:51):
So people sacrificed theirtowels and covered me up.
And there was a lot of commotionand people talking.
And somebody said, Oh, I'm anurse.
And I said, I saw a tourniquetvery, very quickly.
Probably it was already in theprocess, but very quickly,
someone came, put a tournique atourniquet on me.
And it turns out that it wasactually a medical grade
tourniquet.
(21:11):
The deputy who happened to beworking security that Saturday
at Waqaiba Island, he hadanticipated the need for a
tourniquet a few years prior.
He watched the Boston Marathonbombing and saw how many lives
and how many limbs were lost, inpart because people were using
(21:35):
torn-up shirts and pants andanything they could get their
hands on instead of propertourniquets.
So he had this idea and hepetitioned his superiors in the
Seminole County policedepartment.
He petitioned his superiors toget tourniquets for everybody.
And I forget the number rightnow, but it was, I want to say
$60,000 is how much it cost fora medical grade tourniquet for
(21:58):
every emergency worker inSeminole County.
But he had his in his car thatday.
He was working security.
They don't pay cops enough.
And he had to have a second job.
And in his car, he had his copequipment.
SPEAKER_01 (22:12):
And he's the one who made it happen.
SPEAKER_00 (22:14):
He's the one who made it happen.
And he happened to address itcan't be.
SPEAKER_01 (22:19):
Can I uh ask another question?
So while you're being towed tothe dock, are you talking to the
people?
Are they talking to you?
Are you feeling shocky?
SPEAKER_00 (22:28):
Are you crossed out?
No, I'm not.
I'm lucid the whole time.
I don't remember everything thatI said, but I'm told a few
different things.
One thing that I remember themreporting is that I was talking
about my car.
I believe that we are only givenchallenges that we can overcome.
(22:55):
And I believe that we are giventhe tools that we need when we
need them.
Not long before losing my arm, Ipurchased my very first
automatic car.
I learned how to drive on sixshifts.
I always preferred purchasingsix-shift cars.
I did have one automatic carthat was an old beater that
(23:17):
didn't last very long.
But if it was a new car that Iwas intentionally choosing for
myself, it was manual.
I had in May of 2015, or maybeit was April.
I think it was April of 2015.
I had just the very bestaccident you could possibly
have.
If you're gonna have to have anaccident, nobody's hurt, it's
(23:39):
good weather, the people arepleasant.
My car was damaged enough for meto get a large amount of
insurance money for it to fixit.
And I use that as a down paymenton my new car.
I already had my car for about10 years.
I was thinking about getting anew car anyway.
So it really worked out nicely.
And I happened to choose anautomatic car.
So while I was being towed, thatis one story that I told my
(24:03):
rescuers.
Well, at least I have anautomatic car.
Because how would it drive stickshift?
And how hard would it be to gocar shopping in addition to
everything else while I wasrecovering?
And I'm glad you asked thequestion of the what I was
talking about while being towed,because I have trained my brain
(24:24):
to look for silver linings.
I am an expert silver linerlooker, silver lining looker.
I can find them in kind of theworst situations imaginable, or
I can even imagine what thesilver lining might be.
Some people call me too much ofa Pollyanna for that, too much
(24:45):
of an optimist, but I say it's asurvival technique.
When we approach the dayfocusing on things to be
grateful for, we have a betterday.
And when we have a lot of betterdays, we have a better life.
So I was in the habit of lookingon the bright side and an
(25:07):
alligator ate my arm, but atleast I had an automatic car.
SPEAKER_01 (25:14):
Oh, what about the woman holding your arm?
I mean, she must have I mean,how brave just to stick her
hands right into your bloody,you know, appendage there.
SPEAKER_00 (25:23):
I know.
And she was a medicalprofessional.
SPEAKER_01 (25:26):
Okay, so she knew what she was doing.
SPEAKER_00 (25:28):
A medical assistant, I believe, was her title.
I'm not exactly sure it whatwhat her job function was, but
she said that she asked me if Ihad been tested for, I don't, I
don't know what she was specificabout it.
And I and I and I answered, Iwas, but it hit not since
October.
So this was in August.
And I told her the day of mylast blood work, which was in
(25:49):
October when I had been beentested for a range of things.
I don't recall that, but shesays that she did ask and I did
answer.
So I don't think that she waitedto know.
I think she her instinct was tohelp.
And then while she's gettingblood actually um spurted on
her, she's thinking, oh my God,here's a stranger and I have her
(26:10):
blood.
And then she asked is my is myguess.
Yeah, she was extremely brave todo that.
So another beautiful aspect ofmy rescue is that the emergency
workers, the firemen who doubleas EMTs, they were having lunch
at the shopping plaza twominutes away.
(26:32):
So they got the call and theyarrived almost immediately.
They say that I was probablyfrom the Gator's mouth to the
operating room at ORMC, OrlandoRegional Medical Center, within
an hour.
And that's it, just so happensthat there's an excellent trauma
hospital nearby, near enough.
(26:54):
And there was not crazy trafficon I-4, that we were able to get
there, that everything happenedso quickly that yes, I lost a
lot of blood, but I did not die.
SPEAKER_02 (27:06):
So this has transition I'm sorry, Kelly, go
ahead.
Miracle, miracle, miracle.
And one of the parts that justseems just miraculous to me was
tell us how long you were in thehospital.
Four days, not quite four days.
I mean, that is just that's justamazing.
(27:27):
Um so once they got to you tothe hospital, they do surgery,
and then you're you are at homefive days later.
Right.
Two surgeries.
Two surgeries.
So tell us what your mindset waslooking at this new life.
Like I know one thing, you know,we you know, I can't even fathom
(27:52):
the changes that this has put inyour life.
I found out just one small,small one.
I'm standing there at the meet,and we we get a beautiful free
cap in the Rowdy Games goodiebag, and it's wrapped in
plastic.
And there's my friend Racheltrying to get this cap open.
And you have you have it tuckedunder part of your, you know,
(28:14):
your arm that's left, your rightarm, and your left arm, you're
trying to pluck this, you know,the plastic out of the thing.
And I'm like, can I do that foryou?
I grabbed it, opened it up,threw it at, you know, here's
your cap.
And you were like, thanks.
But it was like you were justcruising on, you were gonna open
that thing, which was hard forme to open, you know.
You isn't it a pain to open halfthe things plastic that we have
(28:36):
to open these days with twoarms, you know.
So that's just like the tiniestlittle thing.
But tell us like how you lookedat wow, my life has changed.
SPEAKER_00 (28:50):
Well, at the very beginning, I didn't understand
how dramatically my life hadchanged.
And I'll use the excuse of beingon morphine in the hospital that
maybe my judgment was soimpaired.
But the semester was supposed tostart in two weeks' time.
And I'm very lucky to have asupportive department where I
(29:12):
work, and a lot of people frommy department came and visited
me.
And the chair at the time, thechair of the department came on
my first day.
It happened, it was a Sunday.
A lot of people came to visit methat Sunday.
And my chair of the departmentcame, and she also hadn't
thought about what implicationsdid this have on my professional
(29:32):
life.
She was just coming to visit mein the hospital because I'll
giterate my arm.
And I told her that I had beenthinking of ways I could get
classes moving, that I couldhave perhaps a volunteer student
be a secretary and write on theboard.
And I had been strategizing howon earth I can teach my class?
(29:55):
And I had some solutions that Ithought of.
I had not thought of how am Igetting.
Myself dressed?
How am I getting into the carand driving across and I had not
thought of those details, butthe actual running of the class,
I was going through my brain andtrying to figure out how was I
going back to work in two weeks'time.
(30:15):
After that conversation, I'veguessed my boss talked to HR and
I was not going back to work intwo weeks.
That was absurd, which theyrealized I did not.
And so I was given theshort-term disability and I
ended up taking off thatsemester.
They canceled one class and theywere able to find substitutes on
(30:37):
the at the very, very lastminute, they were able to find
adjuncts to teach three classes.
So yes, I did not go to go backto work, but I thought
immediately, how can I modifythings to still do what I need
to do?
I think that the idea of givingup was just never on the table.
It never really occurred to methat I could just give up.
(30:59):
Now, certain things, as I wasrecovering, certain things that
I asked for help with, I didn't,I didn't know that I'd ever be
able to do them.
For example, opening up things.
I had an occupational therapistwho came to my house a few times
a week, I think, maybe maybe twoor three times a week for the
first few weeks while I was athome, while I was homebound,
(31:21):
just to get my get myself uhfunctional, really.
And one of the things wasenvelopes.
And I said, you know, should Ijust have somebody else?
Should I wait for somebody elseto open up my mail?
And she said, Oh no, you'regonna have to learn to do that
yourself.
And when I was struggling withsome other thing, I remember her
saying, Well, right now youcan't use it, but you will be
(31:43):
able to use your right arm,which to me sounded unthinkable
because I was in so much painand it was, you know, bandaged
up and swollen, and there wasthere was no way I could use it
at that time, which sheacknowledged, but I would be
able to.
Oh man, I can use it now for somany things.
So, in terms of opening up thatcap, having it in my uh armpit
(32:04):
and trying to open it with theother hand, that would be the
first attempt.
And second attempt, if I reallywanted to open it, would be use
my teeth, although I try not todo that in public and I try not
to do it too often just becauseGod forbid I break a tooth.
And in terms of figuring outother things, it takes time.
At the beginning, I wasincapable of putting a pillow in
(32:26):
a pillowcase.
I could make the rest of thebed.
I could put the fitted sheet on,I could put the top sheet on, I
could throw the blanket, I coulddo all of that.
But putting a pillow in apillowcase was out of the
question.
Absolutely impossible.
And now I can do it.
It takes a lot of effort.
And I still sometimes ask forhelp if help is easily
available, but I can put pillowsin a pillowcase now.
So little by little over time,I'm becoming more dexterous, I'm
(32:49):
becoming stronger, and I'm ableto do almost everything.
And then the other things thatI'm maybe not able to do, I have
let them go.
Like what?
For example, a flat iron for myhair.
I was very, I was very happy togive that away.
(33:09):
I gave away my curling iron, myflat iron, one hairdryer.
I still have one in the housefor guests.
Because I don't need to.
I do not need to do that.
That is absolutely not anecessity.
And actually, no, I'm seeingthat there's this tool that
looks like a hairdryer with abrush attached to it that I
might be able to use one-handed.
But the tools that I had backthen, I don't believe I could
(33:32):
use one-handed.
And why should I try?
That is something super easy forme to let go.
Another thing is zippers.
Zippers are awful.
And pants with zippers, maybe Ican get them on.
Buttons and zippers, I can getthem on.
Do I want to take the time andeffort every single time I go to
the bathroom?
I don't, I don't want to.
(33:52):
So yoga pants.
Yoga pants, elastic weights, andpants.
Why would I struggle withbuttons and zippers when there
are yoga pants?
SPEAKER_01 (34:06):
I feel the same way, and I have both hands.
Hey, so you know, your everyinterview we've we've watched of
you, and of course during thisinterview as well, you had this
just incredible, you know,positive attitude.
Did you tell me there was a fewmoments where you were like, you
know, this is hard and you criedor or whatever?
SPEAKER_00 (34:29):
Plenty, plenty.
So when I was in the ambulance,after I was safe, when I was
being saved, I realized that Ialmost died.
There was a very short momentwhere when I thought I might die
at the very beginning with thealligator dashing me around.
But then I was in survival mode.
And once I was in the safety ofthe ambulance on the way to the
(34:53):
hospital, I realized that I hadan easy out.
And I regretted not taking it.
I don't think that I would doanything differently, but I
realized at that point how hardthe road ahead was going to be.
And just that thought of, oh myGod, I had an opportunity to
step out of this struggle, whichlife is beautiful, but life is
(35:17):
also a tremendous challenge.
So I did have that moment of, ohmy God, I had an out and I
didn't take it.
Then in the hospital that night,I believe I was out of the
surgery maybe seven to nineo'clock at night, something like
that.
It was already dark out, if I'mnot mistaken, or getting dark by
(35:38):
the time I was in my hospitalroom.
And I was very angry with myselffor swimming outside of the
group, swimming where in a riverwhere I do know that there are
alligators in the Wakaiba River,obviously, it's Florida
freshwater.
And I forgot the fact that I hadswum on multiple occasions in
(36:00):
that river without gettingeaten.
But I was really being hard onmyself.
Then the next morning, one of myfirst visitors was a friend of
mine who I do a lot of outdooradventuring with.
And the first thing he said was,it could have been any of us.
(36:22):
It could have been any of us.
In other words, the fellowadventurers, the Florida
canoeers and kayakers and hikersand campers, the people who put
ourselves at the mercy ofFlorida nature.
And then I just felt so muchbetter after he said that.
And he's he said he didn't knowwhy he said it.
(36:43):
He was just compelled that hehad to tell me that.
Not, oh, how are you feeling?
Or just it could have been anyof us.
And yeah, it could have.
And it's not the first time thatI have swum in a river.
It just was the unlucky time.
So that was way back at thebeginning.
As I moved through life,sometimes things are just too
(37:06):
hard.
Sometimes I'm I may be trying todo something that I could do
with relatively ease, withrelative ease, or perhaps with
difficulty if I had my two arms.
And I'll say to myself, or I'llsay out loud, hopefully the
neighbors don't hear, this istoo hard.
This is too hard.
(37:26):
And usually at that point, I'llrealize, yeah, this is too hard.
Leave it.
Someone will fix this later.
You don't have to do this.
You don't have to do everything.
Recently on trash day, the trashcan had, I don't know what the
sequence of events was, but bythe time I got home, trash can
(37:46):
had water in it and was on itsside on the ground.
So I tried to lift it up, butbecause of the weight of the
water, I was not able to.
And so what I did was drag itout of the street and leave it
in my driveway.
And don't you know, someone sawthat and someone lifted that
(38:09):
garbage can up.
I don't know who it was, just akind neighbor who saw something
that could be fixed and fixedit.
I didn't even have to ask forhelp, but certainly I could have
waited till there was someonearound and asked for help with
that.
And that's what I do.
I ask for help for things.
And I've found so many assistivedevices that help me get through
(38:31):
my day.
So I use, for example, a fabriccutter to open up packages at
home.
It's not for plastic and paper,but it works.
SPEAKER_01 (38:43):
So hat how about the swimming?
You're a champion swimmer withone and a half arms.
SPEAKER_02 (38:50):
And I don't really feel like a champion swimmer.
Oh, Rachel, your butterfly isbeautiful, and you beat several
people in the 200-meterbutterfly.
Yeah, I want to I you knowyou're not going in circles, so
you're doing something right.
SPEAKER_00 (39:04):
I can't do one stroke.
Well, when swimming was actuallyquite easy.
I thought it might be hard, andI thought I would do the one
arm, the one arm butterfly.
I thought I would swim with myarms extended, and this one
would just stay put, and I woulduse my left arm only.
That's what I envisioned.
But then I watched the videos ofthe Paralympians who are so
(39:26):
inspiring, and they're usingtheir both arms.
If however much arm you have, goahead and use that.
And I now know that your body isvery important in the stroke.
It's not just your arms and yourlegs, it's your whole body.
So by using both arms, thenyou're using your shoulders and
you're using your chest andyou're using your abs in a more
even way, and that's beneficial.
(39:47):
So, my butterfly, thank you forsaying that it's beautiful.
It is more beautiful now than itwas five or six years ago
because I've been getting a lotof help.
And ever since I startedswimming with the master
swimmers, I've little by littleI've been improving my technique
quite a bit.
Because remember, I swamcompetitively until I was 12.
(40:08):
I was good, but I was 12.
And after that, I was alifeguard, I was a swimming
instructor, I was a lifeguardinstructor, but I was not a
skillful competitive swimmer.
I swam a lot of distance, but Iswam pretty slow.
So I'm only now learning how toswim fast.
SPEAKER_01 (40:28):
So go ahead, Count, sorry.
SPEAKER_02 (40:30):
Um, so as a breast cancer survivor, um, I remember
when I first got diagnosed,similarly, you know, how hard is
this gonna be?
Can I do it?
You know, my first consult, theywanted to do a you know a double
massectomy, and I'm like, Ican't do that, I'm not gonna do
that.
I'd rather just let it take me.
Um, have you and then I thensomeone told me, oh, you know,
(40:53):
down the road, this is gonna bethe greatest gift you ever had,
you know, getting cancer isgonna be a great gift.
There's a book called Cancer isa gift or the gift of cancer,
one of those two things.
So at this point, six yearslater, which is funny because
you and I are on six yearspost-breast cancer and you're
six years post-do you feel likethis has been a benefit?
(41:17):
Is your life better?
I know that you've met a greatman through this, you know,
through going back to swimming.
Like, what tell us, like, wouldyou would you wish you had given
up?
Or are you is your life better?
Or are you just somewhere in themiddle?
SPEAKER_00 (41:34):
There are so many what ifs and who knows that it's
really hard to say from thisevent.
I can concretely say that I gotangels.
I I I have the knowledge ofangels protecting me and being
(41:56):
with me through life.
They were always there, and nowI am aware of them, I'm
conscious of them, and I uhsometimes remember to thank
them, sometimes call on them,whereas I never did before.
So that was something veryconcrete, very clear I got from
this event, and that was becauseof the belief that the person
(42:16):
who got me out of the water wasan angel.
It turns out he's a real human,but for a minute, he was nobody
knew who he was, nobodyremembers seeing him.
He was just there, he helped,and he left.
And it turns out he was justshy.
He didn't want to be part ofthe, he didn't want to be in the
limelight.
And at that time, a friend ofmine said, Well, it was an
angel.
Just so matter-of-fact, soconvinced himself that I'm like,
(42:39):
oh, well, that makes senseactually.
And when you look at my rescue,it's too hard to believe that
that was all coincidental.
So the event most definitelyenhanced my spirituality and my
connection with the divine andmy knowledge that there is a
(43:05):
force out there protecting meand hopefully guiding me in the
direction I'm supposed to begoing.
Now, the fear is, or the wonderis if my rescue was planned, was
the attack also planned?
And it's impossible to know.
(43:27):
So, one of the things youmentioned that I'm I have a
great man, which I absolutelydo, and I had met him about 10
years ago when I was not readyfor him, and he was probably not
ready for me.
And having something in commonof this traumatic loss and huge
(43:48):
illness to overcome, I thinkthat that's something that we
connect on now that I definitelydidn't have 10 years ago.
But also, I was on a date with apretty great guy.
The guy that I was on a datewith on that August 8th, 2015,
he was a good catch.
And I was trying to catch him.
There was a lot I did like abouthim, and maybe he wasn't my
(44:10):
mate.
Maybe this alligator, and hedidn't just disappear when the
alligator ate my arm oranything.
He he showed up at the hospitaland he he tried.
And we did not survive thealligator attack and the
recovery thereafter.
Oh, it was our third date.
It was our fifth meeting and ourthird date.
So uh you can imagine how howchallenging it would be to start
(44:32):
a relationship off that way.
But I I don't I can't say if itwould have worked out with him,
and then I would have been withnot the right guy for me.
Who knows?
There's so many who knows.
Um I kind of forget the originalquestion.
I went off on a tangent.
SPEAKER_01 (44:49):
Well, well, I I would like to just sort of,
yeah.
The question was was this goodor bad?
Who knows, right?
But do it over.
Yeah, I I I I certainly believethat God knows what he's doing.
And but anyway, but that's notwhat I'm my question.
Is I'm sure many people havetold you that you're an
(45:10):
inspiration, and you know, howdo you how do you accept that or
do you accept that?
And you know, what do you dowith that?
SPEAKER_00 (45:21):
I have had to accept that at first it was very
uncomfortable, and sometimeswhen people say I'm inspiring,
it's they don't know the yearsof effort that went into it.
So, for example, in yoga class,oftentimes people say I'm
inspiring there, and maybe it'stheir first class or their first
(45:43):
year of class.
And so they don't they don'tknow that I already had a
background in yoga before losingmy arm, and they don't know how
absolutely essential yoga was tomy healing, and how if I didn't
have the yoga, I wouldn't havethe balance necessary to do
(46:04):
certain things with my seat thatI need to do now.
So they they find thatinspiring.
And okay, when you see somebodyin a crazy yoga posture, which I
don't, I'm not doing the crazyyoga postures, but it is, it can
be inspiring.
And so I I can kind of acceptthat a little bit more easily.
Or when somebody sees me swim,long distance fly.
Long distance fly is hard,everyone agrees upon that.
(46:26):
That's there's no debate, butit's something that I have been
doing all my life, not fast.
I'm only recently trying tolearn fast, but the long
distance aspect of it, it's whatI do, but it's not something
everybody can do.
But sometimes people areimpressed with very silly things
like my reading.
(46:48):
Oh my god, you can use a forkwith your left hand.
Yep, that was not a challenge.
That that yes, that was so itdepends on I think what they're
looking towards.
But it the idea, oh my God, youcan do your job even though you
lost your arm.
Well, thank God I'm not awaitress anymore.
(47:09):
Yes, I do have a job that onecan perform with one hand,
luckily.
And I don't really appreciatethat aspect.
I feel like, well, what do youexpect?
I'm not, I'm just going throughday.
I'm eating my day, I'm eatingand I am working and I'm doing
the best that I can.
So that's that's a little bitawkward when people are inspired
(47:32):
by those little things.
At the same time, we have toacknowledge that just going
through life is a challenge.
And if you add another challengeto it, like an invisible
challenge such as breast cancer,which I don't know from personal
experience how that would be togo through it.
And there must be times when athere are times when a cancer
(47:54):
patient is visibly ill, butthere's a lot of times when it's
a silent and invisible struggleto the outside world.
We don't know what people aregoing through.
So I have a visible impairment.
I have a visible challenge and Ihave a traumatic story that
grabs people's interest.
So one thing that I am hoping todo with it is to take that
(48:18):
platform and help people live ahappier and healthier life.
So I happen to have a lot oftools prior to my attack.
I had a lot of tools that I hadbeen developing over years and
some that I had just recentlyacquired that helped me get
(48:41):
through the recovery.
So one of my goals is to sharesome of those resources, some of
those tools with others thathopefully you can learn to live
a healthier and happier lifebefore you have a traumatic
event.
So that you're not learning toget by and also all of a sudden
(49:04):
learning how to take care ofyour own health and wellness.
That that's one challenge.
Actually, I just today, inspiredby going on this podcast, in
fact, I started a YouTubechannel and I posted one video.
It is not a great video.
(49:24):
I have been paralyzed, I guessis the word, where I've been
held back is a is a better word.
I've been held back from postingvideos because they're not
great, because the lighting'snot good, because I don't look
good, because I didn't say theperfect thing.
And so I've tried to make videosa few times in the past and I
never went, I never did anythingwith it.
(49:45):
And so just I created thechannel, I posted a video, and
it is one healthful and easyrecipe.
And my idea of what I want toshare is if I can do it, you can
do it, raw food videos.
Because it takes time and energyto create any kind of healthful
meal in the kitchen, whetheryou're cooking or whether you're
(50:08):
preparing raw food, it takestime.
And a lot of recipes that youfind are very complicated.
And I've simplified, I'vesimplified things, and I'd like
to share my solutions.
And if it means that one personhas one extra healthy meal in a
week, then that's a small help.
SPEAKER_02 (50:29):
That's beautiful.
I love that.
Yeah, Rachel, that is justfantastic.
Well, we we have a little funround that we play at the end of
uh each show with each guest,but before we go to the fun
round, is there anything that wehave not asked you that you
would like to share with ourlisteners?
And maybe it's the name of yourYouTube channel.
(50:50):
I don't know.
SPEAKER_00 (50:51):
Well, the name of the YouTube channel is Rachel.
My name is uh spelled with anextra A R-A-C-H-A-E-L, raw food.
Rachel raw food.
Pretty simple.
And I do hope to be adding morevideos to it.
There is one thing that I don'tknow for sure if it has any
(51:12):
relevance to this particularstory.
But a word of uh caution andadvice to people in the world
out there, don't feed thewildlife.
There's no way to know if thisalligator had been fed, but it
is a hypothesis because it wasin an area where there were a
(51:34):
lot of people at a bar, a lot ofdrunk people, a lot of tourists,
people doing stupid things likefeeding alligators.
And alligators should be afraidof people.
But if they associate peoplewith food, they leave that, they
lose that fear.
And again, I have no idea ifthis alligator was fed.
There's no way to know that.
But in general, it's a bad ideato feed wildlife.
(51:56):
And even a bird, if a bird isdependent on you for food, what
happens when you're not therefeeding it anymore?
So that's something that Ibecame aware of after this
attack and just uh a suggestion,especially seagulls at the
shore.
Please don't feed those.
SPEAKER_02 (52:11):
I I couldn't agree more.
I there's a beautiful park thatI walk in, and people feed the
squirrels so often now that itruins my walk around the park
because the squirrels chargeyou.
Like they literally you have toshoo them away because they're
crawling up your leg to getfood.
Yeah, and and then another oneuh there's a beautiful mountain
(52:32):
called Beach Mountain in NorthCarolina, which is overrun with
deer because people are justfeeding the deer and they're
developing a weird disease fromeating human food, and the
people think they're doingsomething great for these deer,
and they're actually being, youknow, it's causing something
called blue nose and um orsomething, something along those
(52:53):
lines.
But it's it's those are just twoexamples directly in my life,
and I'm I'm a city girl, so um,so yeah, I totally agree with
you.
SPEAKER_00 (53:02):
That's terrible, and human food is not very healthy,
as natural and good food.
So let the animals eat theirnuts and their berries because
that's much more helpful forthem.
SPEAKER_02 (53:11):
Yeah.
Rachel Raw food is healthythough.
SPEAKER_00 (53:13):
So it is.
SPEAKER_02 (53:15):
It is this is awesome.
All right, so we have a quicklittle little round of a few
questions, and um, it's just forour listeners to get to know you
better and maybe connect withyou on some other parts of your
life.
So these are one-word answers.
Cat or dog?
Cat.
Red or blue?
(53:37):
Blue.
unknown (53:39):
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (53:39):
Milk chocolate or dark chocolate?
If I'm making it, dark.
Kickboard or no kickboard.
No kickboard.
Mountains or beach?
Both.
I love it.
Football or baseball?
Neither.
Okay, we get that one.
(54:00):
iPhone or Android?
iPhone coffee or tea?
Both.
Morning person or night owl?
Morning person.
Okay.
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (54:12):
Favorite pizza topping.
Pineapple and ham.
Favorite vegetable.
I mean onion.
Favorite place to swim.
SPEAKER_00 (54:32):
Lake Quicocha in the mountains of Ecuador.
SPEAKER_01 (54:37):
Wow, that's a great answer.
SPEAKER_00 (54:39):
Actually, it's pretty cold.
It's actually very cold.
That's not a good answer.
SPEAKER_01 (54:43):
Well, there's no alligators up there, I don't
guess.
SPEAKER_00 (54:45):
True.
True.
How do you relax?
With breathing if I need to.
On the fly, if I need relaxationwith breathing.
What's your shoe size?
SPEAKER_01 (54:58):
Eat.
Okay.
What's your favorite Star Warscharacter?
Or Harry Potter, whichever.
Oh boy.
Hun solo.
He's so sexy.
Uh I know you can cook.
Uh, what's your favorite thingto cook?
Or not cook, prepare, I guess,in your case.
(55:19):
Chocolate.
What word comes to mind when youdive in the water?
Free.
SPEAKER_02 (55:26):
Wow.
Beautiful.
Rachel, this has just been soincredible.
We're just really grateful foryou spending so much.
Oh, thank you.
SPEAKER_01 (55:35):
It's been a pleasure.
That's so beautiful.
And your whole you know being isjust beautiful.
Thank you very much.
SPEAKER_02 (55:41):
Thank you.
Take care.
You too.
It's now time for the takeaways.
Our takeaways for RachelLilienthal.
Attacked by a nightfuck gator.
Yeah.
Loses the majority of her rightarm and she was right-handed.
Uh, just just what a story, whatan inspiration.
(56:01):
So much there.
I'm so inspired by it.
What's your first takeaway?
SPEAKER_01 (56:05):
The first one, I one of one of the things she said is
that she she looks for silverlinings.
And when you listen to her inthe interview, you'll get the
impression this is a woman whoreally tries to see the positive
in things.
Um, but but her littleexpression was uh if you look
for silver linings, your day isa little better.
And if you have a lot of littlebetter days, then you have a
better life.
(56:26):
That's like, I think that's sogood.
I mean, gratitude, it's soeverybody says it, but she lives
it.
You know, she had every reasonto be to be annoyed, to be
bitter or to, you know,whatever, but she she's not.
Listen to her.
She's grateful and beautiful,like gorgeously beautiful from
the inside out, just beautiful.
(56:48):
So I love that.
Look, look for silver liningsand put a whole bunch of them
together and you're gonna have abetter life.
SPEAKER_02 (56:53):
Yeah, even as she realizes she's lost her arm,
right?
It's splurting, spurting bloodand her nerves are out, and
she's being dragged to you know,be rescued the doc.
She's thinking, gosh, I'm soglad I just bought an automatic
cat.
I mean, talk about uh lookingfor a silver lining.
(57:16):
Like that's just amazing.
So yeah, she she I love thesilver linings part.
So I loved uh this part whereshe said, you know, life is hard
no matter what.
Right.
You you may see someone like shesaid, I you know, I she visible
visibly has a disability withher arm being gone, but people
(57:36):
are walking around with allkinds of I mean mental health,
we talk about that all the time.
Right, you can't see what peopleare suffering from always.
Sometimes you do, sometimes youdon't, right?
But that life is hard.
And so she said she sometimesgets people when she's in yoga
class, like, wow, I can'tbelieve you're so good at yoga.
She's like, I was really she shewas really good at yoga before
(58:00):
she lost her arm.
And so this goes, you know, thisthis I relate to so much with my
breast cancer that be ready forlife to be hard.
Be ready, have your mentalskills, have your body in shape,
have your mind in shape, haveyour life in shape.
Because guess what?
Life is gonna throw really hardstuff at you.
(58:22):
It's not a matter of if, it'sjust a matter of when.
We lose people, things happen.
If you are ready, you will getthrough things so much better.
And I, you know, I just youknow, think about my breast
cancer where I was in reallygood physical shape.
And so I returned to really goodphysical shape.
(58:42):
And of course, I was mentallytough from swimming.
I mean, I think I thinkathletics makes you mentally
tough.
And so it wasn't something thatjust knocked me to my knees
because I was prepared andRachel was doing yoga, she was
eating right, she was seeing thesilver linings, and so she has
this you know horrible thinghappen to her, and she's you
(59:06):
know, gonna use it to be evenmore amazing than she was.
So I love that.
SPEAKER_01 (59:12):
Yeah, that's a really, really great point
because as you say, it's not ifit's when.
unknown (59:18):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (59:18):
So and and my next takeaway kind of is a piggyback
on that.
When she was telling the storyof being twirled by the
alligator, she said she made thedecision to exhale rather than
hold her breath, you know,whether that was, you know, the
right thing or not to do.
I think that was really symbolicof, you know, how what do you do
when that bad thing happens?
(59:40):
You know, if if your firstinstinct is to just panic and
fight, and you know, then thenthen it's gonna not necessarily
go well for you.
So she she exhaled, she blewbubbles.
And I thought I think that's sosymbolic for how we can handle
and be prepared to handle thebad things.
The tough things that are comingour way that are, you know,
(01:00:03):
around the block.
I remember I was in a um kind ofa car wreck with my sister and
Jenny, who the one who's who'swho passed away from brain
cancer.
But we were as as the car wascareening around, she says very
calmly, you know, and I'mwrestling the car, she says,
okay, Jesus.
(01:00:24):
And she just said, and Iremember just thinking, oh yeah,
exhale.
Just okay, you know, this ishappening, let let's just
exhale.
And I, you know, I I want tohave that in my bag of tricks
for the next thing that comesalong.
I want to exhale, and I want tosay, okay, Jesus, too.
SPEAKER_02 (01:00:42):
Yes, yes, that's a beautiful one.
Um, my second one is when shesaid, sometimes, you know, and
this is a great example.
We don't, we she's not alwayslooking, you know, she's not
always seeing silver linings,and sometimes she said she just
screams out, this is hard.
(01:01:02):
I love that.
Letting, letting go.
Thanks so much for listening tothis Champions Mojo Encore
episode.
If it inspired you, please shareit with a friend and consider
leaving a quick review.
It truly helps.
I'll be back in January 2026with all new episodes to help
you live well, swim well, andkeep your mojo going.
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