Legless Ukrainian, adopted in the USA, became a Paralympic sports star

On March 9, the 2018 Winter Paralympic Games will start in South Korea. Oksana Masters will represent the American team in cross-country skiing in Pyeongchang. Born in Ukraine with a disability, then adopted by an American family, she was able to build a successful sports career in the United States.

This will not be the first Olympiad for the athlete, she has already won one silver and two bronze medals at the previous winter and summer Paralympic Games.

We present the success story of Oksana Masters.

From birth to seven years, she lived in three different orphanages. Oksana was born in 1989 in the Ukrainian city of Khmelnitsky. Parents abandoned her when she was still in the maternity hospital, seeing terrible deformities in her arms and legs in the baby, which, according to doctors, were due to radiation - only three years passed after the Chernobyl accident, Oksana was born, writes Share America.

“I was missing the main supporting bone in both legs. And on my left leg I didn’t have a full knee, it was a floating knee. I had six fingers. My hands were webbed. Besides, I have one kidney. I don't have a full biceps on the right side. Thank God my hair wasn't damaged. I could use my body a little more, but I’m happy with what I have,” Oksana shared in an interview with the publication WBUR.

She recalls that there was little food in the orphanage, and the children were beaten, they all dreamed of being taken into the family.

“It’s strange not knowing what family is. Not knowing what a mother’s love is, what a hug is, or many other things,” the athlete admitted.

The girl was lucky - she was adopted by 43-year-old single American speech therapist from the Buffalo Gay Masters. In 1997, the girl moved to the USA.

According to her, she began to learn English from Scooby-Doo cartoons, she put a lot of effort, and after 6 months, people could not believe that English was her non-native language.

However, health problems did not recede: Oksana had her left leg amputated in 9 years, and her right leg in 14 years. In addition, she needed surgery to ensure the normal functioning of her hands.

Sport helped the girl to adapt to the new life. Despite her disability, Oksana was rolling on the ice, playing volleyball and playing other sports. After amputation of both legs, she became engaged in adaptive rowing.

In 2008, adaptive rowing was introduced into the Paralympic Games program.

In 2010, a Ukrainian with an American passport won the CRASH-B Sprints tournament in Boston, setting a new world record on a rowing machine. CRASH-B Sprints - famous in the USA rowing competitions on simulator shells, in the category for legless athletes.

She began to achieve great success, winning bronze in rowing at the 2012 Paralympic Summer Games in London.

But the next year, she felt a sharp, painful pain during the race at the World Championships in rowing in Chungju (South Korea). The doctors said that she had to give up rowing, otherwise she would face irreversible damage to the spine.

“I thought that after this my life in sport was over,” she says. But soon after, she started cross-country skiing, as they allow you to use the same muscle groups as rowing.

Fourteen months later, she won silver and bronze in the ski disciplines at the 2014 Paralympic Winter Games in Sochi.

And in 2016, in Rio de Janeiro, she almost became a winner in cycling, which she took up with just to keep fit in the offseason.

Masters made her first trip to her native Ukraine in 2015, at the request of the US Embassy in Kiev. She visited orphanages, similar to those where she grew up, and met with wounded Ukrainian soldiers.

“It was a surreal experience - to spend time with children and soldiers, being living proof that the situation could actually improve,” she shared her impressions of the trip, adding that, “regardless of the obstacles that a person has to deal with, there is always a way forward. ”

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