My Shot

by Elena Delle Donne

  As Meghan and I shot and rebounded for about an hour, I realized I was happy in a way I hadn’t been in years. My head was clear, and I wasn’t overthinking anything. I was just feeling, and the sensation was pure bliss.

  I love this sport, I realized, and I think I’m going to play it here at Delaware.

  Chapter Eleven

  Basketball, Take Two

  I didn’t decide to join the Blue Hen basketball team right away, nor did I rush into my volleyball coach’s office and tell her I wasn’t coming back for a second season. I wanted to let the thought of going back sink in, and, of course, I had to talk it over with my family.

  When I told my dad, he wasn’t surprised at all. He was also over-the-moon excited because he could sense how eager I was.

  “I know you, Elena,” he said. “I watched you pick up a basketball for the first time when you were four, and I’ve never seen anyone so attached to anything. I’ve always known basketball is a part of you as much as your nose is to your face.” Then he paused and looked at me seriously. “When you decide to start playing again—if you decide to play again—just remember the feeling you have now, which is love. You love this game. Don’t let all the other stuff get to you.”

  Dad understood my feelings about basketball better than anyone else, and right at that moment his words really hit me. This time around—if I actually decided to go back—I wasn’t going to play basketball because of what other people wanted. I wasn’t going to be on a team because it was the only path in front of me. Now that I’d cleared out all the noise in my head and realized that I actually did love the game, I was going to play for me. Going back would be my decision—and mine alone—and I would head into it with one purpose: to feel good.

  When I met with Coach Martin a few weeks later, I still hadn’t made up my mind for sure. I was leaning toward playing again, but I knew it was a huge—possibly life-changing—decision, so I really just wanted to give her a heads-up that I was thinking about it. I wanted to ease into the conversation, so for forty-five minutes we talked about everything but basketball. Then I broke the ice.

  “Coach,” I said, “I think I might play basketball again. But I’m really not sure. A part of me never wants to start in another game. But if I decide to, I’ll be in touch, because you’ve been so great to me this year. Thank you for that.”

  Just like she’d been all year, Coach Martin didn’t crowd me or pressure me. In fact, she didn’t give a single hint that what I was saying might change her whole program. Instead all she said was, “You’re welcome. It was so nice to see you today. I really enjoyed all that we talked about.”

  I’m sure Coach Martin saw my face in the stands of the Bob over the next few months. I snuck into a few games to see the dynamics of the team. I like everything about them, I thought when I watched them. They look like they’re having a great time together.

  Early that spring I still wasn’t ready to make a decision, but I started working out with John Noonan again. My body fell into the familiar groove it had known since I was four, and playing began to feel natural again—like it was a gift, not a burden. By May I’d made up my mind, and I called Coach Martin to tell her the news.

  “Coach,” I said proudly, “I’d like to play for Delaware. That’s if you’ll have me, of course.”

  I couldn’t see her face break out into a smile, but I could hear her laugh on the other end of the line as she started to talk.

  “Elena, nothing would make me happier. But it’s not about me. It’s about you. So know that I and every single person on our team wants you to enjoy yourself next year.”

  I think I will, I told myself. I’ve got a few months to get ready, so right now just feel good about the decision I’ve made.

  • • •

  The Blue Hens women’s basketball team wasn’t exactly a basketball powerhouse. Not like UConn, at least. They’d finished the previous season with a 15–15 record, they had been to the NCAA tournament only twice—once during the 2007–08 season, when they’d lost in the first round—and if they were lucky, they got maybe a thousand fans per game. That’s one fifth of the Bob Carpenter Center capacity.

  When I joined the team during the 2009–10 season as a redshirt freshman (meaning I was a sophomore academically but in my first year athletically), all that changed. I wasn’t sure if it was because people expected us to win or because I was such good gossip, but suddenly twice as many people started showing up for games. These fans weren’t just parents or bored students, either; they were the young girls who’d lined up after my volleyball matches and asked me to sign autographs. They were people for whom basketball actually meant something. They didn’t come only to experience a thrilling victory—because sometimes we weren’t even expected to win—but because they really enjoyed the dynamics of the sport.

  Believe me, I did too. From the moment I started practicing, I loved being back.

  One of the things that’s most often said about me is that on the court my face doesn’t reveal anything. I might be in agony over the basket I just missed—or I might be head-over-heels happy about blocking a shot—but my face will be a blank slate. During my freshman season I looked as serious as always during every game. But the truth was that inside I was beaming.

  The team dynamics just felt different. On the court we were dedicated players, but off it we were regular old college students. No one treated us like we were slacking off if we didn’t think about basketball 24/7, and I wasn’t hard on myself if I decided to do something like go shopping before a game instead of resting to “conserve my energy.” (Sheesh. I was such a serious kid!)

  During my first season, we attended an away game over the Thanksgiving break. After we all ate Thanksgiving dinner together, our coaches decided to put the freshman players on the spot.

  “All of you have to come up with a skit,” one of the assistant coaches announced. “And it better be funny! You have half an hour to figure this out starting . . . now!”

  I’m not the world’s best actress—or even close to it—but I love watching movies. One of my favorites is The Break-Up with Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn. I know pretty much every scene line-for-line, so when the other freshman players and I huddled together to figure out what to perform, I knew the answer right away.

  “Let’s do our best impression of the scene where Jennifer Aniston’s gay brother teaches everyone a cappella at the dinner table.”

  We might have had only a half hour to practice, but we nailed it. People were practically on the floor laughing. I was so proud of myself. But more than that, I realized how much I was growing as a person. For the first time in forever, I was feeling relaxed around my teammates.

  I was doing well on the court too. Taking a year off hadn’t broken my stride, and I averaged 26.7 points a game, which was the third-highest Division 1 average in the country. In a game against James Madison University in February, I scored a record-high fifty-four points, which was the highest single-game score of any female Division 1 player all season. At the end of the year, I was named the CAA’s Rookie of the Year, and I was the first player ever in UD history to be named an Associated Press All-American, landing a spot on the third team.

  Our team wasn’t the Elena Delle Donne Show either. If it had been, I’m sure I would have been unhappy because I just couldn’t stand all that pressure. Instead we played beautifully together. And while we didn’t get a bid to the NCAA tournament, the season was a huge improvement over the previous one, and we finished with a 25–12 record. We left that year on a high, feeling deep in our bones that the 2010–2011 season was going to be the best we’d ever had.

  Thankfully, I had no idea that I might not be in my prime. I was given no warning that the winter of 2010 was going to be the most physically and emotionally challenging period in my entire life.

  Chapter Twelve

  Lyme Disease, Take Two

  In 2010 my sophomore season started out beautifully. In the preseason I was named to thr
ee watch lists, and by early December the UD women’s team had won six out of our first seven games, most by double digits. We were filling up the Bob almost to capacity, and we were completely in sync during practices and games. In fact, Coach Martin was saying that we were the best team she’d seen in her more than 250 games as head coach.

  The only problem was that a week or so after Thanksgiving, I started feeling terrible. And on December 19, at an away game against Penn State, I fell completely apart.

  Ever since I was a kid, I’d always done as much as possible to take care of my body to prevent illnesses. I ate right, and I saw my doctor regularly. If a pain in my shoulder or my hamstring—or anywhere, really—was bothering me, I’d go see a doctor immediately. And to prevent injuries or illnesses, I’d always stretch well, warm up, drink lots of water, take my vitamins, and get my flu shot. After all, basketball season is right smack in the middle of flu season, and the last thing I wanted was to miss a game because of something I likely could have prevented.

  A day or two before our game against Penn State, my body started to ache all over. I wasn’t just uncomfortable either; I was having deep muscle pains, especially in my arms and legs. I talked to Coach Martin about it, and she booked me an appointment with the team doctor right away. He took my temperature and checked my vitals, and he couldn’t find anything wrong with me.

  “You don’t have a fever or any visible signs of an infection like the flu,” he said, “so I think you’ve just been practicing and playing too hard. Keep an eye on how you’re feeling and get some rest. If you need to sit out some practices or games, do it.”

  After totally burning out twice in my life, I knew my body well enough to realize when it was time to take a break. My aches and pains weren’t constant, so I wasn’t convinced I had to sideline myself just yet. In fact, when Coach Martin asked me if I felt well enough to start against Penn State, I didn’t hesitate to say yes.

  Unfortunately, I felt awful from the moment the whistle blew. After I tipped the ball, I just couldn’t move as fast as I usually did. It was like I was walking through mud. When I passed the ball to a teammate, every joint and muscle in my body started to scream. After the ball came back to me, I began to dribble more slowly and deliberately, like I was doing it in slow motion, and when it came time to make a shot, I could barely lift my arms more than halfway. The basketball felt like it weighed ten thousand pounds, and I practically had to throw my whole body forward when I lunged for the basket.

  Ugh.

  Of course I missed the shot. The ball didn’t even come close to the net. Eleven minutes into the game, I turned and limped toward the sideline.

  “Coach,” I whispered, “I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I need to sit out the rest of the game. I think I’m going to pass out.”

  In the sixteen years I’d been playing basketball, I’d never—not once—left a game midstream. But there was nothing else I could do. My body felt foreign, like it had been invaded by something that wanted to knock it down and then stomp all over it. From the bench I watched the game unfold, but it seemed like it was a million miles away. When we lost, I didn’t even feel sad; I was too busy imagining that my head had been wrapped in plastic, because I thought I was going to suffocate.

  That night I went back to campus, crawled into bed, and slept for twelve hours. When I woke the next morning, I could hardly turn over because my pain was so unbearable, and my head was throbbing like someone was beating it with a bat. After about twenty minutes of trying, I finally rolled over, extended my arm, and pressed a few buttons on my phone. I heard a ringing, then my mother’s voice.

  “Mom?” I groaned.

  “Elena?” she said. “Are you feeling okay? I was so worried about you after the game. Did you get some sleep?”

  “Come get me,” I said. “Please, come quick. I need you to take me to the hospital. I think I’m dying.”

  Mom arrived within a half hour, unshowered and wearing no makeup. After she practically carried me through the door and loaded me into the car, she drove me straight to my primary care physician. A nurse ushered me in, took me to a small, private room, and checked me out. Less than ten minutes later, I met with my doctor.

  “We’re going to run some tests,” he said, “But I don’t think you’re in any immediate danger. Your blood pressure is fine, and so is your temperature. We’re just going to monitor your heart to be sure.”

  The doctor and nurse hooked me up to a heart monitor and gave me a pain reliever so that I’d feel more comfortable. I drifted off into an uneasy sleep, and when I woke up, a nurse was asking if she could draw some blood. I nodded my head—still in terrible pain—but I couldn’t speak. Just please find out what’s wrong with me, I thought, because I can’t go on like this.

  Since my condition didn’t get worse, I went home with my mom rather than to the hospital. I decided to stay there. I couldn’t take care of myself, so I needed my mom and dad—and Gene, who’d just moved back to Wilmington to work with my dad—to do it for me. The next day I hardly ate anything, and for what felt like a week, I slept eighteen hours a day. I couldn’t hold a conversation or make decisions, since my brain was so foggy, and almost every day I’d position myself in a quiet, dark room and stay there all day, paralyzed from a migraine.

  Yet the test results from the doctor came back and revealed nothing.

  “It’s not a bacterial infection, and we can’t find any evidence of a virus or parasite,” the doctor said. “So we’re not really sure what it is. I recommend seeing some specialists, like an infectious disease doctor, a cardiologist, and even a back specialist, since you’re having so much discomfort in your back.”

  After years and years of dealing with all the mysteries and challenges surrounding Lizzie’s health, my parents absolutely refused to give up. They knew that I wouldn’t have felt sick or hurt for no reason, so they were determined to find out what was wrong with me. Over the next few weeks, they scheduled appointments with all of the doctors that my primary care physician recommended. I saw all of them and donated what felt like a gallon of blood. I got an MRI on my brain and even had a stress test, which I fainted in the middle of. Yet test after test after test showed nothing. I’d made it my full-time job to get a diagnosis, and drove hundreds of miles to do it, yet I still didn’t get an answer. After almost a month my family and I weren’t just scared or frustrated; we were furious—especially when doctors started writing me off.

  “Elena’s clearly been through a lot,” one doctor said. “I think she’s just depressed. This is probably all in her head.”

  “Nothing’s wrong with her,” said another.

  And finally: “It must be chronic fatigue syndrome, which means your playing days are over.”

  Now, I’ve had huge ups and downs in my life, and when I left UConn, I could hardly string two thoughts together, so I know what depression feels like. This was not it. There was something terribly wrong with me physically, and if we couldn’t find out what it was, I was positive I was going to die.

  Worse, some doctors thought so too.

  “It might be a neurological condition like multiple sclerosis,” a neurologist told me. “So we need to run more tests. MS only gets worse—not better—so you need to know as soon as possible so you can prepare yourself.”

  Luckily, those tests came back negative. But I still didn’t have any answers.

  While lying in bed aching all over, suffering through migraines, and sleeping like it was my life’s mission, I’d missed ten basketball games. Some days, when I was feeling halfway good, I’d have my mom drive me to the Bob, and I’d try to train with my team. But it was never easy. I was just too sore and tired.

  After about six weeks of shuttling from one doctor to another, with no diagnosis or even a sense of what we should explore next, my mom announced that she thought we should see a Lyme disease specialist.

  “A friend of mine read in the paper about you being sick,” she said, “and she suggested it
might be a flare-up of Lyme disease.”

  “There’s no way,” I shot back. “I got over that two years ago. It’s not a chronic condition, so it can’t come back.”

  Like I said before, Mom refused to take no for an answer when it came to her kids’ health, and she knew that sometimes what seems to be impossible can happen. For example, some doctors had been sure Lizzie would never be able to lift her head on her own or ever be able to walk. Of course she does both.

  Mom had gone ahead and scheduled an appointment with a nurse practitioner in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Her name was Rita Rhoads, and she owned a clinic that specialized in tick-borne illnesses. It would take me a good hour to drive there, but, like Mom, I didn’t care. I was desperate. I would have flown halfway around the country if it would help me get to the bottom of what was wrong with me.

  My dad is super-knowledgeable when it comes to health, and he always asks the right questions, so he decided to go with me. He’d also spent the entire month researching tick-borne illnesses and had a ton of questions for Rita.

  From the moment we pulled up to the Integrative Health Consults offices, though, I was just as skeptical as I’d been when Mom had first said the words “Lyme disease flare-up.” First off, Christiana, Pennsylvania, had maybe a thousand people in it. It was in the middle of Amish country, and we’d passed more horse-drawn wagons than cars on the way there. Second, it was the furthest thing from a hospital—or even a doctor’s office—I’d ever seen. Rita Rhoads saw patients in a small blue vinyl-sided house on the side of a busy country road. Is this for real? I thought. But I figured my parents knew best, so I decided to just go with it.

  I’d filled out a long questionnaire about my health before I’d gotten on the road to drive to Pennsylvania, and when Rita Rhoads walked in and sat across from me in an overstuffed chair, she was clearly prepared. But was I? Rita looked more like a country nurse than an expert in tick-borne diseases. I wasn’t just worried about what I was going to say; I also wasn’t sure I could trust her. But when she started asking me questions, I realized how wrong I was.