Normally she trains in Edam, but she comes here once a month. She then practices together with other Dutch participants for the next championship, which will take place in June: the European Transplant Games in Arnhem.
When Amaysa was a baby, she needed a donor liver. She ended up receiving part of her mother’s liver. Does that ever bother her? “No, actually not,” Amaysa says thoughtfully, before crouching down into a sprint starting position.
Some time in the hospital
Her mother Aletta smiles at her daughter, because it is actually not true: “She doesn’t always feel like talking about it. But she constantly takes medication and is very vulnerable. She was recently in the hospital in Groningen again for a while.”
It is not surprising that Amaysa prefers not to talk about it: she wants to jump, dance and run, like she is doing today on the cinder track. Together with a group of friends, who are also training here today and have gone through much the same thing. Amaysa: “Most of the time we don’t talk about it, but sometimes we show each other our scars.”
And she is optimistic about her chances for a new gold medal: “I am even faster than last year, that’s what my mother and father say.”
