Champions Mojo
Welcome Masters swimmers, triathletes, and anyone striving to live well and swim well! Hear powerful interviews with world-class champions, leading experts, and everyday heroes—sharing tips, tools, and stories to boost your motivation, training, and life performance. Hosted by Kelly Palace, elite Masters swimmer, author, and former NCAA Division I head coach. A podcast that champions you!
Champions Mojo
A 9-Foot Gator Took Her Arm, But She Saw a Silver Lining and Maybe Angels: Rachael Lillienthal, ENCORE EP 288
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.
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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.
The alligator didn't budge. He just sat there with my arm in his mouth, not moving. So I thought I needed to be aggressive and I punched the alligator as hard as I could with my left hand. At that point, the alligator started thrashing me around and rolling me around underwater. The first time he rolled me around, I did not know how long that was going to last. I did not know if I was ever going to come up for air. And I thought, is this the way I'm going to die?
SPEAKER_02:Hello, friends. This is Kelly Palace, host of Champions Mojo, your place for better health, resilience, and master swimming. I'm taking a short break from recording new episodes of Champions Mojo for two exciting reasons. First, I'm launching my latest book, False Cure. It's a whistleblowing investigative journalism book about a denied health epidemic. If you'd like more information on that, it's in the show notes. The second and most compelling reason I'm on a break is here at Champions Mojo, we're preparing for the January 2026 reboot of powerful new weekly episodes with expert guest interviews, inspiring topics, and tips to take your mindset, health, and personal performance to the next level. We will be announcing some incredible partnerships with the show, and I guarantee what we have in store for you will empower you and keep your mojo strong in the new year. While I'm preparing some of this great stuff, we've selected some of our best shows ever for an Encore series. My hope is that if this is your second time listening to this episode, you'll take away even more 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 this Encore presentation in its entirety. Today we have a show that is so compelling that we almost guarantee you will be glued to your listening device. It's riveting. I just had lunch with my brother and sister-in-law and told them I'm getting ready to record a show that's so riveting. It's going to inspire you and it may even terrify you. So we're going to be talking with Rachel Lilienthal, a master swimmer who was attacked by a nine-foot alligator while swimming in open water in the Waukiva River near Apopka, Florida, in 2015. Rachel lost the majority of her right arm in that attack and almost her life. Maria, can you tell us a little bit more about this brave champion?
SPEAKER_01:Sure, Kelly. It's been six years since Rachel's alligator attack and the loss of her arm. But that didn't keep her from winning gold recently in the 200-meter butterfly in the Rowdy Gaines short course meters masters classic meet. Besides being a talented swimmer, Rachel's a Spanish professor at Rollins College. And we've got lots of questions. We want to hear Rachel's story. So let's get started. Again, Rachel, welcome to the show. We're so glad you're here.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks so much. I'm happy to be here.
SPEAKER_02:Yes, yes. So, Rachel, just a little background for our listeners, because as I introduced you and I and I told you before, we we have a lot of people on the show, but none that are like really good friends. So I heard your story when we were in a swim meet together several months ago. And at first I thought you were joking me that you had lost your arm about an alligator with an alligator. So we're gonna hear all the details on that. But regarding this Rowdy Games 200 meter butterfly, I want to tell the listeners a little story about I was on the deck. And if you don't know the Rowdy Games uh short course meters masters classic, it is one of the premier swim meets in the US. People come from all over, it was very well attended. This was just a few weeks ago. And Rachel is swimming the 200-meter butterfly. And after she swam, I was I was at 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 the announcer, or I'm sorry, the starter for the whole meet, I walk past him and he taps me on the shoulder and he said, Is that your friend? And I said, Yes. He said, Was she a swimmer before she lost her arm? And I said, Yes. He said, Well, my goodness, uh, she must have like her butterfly is so beautiful as it is. I can't even imagine what it looked like before. So it you got everybody's attention at that meet. You swam this amazing race. Um, so Rachel, we want to hear every detail of how this event occurred. And yet leave us a little breathing room because I know we will have questions. So make a few pauses because we're probably gonna know that our listeners are going, but what about that? But what about that? So um, yeah, like you said, you want all the details. I said yes, please. The same details you were on the date, the new bathing suit. We want it all. Okay.
SPEAKER_00:Well, thank you, Kelly, for that wonderful introduction and also for the kudos that I hadn't heard yet about that master's meet. And thank you for cheering me on because 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. When I was a small child, I was a competitive swimmer and then I stopped swimming competitively at age 12. But I loved it. It's something that I did for my physical 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 was on a date, and I was swimming with my friend for a few minutes, 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 and clean and cool. And it was August in Florida, it was hot outside. I was very, very happy in the water. So we came to the agreement that he would get out and I would stay in. So I was in a main swimming area with many people, children, dogs, plenty of people, music. It was a party atmosphere. And all by myself, I felt kind of silly once my date got out of the water. So I decided I would swim off and get some exercise. I will never forget the feeling of going through each and every one of those strokes. I did a little freestyle, I did a little breaststroke, I did some butterfly, and I even did the backstroke. And I decided, wouldn't it be a great idea to swim to where I had canoeed or kayaked in the past, to where the springs start. So I was at Wokaiba Island, which is just a short distance from the start of the Wokaiba River at the Wokaiba Springs. And I thought, oh, I'll swim all the way to the beginning. And I didn't actually get near that far when I realized the water was getting a lot uh too shallow for my comfort. And so I turned around and I was swimming back. Luckily, I wasn't that far from Wokaiba Island where all the people were, when I felt an alligator come across my back. Now, I I did not believe it was an alligator at first. In fact, I just felt a scraping on my back and I thought it might have been a canoe not looking where they were going. So I turned around, fully prepared to yell at somebody to watch where they were going, and something clamped down on my arm. I still didn't believe it was an alligator. In fact, I thought I couldn't think of any other logical explanation of what it might be, but it couldn't be an alligator. No way. I had just told people that I wasn'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 if you bother them.
SPEAKER_01:I'm fine. I could have said the same thing to my kids.
SPEAKER_00:I had literally just said that. So I took a moment, I was still pretty calm, and I touched whatever was on my arm, and it felt reptilian. So if it was reptilian and it was in a river in Florida, then it had to be an alligator. There was no denying it. And so now what? Rachel. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:So there was, if I recall when I when you first told me this story, tell us about the boys that teased you about an alligator and you thought you would turn around and then tell us that little part of it, because I think that played a little bit in your bravado.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. My ego had taken over. I wasn't really sure how far I was going to swim when I left my date when he got out and I stayed in. I thought it would just be for a little while. And I swam up to a bridge, which is in view of the main swimming area. And I thought, well, maybe I'll turn back. But then I thought, I love bridges. Let me go under the bridge. And as I was going under this bridge, I felt a little bit icky. A little bit, I couldn't really identify what it was. But I said, well, I'll just go under the bridge and then decide if I'm going to continue further or not. And a canoe with two boys came under the bridge, and one boy said, You know, we saw a big alligator not too far away. And I turned around just as fast as I could, and I started swimming fast. I had been swimming for pleasure and I was swimming for speed, swimming fast back towards the main swimming area. Then the other boy said, Oh, he was only kidding. There's no alligator. And at that point, I thought, of course not. It's a crowded day. There's millions of people around. There's not going to be alligators right now, right here. And my ego took over. I completely forgot about that feeling I had been sensing. I hadn't fully digested it. I hadn't fully analyzed it, but I completely forgot. Actually, I forgot until months later 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 around and said, it's not true. And I was, I was angry at the boy, and I just said, Oh, I will swim. And that's when I actually thought, oh, swim to the beginning of this spring. So I felt this alligator come across me, grabs my arm.
SPEAKER_01:Can I interrupt you for a second? So were you between the bridge and the swimming area at that point or beyond the bridge? Right.
SPEAKER_00:I had passed the bridge.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, okay.
SPEAKER_00:And I had already turned around and I was coming back towards the bridge.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, but you hadn't gotten back under the bridge yet, though.
SPEAKER_00:No, the bridge was in view. Okay. So I pet this alligator. I tapped it gently and I was trying 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. 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 by getting thrashed around under the water. And I decided not to hold my breath, which I think was a crucial element of my survival. I decided to slowly exhale, slowly blow bubbles while he was thrashing me around. Now I didn't know I could hold my breath longer than I could slowly exhale, but I feel that that slow exhale helped me keep my cool enough and always, when in doubt, breathe. So I breathed. And he let me up for air and I breathed. It was a wonderful gasp of air. 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 arm break. And then I knew, okay, this is a this is a big deal. This is, I'm not getting out of this on my own. So I called for help. And I can't believe I didn't initially call for help, but I didn't. My first response was, I'm gonna get out of this on my own. And then when I realized I couldn't, I called for help. There were some canoeers a little bit ahead of me in the river, almost at the bridge. They turned around, they saw what was happening, and they tried to turn around and come towards me. But they weren't very skilled at canoeing, and I think they were having a hard time. So they decided instead to go ahead and blow their whistle and alert people that there was a problem. I was desperate in that in that moment. I was full of despair. I really didn't think anyone was going to help me. I had completely forgotten of the congestion on the river ahead of me. I'd completely forgotten that there were, in fact, there was a traffic jam of canoes and kayaks at the place where the Rock Springs Run meets the Wakaiba River.
SPEAKER_01:Can I ask you another question here? Sure. How when the because none of us have ever been twirled by an alligator.
SPEAKER_02:It's called isn't it called a death roll? Yeah, it's a big thing. Yeah I I've I've heard that's how alligators kill their prey, is that they take a death roll.
SPEAKER_01:So my question is my question for you is you know, he he's twirling, you're it's you sound amazingly calm. And uh, but you get an occasional breath of air, you know, that where you're up and you had enough time, of course, to call for help. Is that is that lasting a second, a millisecond, 10 seconds?
SPEAKER_00:How long was those little pauses? That is an impossible question to 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 an instant. They were very close to me actually when this happened. Being thrashed around, it felt like a very long time. But after I was let up for air and then thrashed again, I realized that he wasn't going to thrash me around long enough for me to drown. I was gonna get air again. Each I didn't doubt after that first time, I didn't doubt, I don't think, if I was going to get a breath or not. He didn't actually thrash me around again until I hit him. So it was, I'm sitting here with my prey caught. I'm chilling on the river. And then I punch him and he thrashes me around. I breathe, I rest, he rests, I punch him again, he thrashes me again. So I had felt this despair that these people who I saw were not going to come to my rescue. And immediately thereafter, I heard a voice saying, What's going on? Get in the kayak. And it was this young woman named Krista Carlson who sped ahead when she saw that there was a problem or she heard my cry for help. She sped ahead with her very strong boyfriend in the back of the double kayak and her in the front. She happened to have been a lifeguard, so she had that instinct and that desire to help and that athleticism that made her and her boyfriend able to rush to my aid. So I explained there's an alligator. And I think it was Krista that said, hit the alligator with the paddle. So the boyfriend hits, and the boyfriend's name was Casey. The boyfriend hits the alligator with the paddle, and the alligator rolls me around even worse than the first time. I think that my puny little fist was no match for that paddle, the extension of this strong young man. So he thrashed me around more. And it this happened a few times. Again, it was hit the alligator with a paddle, punish Rachel, rest, repeat. At one point, the alligator tore off half of my bathing suit. So I'm I'm aware now that my new bathing suit has been ruined, and I'm wearing half a bathing suit. Pause, breathe, rest, thrash again, repeat. And this time, the alligator takes my entire bathing suit. And I'm completely naked. And I believe it was at that point where we were all thinking this is futile. This is maybe we need more help. This doesn't seem to be going anywhere. And so Krista had the idea of hitting the alligator between the eyes. So she told her boyfriend to try and hit the alligator between the eyes, which worked. The alligator swam off, and I was in bliss for a nanosecond when I realized that my arm was gone with the alligator. And I was spewing blood, little ps 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 you see when a limb has been severed, there's these little tubes that come out, and there's this spewing blood. So that's when I kind of lost my cool. At that point, Krista's mother and father had arrived on the scene. And they took over the effort of towing me, and Krista and her boyfriend went ahead for help. I don't think they knew about the canoe who had already gone ahead for help, but they also were able to give more details about what was happening. So the mother and father recruited some other people on the river. There happened to be an Eagle Scout 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 her best at giving me a tourniquet while they towed me. So I was being towed, I had my arm here, and she had my arm. She was holding my arm, and her husband, 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 back was paddling at the same time 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 can get there faster myself. Because it was quite difficult to coordinate these two vessels with not full paddling power and this burden of me in between. It was quite difficult for them to maneuver. And I thought, I can just swim ahead. And they they said no. So when I got to the dock, also I 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 they got to the dock where there were people waiting, and there was this extraordinarily strong man waiting to get me out of the water. 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 me by my left arm, he pulled me up, and he laid me gently on the dock. I think that was an amazing feat of strength. And the fact that he was there to do that was a mini miracle. Also, as I had been towed towards the dock, I saw that there was someone standing and triumphantly 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 realized that I should be covered. So people sacrificed their towels and covered me up. And there was a lot of commotion and people talking. And somebody said, Oh, I'm a nurse. And I said, I saw a tourniquet very, very quickly. Probably it was already in the process, but very quickly, someone came, put a tournique a tourniquet on me. And it turns out that it was actually a medical grade tourniquet. The deputy who happened to be working security that Saturday at Waqaiba Island, he had anticipated the need for a tourniquet a few years prior. He watched the Boston Marathon bombing and saw how many lives and how many limbs were lost, in part because people were using torn-up shirts and pants and anything they could get their hands on instead of proper tourniquets. So he had this idea and he petitioned his superiors in the Seminole County police department. He petitioned his superiors to get tourniquets for everybody. And I forget the number right now, but it was, I want to say$60,000 is how much it cost for a medical grade tourniquet for every emergency worker in Seminole County. But he had his in his car that day. 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 cop equipment.
SPEAKER_01:And he's the one who made it happen.
SPEAKER_00:He's the one who made it happen. And he happened to address it can't be.
SPEAKER_01:Can I uh ask another question? So while you're being towed to the dock, are you talking to the people? Are they talking to you? Are you feeling shocky?
SPEAKER_00:Are you crossed out? No, I'm not. I'm lucid the whole time. I don't remember everything that I said, but I'm told a few different things. One thing that I remember them reporting is that I was talking about my car. I believe that we are only given challenges that we can overcome. And I believe that we are given the tools that we need when we need them. Not long before losing my arm, I purchased my very first automatic car. I learned how to drive on six shifts. I always preferred purchasing six-shift cars. I did have one automatic car that was an old beater that didn't last very long. But if it was a new car that I was intentionally choosing for myself, it was manual. I had in May of 2015, or maybe it was April. I think it was April of 2015. I had just the very best accident you could possibly have. If you're gonna have to have an accident, nobody's hurt, it's good weather, the people are pleasant. My car was damaged enough for me to get a large amount of insurance money for it to fix it. And I use that as a down payment on my new car. I already had my car for about 10 years. I was thinking about getting a new car anyway. So it really worked out nicely. And I happened to choose an automatic car. So while I was being towed, that is one story that I told my rescuers. Well, at least I have an automatic car. Because how would it drive stick shift? And how hard would it be to go car shopping in addition to everything else while I was recovering? And I'm glad you asked the question of the what I was talking about while being towed, because I have trained my brain to look for silver linings. I am an expert silver liner looker, silver lining looker. I can find them in kind of the worst situations imaginable, or I can even imagine what the silver lining might be. Some people call me too much of a Pollyanna for that, too much of an optimist, but I say it's a survival technique. When we approach the day focusing on things to be grateful for, we have a better day. And when we have a lot of better days, we have a better life. So I was in the habit of looking on the bright side and an alligator ate my arm, but at least I had an automatic car.
SPEAKER_01: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:I know. And she was a medical professional.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, so she knew what she was doing.
SPEAKER_00:A medical assistant, I believe, was her title. I'm not exactly sure it what what her job function was, but she said that she asked me if I had been tested for, I don't, I don't know what she was specific about it. And I and I and I answered, I was, but it hit not since October. So this was in August. And I told her the day of my last blood work, which was in October when I had been been tested for a range of things. I don't recall that, but she says that she did ask and I did answer. So I don't think that she waited to know. I think she her instinct was to help. And then while she's getting blood actually um spurted on her, she's thinking, oh my God, here's a stranger and I have her blood. And then she asked is my is my guess. Yeah, she was extremely brave to do that. So another beautiful aspect of my rescue is that the emergency workers, the firemen who double as EMTs, they were having lunch at the shopping plaza two minutes away. So they got the call and they arrived almost immediately. They say that I was probably from the Gator's mouth to the operating room at ORMC, Orlando Regional Medical Center, within an hour. And that's it, just so happens that there's an excellent trauma hospital nearby, near enough. And there was not crazy traffic on I-4, that we were able to get there, that everything happened so quickly that yes, I lost a lot of blood, but I did not die.
SPEAKER_02:So this has transition I'm sorry, Kelly, go ahead. Miracle, miracle, miracle. And one of the parts that just seems just miraculous to me was tell us how long you were in the hospital. Four days, not quite four days. I mean, that is just that's just amazing. Um so once they got to you to the hospital, they do surgery, and then you're you are at home five days later. Right. Two surgeries. Two surgeries. So tell us what your mindset was looking at this new life. Like I know one thing, you know, we you know, I can't even fathom the changes that this has put in your 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 goodie bag, and it's wrapped in plastic. And there's my friend Rachel trying to get this cap open. And you have you have it tucked under part of your, you know, your arm that's left, your right arm, 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 for you? 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 just cruising on, you were gonna open that thing, which was hard for me to open, you know. You isn't it a pain to open half the things plastic that we have to open these days with two arms, you know. So that's just like the tiniest little thing. But tell us like how you looked at wow, my life has changed.
SPEAKER_00:Well, at the very beginning, I didn't understand how dramatically my life had changed. And I'll use the excuse of being on morphine in the hospital that maybe my judgment was so impaired. But the semester was supposed to start in two weeks' time. And I'm very lucky to have a supportive department where I work, and a lot of people from my department came and visited me. And the chair at the time, the chair of the department came on my first day. It happened, it was a Sunday. A lot of people came to visit me that Sunday. And my chair of the department came, and she also hadn't thought about what implications did this have on my professional life. She was just coming to visit me in the hospital because I'll giterate my arm. And I told her that I had been thinking of ways I could get classes moving, that I could have perhaps a volunteer student be a secretary and write on the board. And I had been strategizing how on earth I can teach my class? And I had some solutions that I thought of. I had not thought of how am I getting. Myself dressed? How am I getting into the car and driving across and I had not thought of those details, but the actual running of the class, I was going through my brain and trying to figure out how was I going back to work in two weeks' time. After that conversation, I've guessed my boss talked to HR and I was not going back to work in two weeks. That was absurd, which they realized I did not. And so I was given the short-term disability and I ended up taking off that semester. They canceled one class and they were able to find substitutes on the at the very, very last minute, they were able to find adjuncts to teach three classes. So yes, I did not go to go back to work, but I thought immediately, how can I modify things to still do what I need to do? I think that the idea of giving up was just never on the table. It never really occurred to me that I could just give up. Now, certain things, as I was recovering, 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 therapist who came to my house a few times a week, I think, maybe maybe two or three times a week for the first few weeks while I was at home, while I was homebound, just to get my get myself uh functional, really. And one of the things was envelopes. And I said, you know, should I just have somebody else? Should I wait for somebody else to open up my mail? And she said, Oh no, you're gonna have to learn to do that yourself. And when I was struggling with some other thing, I remember her saying, Well, right now you can't use it, but you will be able to use your right arm, which to me sounded unthinkable because I was in so much pain and it was, you know, bandaged up and swollen, and there was there was no way I could use it at that time, which she acknowledged, but I would be able to. Oh man, I can use it now for so many things. So, in terms of opening up that cap, having it in my uh armpit and trying to open it with the other hand, that would be the first attempt. And second attempt, if I really wanted to open it, would be use my teeth, although I try not to do that in public and I try not to do it too often just because God forbid I break a tooth. And in terms of figuring out other things, it takes time. At the beginning, I was incapable of putting a pillow in a pillowcase. I could make the rest of the bed. I could put the fitted sheet on, I could put the top sheet on, I could throw the blanket, I could do all of that. But putting a pillow in a pillowcase was out of the question. Absolutely impossible. And now I can do it. It takes a lot of effort. And I still sometimes ask for help if help is easily available, but I can put pillows in a pillowcase now. So little by little over time, I'm becoming more dexterous, I'm becoming stronger, and I'm able to do almost everything. And then the other things that I'm maybe not able to do, I have let them go. Like what? For example, a flat iron for my hair. I was very, I was very happy to give that away. I gave away my curling iron, my flat iron, one hairdryer. I still have one in the house for guests. Because I don't need to. I do not need to do that. That is absolutely not a necessity. And actually, no, I'm seeing that there's this tool that looks like a hairdryer with a brush attached to it that I might be able to use one-handed. But the tools that I had back then, I don't believe I could use one-handed. And why should I try? That is something super easy for me to let go. Another thing is zippers. Zippers are awful. And pants with zippers, maybe I can get them on. Buttons and zippers, I can get them on. Do I want to take the time and effort every single time I go to the bathroom? I don't, I don't want to. So yoga pants. Yoga pants, elastic weights, and pants. Why would I struggle with buttons and zippers when there are yoga pants?
SPEAKER_01:I feel the same way, and I have both hands. Hey, so you know, your every interview we've we've watched of you, and of course during this interview as well, you had this just incredible, you know, positive attitude. Did you tell me there was a few moments where you were like, you know, this is hard and you cried or or whatever?
SPEAKER_00:Plenty, plenty. So when I was in the ambulance, after I was safe, when I was being saved, I realized that I almost died. There was a very short moment where when I thought I might die at the very beginning with the alligator dashing me around. But then I was in survival mode. And once I was in the safety of the ambulance on the way to the hospital, I realized that I had an easy out. And I regretted not taking it. I don't think that I would do anything differently, but I realized at that point how hard the road ahead was going to be. And just that thought of, oh my God, I had an opportunity to step out of this struggle, which life is beautiful, but life is also a tremendous challenge. So I did have that moment of, oh my 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 nine o'clock at night, something like that. It was already dark out, if I'm not mistaken, or getting dark by the time I was in my hospital room. And I was very angry with myself for swimming outside of the group, swimming where in a river where I do know that there are alligators in the Wakaiba River, obviously, it's Florida freshwater. And I forgot the fact that I had swum on multiple occasions in that river without getting eaten. But I was really being hard on myself. Then the next morning, one of my first visitors was a friend of mine who I do a lot of outdoor adventuring with. And the first thing he said was, it could have been any of us. It could have been any of us. In other words, the fellow adventurers, the Florida canoeers and kayakers and hikers and campers, the people who put ourselves at the mercy of Florida nature. And then I just felt so much better after he said that. And he's he said he didn't know why he said it. He was just compelled that he had to tell me that. Not, oh, how are you feeling? Or just it could have been any of us. And yeah, it could have. And it's not the first time that I have swum in a river. It just was the unlucky time. So that was way back at the beginning. As I moved through life, sometimes things are just too hard. Sometimes I'm I may be trying to do something that I could do with relatively ease, with relative ease, or perhaps with difficulty if I had my two arms. And I'll say to myself, or I'll say out loud, hopefully the neighbors don't hear, this is too hard. This is too hard. And usually at that point, I'll realize, 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 trash can had, I don't know what the sequence of events was, but by the time I got home, trash can had water in it and was on its side on the ground. So I tried to lift it up, but because of the weight of the water, I was not able to. And so what I did was drag it out of the street and leave it in my driveway. And don't you know, someone saw that and someone lifted that garbage can up. I don't know who it was, just a kind neighbor who saw something that could be fixed and fixed it. I didn't even have to ask for help, but certainly I could have waited till there was someone around and asked for help with that. And that's what I do. I ask for help for things. And I've found so many assistive devices that help me get through my day. So I use, for example, a fabric cutter to open up packages at home. It's not for plastic and paper, but it works.
SPEAKER_01:So hat how about the swimming? You're a champion swimmer with one and a half arms.
SPEAKER_02:And I don't really feel like a champion swimmer. Oh, Rachel, your butterfly is beautiful, and you beat several people in the 200-meter butterfly. Yeah, I want to I you know you're not going in circles, so you're doing something right.
SPEAKER_00:I can't do one stroke. Well, when swimming was actually quite easy. I thought it might be hard, and I thought I would do the one arm, the one arm butterfly. I thought I would swim with my arms extended, and this one would just stay put, and I would use my left arm only. That's what I envisioned. But then I watched the videos of the Paralympians who are so inspiring, and they're using their both arms. If however much arm you have, go ahead and use that. And I now know that your body is very important in the stroke. It's not just your arms and your legs, it's your whole body. So by using both arms, then you're using your shoulders and you're using your chest and you're using your abs in a more even way, and that's beneficial. So, my butterfly, thank you for saying that it's beautiful. It is more beautiful now than it was five or six years ago because I've been getting a lot of help. And ever since I started swimming with the master swimmers, I've little by little I've been improving my technique quite a bit. Because remember, I swam competitively until I was 12. I was good, but I was 12. And after that, I was a lifeguard, I was a swimming instructor, I was a lifeguard instructor, but I was not a skillful competitive swimmer. I swam a lot of distance, but I swam pretty slow. So I'm only now learning how to swim fast.
SPEAKER_01:So go ahead, Count, sorry.
SPEAKER_02: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, they wanted to do a you know a double massectomy, and I'm like, I can't do that, I'm not gonna do that. I'd rather just let it take me. Um, have you and then I then someone told me, oh, you know, down the road, this is gonna be the greatest gift you ever had, you know, getting cancer is gonna be a great gift. There's a book called Cancer is a gift or the gift of cancer, one of those two things. So at this point, six years later, which is funny because you and I are on six years post-breast cancer and you're six years post-do you feel like this has been a benefit? Is your life better? I know that you've met a great man through this, you know, through going back to swimming. Like, what tell us, like, would you would you wish you had given up? Or are you is your life better? Or are you just somewhere in the middle?
SPEAKER_00:There are so many what ifs and who knows that it's really hard to say from this event. I can concretely say that I got angels. I I I have the knowledge of angels protecting me and being with me through life. They were always there, and now I am aware of them, I'm conscious of them, and I uh sometimes remember to thank them, sometimes call on them, whereas I never did before. So that was something very concrete, very clear I got from this event, and that was because of the belief that the person who got me out of the water was an angel. It turns out he's a real human, but for a minute, he was nobody knew who he was, nobody remembers seeing him. He was just there, he helped, and he left. And it turns out he was just shy. He didn't want to be part of the, he didn't want to be in the limelight. And at that time, a friend of mine said, Well, it was an angel. Just so matter-of-fact, so convinced himself that I'm like, oh, well, that makes sense actually. And when you look at my rescue, it's too hard to believe that that was all coincidental. So the event most definitely enhanced my spirituality and my connection with the divine and my knowledge that there is a force out there protecting me and hopefully guiding me in the direction I'm supposed to be going. Now, the fear is, or the wonder is if my rescue was planned, was the attack also planned? And it's impossible to know. So, one of the things you mentioned that I'm I have a great man, which I absolutely do, and I had met him about 10 years ago when I was not ready for him, and he was probably not ready for me. And having something in common of this traumatic loss and huge illness to overcome, I think that that's something that we connect on now that I definitely didn't have 10 years ago. But also, I was on a date with a pretty great guy. The guy that I was on a date with on that August 8th, 2015, he was a good catch. And I was trying to catch him. There was a lot I did like about him, and maybe he wasn't my mate. Maybe this alligator, and he didn't just disappear when the alligator ate my arm or anything. He he showed up at the hospital and he he tried. And we did not survive the alligator attack and the recovery thereafter. Oh, it was our third date. It was our fifth meeting and our third date. So uh you can imagine how how challenging it would be to start a relationship off that way. But I I don't I can't say if it would have worked out with him, and then I would have been with not the right guy for me. Who knows? There's so many who knows. Um I kind of forget the original question. I went off on a tangent.
SPEAKER_01:Well, well, I I would like to just sort of, yeah. The question was was this good or bad? Who knows, right? But do it over. Yeah, I I I I certainly believe that God knows what he's doing. And but anyway, but that's not what I'm my question. Is I'm sure many people have told you that you're an inspiration, and you know, how do you how do you accept that or do you accept that? And you know, what do you do with that?
SPEAKER_00:I have had to accept that at first it was very uncomfortable, and sometimes when people say I'm inspiring, it's they don't know the years of effort that went into it. So, for example, in yoga class, oftentimes people say I'm inspiring there, and maybe it's their first class or their first year of class. And so they don't they don't know that I already had a background in yoga before losing my arm, and they don't know how absolutely essential yoga was to my healing, and how if I didn't have the yoga, I wouldn't have the balance necessary to do certain things with my seat that I need to do now. So they they find that inspiring. And okay, when you see somebody in a crazy yoga posture, which I don't, I'm not doing the crazy yoga postures, but it is, it can be inspiring. And so I I can kind of accept that a little bit more easily. Or when somebody sees me swim, long distance fly. Long distance fly is hard, everyone agrees upon that. That's there's no debate, but it's something that I have been doing all my life, not fast. I'm only recently trying to learn fast, but the long distance aspect of it, it's what I do, but it's not something everybody can do. But sometimes people are impressed with very silly things like my reading. Oh my god, you can use a fork with your left hand. Yep, that was not a challenge. That that yes, that was so it depends on I think what they're looking towards. But it the idea, oh my God, you can do your job even though you lost your arm. Well, thank God I'm not a waitress anymore. Yes, I do have a job that one can perform with one hand, luckily. And I don't really appreciate that aspect. I feel like, well, what do you expect? I'm not, I'm just going through day. I'm eating my day, I'm eating and I am working and I'm doing the best that I can. So that's that's a little bit awkward when people are inspired by those little things. At the same time, we have to acknowledge that just going through life is a challenge. And if you add another challenge to it, like an invisible challenge such as breast cancer, which I don't know from personal experience how that would be to go through it. And there must be times when a there are times when a cancer patient is visibly ill, but there's a lot of times when it's a silent and invisible struggle to the outside world. We don't know what people are going through. So I have a visible impairment. I have a visible challenge and I have a traumatic story that grabs people's interest. So one thing that I am hoping to do with it is to take that platform and help people live a happier and healthier life. So I happen to have a lot of tools prior to my attack. I had a lot of tools that I had been developing over years and some that I had just recently acquired that helped me get through the recovery. So one of my goals is to share some of those resources, some of those tools with others that hopefully you can learn to live a healthier and happier life before you have a traumatic event. So that you're not learning to get by and also all of a sudden learning how to take care of your own health and wellness. That that's one challenge. Actually, I just today, inspired by going on this podcast, in fact, I started a YouTube channel and I posted one video. It is not a great video. I have been paralyzed, I guess is the word, where I've been held back is a is a better word. I've been held back from posting videos because they're not great, because the lighting's not good, because I don't look good, because I didn't say the perfect thing. And so I've tried to make videos a few times in the past and I never went, I never did anything with it. And so just I created the channel, I posted a video, and it is one healthful and easy recipe. And my idea of what I want to share is if I can do it, you can do it, raw food videos. Because it takes time and energy to create any kind of healthful meal in the kitchen, whether you're cooking or whether you're preparing raw food, it takes time. And a lot of recipes that you find are very complicated. And I've simplified, I've simplified things, and I'd like to share my solutions. And if it means that one person has one extra healthy meal in a week, then that's a small help.
SPEAKER_02:That's beautiful. I love that. Yeah, Rachel, that is just fantastic. Well, we we have a little fun round 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 we have not asked you that you would like to share with our listeners? And maybe it's the name of your YouTube channel. I don't know.
SPEAKER_00:Well, the name of the YouTube channel is Rachel. My name is uh spelled with an extra A R-A-C-H-A-E-L, raw food. Rachel raw food. Pretty simple. And I do hope to be adding more videos to it. There is one thing that I don't know for sure if it has any relevance to this particular story. But a word of uh caution and advice to people in the world out there, don't feed the wildlife. There's no way to know if this alligator had been fed, but it is a hypothesis because it was in an area where there were a lot of people at a bar, a lot of drunk people, a lot of tourists, people doing stupid things like feeding alligators. And alligators should be afraid of people. But if they associate people with food, they leave that, they lose that fear. And again, I have no idea if this alligator was fed. There's no way to know that. But in general, it's a bad idea to feed wildlife. And even a bird, if a bird is dependent on you for food, what happens when you're not there feeding it anymore? So that's something that I became aware of after this attack and just uh a suggestion, especially seagulls at the shore. Please don't feed those.
SPEAKER_02:I I couldn't agree more. I there's a beautiful park that I walk in, and people feed the squirrels so often now that it ruins my walk around the park because the squirrels charge you. Like they literally you have to shoo them away because they're crawling up your leg to get food. Yeah, and and then another one uh there's a beautiful mountain called Beach Mountain in North Carolina, which is overrun with deer because people are just feeding the deer and they're developing a weird disease from eating human food, and the people think they're doing something great for these deer, and they're actually being, you know, it's causing something called blue nose and um or something, something along those lines. But it's it's those are just two examples directly in my life, and I'm I'm a city girl, so um, so yeah, I totally agree with you.
SPEAKER_00:That's terrible, and human food is not very healthy, as natural and good food. So let the animals eat their nuts and their berries because that's much more helpful for them.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Rachel Raw food is healthy though.
SPEAKER_00:So it is.
SPEAKER_02:It is this is awesome. All right, so we have a quick little little round of a few questions, and um, it's just for our listeners to get to know you better and maybe connect with you on some other parts of your life. So these are one-word answers. Cat or dog? Cat. Red or blue? Blue.
unknown:Okay.
SPEAKER_02: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. iPhone or Android? iPhone coffee or tea? Both. Morning person or night owl? Morning person. Okay. Okay.
SPEAKER_01:Favorite pizza topping. Pineapple and ham. Favorite vegetable. I mean onion. Favorite place to swim.
SPEAKER_00:Lake Quicocha in the mountains of Ecuador.
SPEAKER_01:Wow, that's a great answer.
SPEAKER_00:Actually, it's pretty cold. It's actually very cold. That's not a good answer.
SPEAKER_01:Well, there's no alligators up there, I don't guess.
SPEAKER_00:True. True. How do you relax? With breathing if I need to. On the fly, if I need relaxation with breathing. What's your shoe size?
SPEAKER_01:Eat. Okay. What's your favorite Star Wars character? Or Harry Potter, whichever. Oh boy. Hun solo. He's so sexy. Uh I know you can cook. Uh, what's your favorite thing to cook? Or not cook, prepare, I guess, in your case. Chocolate. What word comes to mind when you dive in the water? Free.
SPEAKER_02:Wow. Beautiful. Rachel, this has just been so incredible. We're just really grateful for you spending so much. Oh, thank you.
SPEAKER_01:It's been a pleasure. That's so beautiful. And your whole you know being is just beautiful. Thank you very much.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you. Take care. You too. It's now time for the takeaways. Our takeaways for Rachel Lilienthal. Attacked by a nightfuck gator. Yeah. Loses the majority of her right arm and she was right-handed. Uh, just just what a story, what an inspiration. So much there. I'm so inspired by it. What's your first takeaway?
SPEAKER_01:The first one, I one of one of the things she said is that she she looks for silver linings. And when you listen to her in the interview, you'll get the impression this is a woman who really tries to see the positive in things. Um, but but her little expression was uh if you look for silver linings, your day is a little better. And if you have a lot of little better days, then you have a better life. That's like, I think that's so good. I mean, gratitude, it's so everybody says it, but she lives it. You know, she had every reason to 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. So I love that. Look, look for silver linings and put a whole bunch of them together and you're gonna have a better life.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, even as she realizes she's lost her arm, right? It's splurting, spurting blood and her nerves are out, and she's being dragged to you know, be rescued the doc. She's thinking, gosh, I'm so glad I just bought an automatic cat. I mean, talk about uh looking for a silver lining. Like that's just amazing. So yeah, she she I love the silver linings part. So I loved uh this part where she said, you know, life is hard no matter what. Right. You you may see someone like she said, I you know, I she visible visibly has a disability with her arm being gone, but people are walking around with all kinds of I mean mental health, we talk about that all the time. Right, you can't see what people are suffering from always. Sometimes you do, sometimes you don't, right? But that life is hard. And so she said she sometimes gets people when she's in yoga class, like, wow, I can't believe you're so good at yoga. She's like, I was really she she was really good at yoga before she lost her arm. And so this goes, you know, this this I relate to so much with my breast cancer that be ready for life to be hard. Be ready, have your mental skills, have your body in shape, have your mind in shape, have your life in shape. Because guess what? Life is gonna throw really hard stuff at you. It's not a matter of if, it's just a matter of when. We lose people, things happen. If you are ready, you will get through things so much better. And I, you know, I just you know, think about my breast cancer where I was in really good physical shape. And so I returned to really good physical shape. And of course, I was mentally tough from swimming. I mean, I think I think athletics makes you mentally tough. And so it wasn't something that just knocked me to my knees because I was prepared and Rachel was doing yoga, she was eating right, she was seeing the silver linings, and so she has this you know horrible thing happen to her, and she's you know, gonna use it to be even more amazing than she was. So I love that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's a really, really great point because as you say, it's not if it's when.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:So and and my next takeaway kind of is a piggyback on that. When she was telling the story of being twirled by the alligator, she said she made the decision 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 symbolic of, you know, how what do you do when that bad thing happens? You know, if if your first instinct is to just panic and fight, and you know, then then then it's gonna not necessarily go well for you. So she she exhaled, she blew bubbles. And I thought I think that's so symbolic for how we can handle and be prepared to handle the bad things. The tough things that are coming our way that are, you know, around the block. I remember I was in a um kind of a car wreck with my sister and Jenny, who the one who's who's who passed away from brain cancer. But we were as as the car was careening around, she says very calmly, you know, and I'm wrestling the car, she says, okay, Jesus. And she just said, and I remember just thinking, oh yeah, exhale. Just okay, you know, this is happening, let let's just exhale. And I, you know, I I want to have that in my bag of tricks for the next thing that comes along. I want to exhale, and I want to say, okay, Jesus, too.
SPEAKER_02:Yes, yes, that's a beautiful one. Um, my second one is when she said, sometimes, you know, and this is a great example. We don't, we she's not always looking, you know, she's not always seeing silver linings, and sometimes she said she just screams out, this is hard. I love that. Letting, letting go. Thanks so much for listening to this Champions Mojo Encore episode. If it inspired you, please share it with a friend and consider leaving a quick review. It truly helps. I'll be back in January 2026 with all new episodes to help you live well, swim well, and keep your mojo going.
