(Provided by Tennis World USA)
World No 56 Peyton Stearns revealed she found out there was a parasite in her body after running blood and other tests to determine why she was feeling ill and fatigued for a few weeks. Since the French Open, 21-year-old Stearns has been feeling weak and fatigued, which made it tougher for her to practice and play.
But Stearns refused to take a break after the French Open as she competed in an ITF event in Makarska and she also took part in the qualifying event of a WTA 500 tournament in Berlin this past weekend. After losing to Jaime Fourlis in the Berlin qualifying final round, Stearns paid a visit to the doctor as she wanted to see if she could find out why she wasn’t feeling her best in the last few weeks.
Stearns received a pretty much stunning diagnosis but she is expecting to be ready for Wimbledon.
Stearns: Time to get this parasite out of my body
“Since the French Open I’ve been battling an unknown illness on and off randomly.
I’ve had severe symptoms and countless trips to the bathroom per day, as my body was rejecting something inside of me. I wasn’t able to keep food down most days and because of that my body was fatigued and tired making it extremely hard to get out of bed some mornings.
I thought it was just the flu or something similar and was told to let it run its course, but after 3 weeks I decided to seek medical help from a doctor. After running some blood and other tests we found out I’ve been hosting a parasite in my body!
Going to take some time to recover and get ready for Wimbledon and most importantly get this parasite out of my body for good,” Stearns said in a message posted on her Twitter.
pic.twitter.com/0DdYlXDz1X — Peyton Stearns (@peyton_stearns) June 20, 2023
Stearns is set to make her Wimbledon debut in early July.