A shark attack changed her life but that hasn't stopped this CT Paralympian from giving back

HARTFORD, Conn. - Three years ago, a shark attacked Ali Truwit while she was snorkeling in the Turks and Caicos Islands.

A few days later, on her 23rd birthday, Truwit, a Yale swimmer who grew up in Darien, Conn., was in a hospital in New York undergoing the amputation of her lower leg.

"As you can imagine, those were really dark hard days for me, where I felt just a level of pain and grief and sadness that I have never known before," Truwit said. "There was a lot of fear and questions around what my future was going to look like; who I could still be."

What she could still be, she discovered, was a Paralympian, a silver medal-winning Paralympian actually. Truwit took home two medals in swimming from the 2024 Paralympics in Paris and in doing so, found herself again.

Now she wants to give back. Truwit, who now lives in New York City, is organizing her second annual "Stronger Than You Think" swim-a-thon scheduled for May 31 at Chelsea Piers in Stamford from 3-5 p.m. It's a fundraiser for her Stronger Than You Think Foundation, which supports water safety initiatives as well as financial support for women and girls who need prosthetics and para athletes.

"I felt a lot of healing in being able to take this trauma that happened to me and use it for good in this way," she said. "We have been able to support eight water safety programs with thousands of hours of swim lessons for children in underserved communities. We've been able to support 20 women and girls with life-changing prosthetics and they've gone out into the world and done incredible things."

The foundation also just gave a grant to the Women's Sports Foundation for travel and training for para athletes.

So far the swim-a-thon has raised over $90,000 but Truwit wants to hit the $100,000 mark.

"I love that it's in May because it's Water Safety Month and also this year, it's really special because it's on May 31, which is my birthday and the three-year mark of the amputation," she said. "For me, personally, it's healing and special to bring some joy to what sometimes feels like a hard day."

Truwit grew up swimming at Chelsea Piers and went to Yale to swim. She graduated in 2023 and two days later, she and Sophie Pilkinton, a former Yale swim captain who had just finished medical school, went to Turks and Caicos to celebrate.

As they were snorkeling, 75 yards from the boat, a shark attacked them. Pilkinton and Truwit fought as best they could but the shark clamped onto Truwit's leg.

"The next thing I knew it had bitten off my foot and part of my leg," Truwit said. "I was bleeding out in the water. We screamed for help, but no help came so we made the split second decision to swim for our lives back to the boat which was 75 yards away in the open ocean with the shark chasing us and me footless and bleeding."

Pilkinton applied a tourniquet to Truwit's leg, which saved her life. Truwit was airlifted to Miami, where another Yale teammate, Hannah Walsh, was doing a medical school rotation.

"She was the first face I saw off the ambulance," Truwit said. "She was with me in the resuscitation room. I went through life-saving surgery and blood transfusions to fight against serious infections."

After two surgeries there, she was flown to New York where the lower part of her leg was amputated.

A few weeks before the trip, Truwit had run a marathon with her mother. The thought of no longer being able to compete in such events was unbearable.

"But at the same time, coupled with that grief and sadness was the real deep gratitude for the support system around me; for all the heroes who rose up and saved my life and for the fact I was alive," she said. "I felt pretty motivated to do everything I could to make the most of that second chance in my life."

Noelle Lambert, a Paralympic track athlete and a former Division I lacrosse player who had lost her leg in a moped accident in 2016, reached out to Truwit and told her to think about the Paralympics coming up in 2024.

"She said, ‘It's brought me so much healing and strength, I feel like you would really love it; you're also an athlete,'" Truwit said. "At the time I thought she was crazy – I have 11 months, I hadn't even been fitted for a prosthetic yet, I don't know how I'm walking, let alone recovering from a shark attack and amputation and training fast enough to make the Paralympics in that time.

"I kind of let it go by the wayside. I was flattered she thought of it but didn't really see it as a reality for myself."

But then she wanted to get back in the pool. It was hard, going back into the water, even in a pool, but she did it.

"After I did that, I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, what if I could pull this off?'" she said. "I knew it was an ambitious goal. I knew about the Paralympics, but I don't think I had an accurate concept of how fast the Paralympics are. Like for me to medal in Paris, I had to swim roughly the same times that I had swum to get recruited Division I at Yale with two legs … but this time with one leg.

"There were a lot of medical challenges; there was grief in the water. I have an incredible coach and we navigated it together."

She went to her first Paralympic swim meet that December. She trained for nine months, qualified in June, and came home to Darien with two medals, in the 400 meter freestyle (4:31.39) and the 100 backstroke (1:08.98). She set the U.S. record for both events.

"Honestly, I felt like I had won a medal by making it to the Paralympics," she said. "It was a balance between feeling really good about how far I had come, and also wanting to push myself to do the best I could to medal.

"To race with the American flag on my cap was such a special way to thank all of the everyday American heroes who rose up and saved my life from doctors and nurses and prosthetists and friends and family, physical therapists – there was a long list of people that I was like, this is a special way to kind of say thank you to them. My journey, I feel, is a testament to the power of community, to come together and pull someone through."

Last fall, Truwit did something she never thought she would be able to do again when she ran the New York City Marathon. Now, she is focused on the 2028 Paralympics.

"I'm going to throw everything I have to qualify for Team USA for LA 2028," she said. "I'm really excited. It's going to be special to have that home support."

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This story was originally published May 25, 2026 at 2:54 AM.