Paralympic Team USA athlete Tracy Otto is celebrating several major milestones.
Otto, 28, announced her pregnancy after her partner, Ricky Riessle, popped the question under the Eiffel Tower. “We have been keeping a secret… Paralympian ✅🏹 Proposal ✅💍…. Pregnant!👶,” she wrote via Instagram on Monday, September 2. “Baby Riessle due January 2025!!”
Otto posted a carousel of snaps, including an action shot of her competing in archery, a pic of her engagement ring in front of the Eiffel Tower and another of the ultrasound.
Otto’s pregnancy news comes one day after she uploaded a sweet video of Riessle’s proposal in the City of Love.
In the clip, Otto was shocked as Riessle got down on one knee beside her wheelchair. Through tears, Otto nodded her head yes, and the pair shared a sweet smooch. Riessle placed the ring on Otto’s finger as they kissed again.
Otto shared a separate post via Instagram, uploading a series of snaps from the moment including a close-up shot of her engagement ring. “I may not have won a medal today but I am going home with something shiny 😉💍,” she wrote.
Otto’s life update comes nearly five years after she was attacked by her ex-boyfriend. Otto told the BBC that she became paralyzed from the chest down with “limited use of her arms and hands” and lost her left eye following the incident in October 2019.
Otto recalled to the outlet that she was attacked by her ex in her bed at her home in Tampa, Florida. Otto explained that it had been a month after she broke up with her ex and had started dating Riessle.
“I remember rolling over and getting comfortable in bed and drifting off to sleep. And then all of a sudden, I hear this loud noise and I see a flashlight in my face and I was so confused,” Otto told the outlet in August. “And then I heard his voice, and I realized it was my ex.”
Otto said her ex “decided to go to purchase a high-powered pellet gun” after seeing her sleeping with Riessle through her bedroom window.
“And he comes back to my house, breaks in and wakes us up, screaming at us to get out of bed,” she said. “He tells us that he’s going to kill us and that if he didn’t kill himself, he was going to call the police.”
Otto received several punches and was shot in her left eye, per the BBC. She was also stabbed in the back of the neck and sexually assaulted.
Riessle was also shot in the face and stabbed in the back. The ex called the police, alerting them he had “killed my girlfriend and [her] new boyfriend.” He was sentenced to 40 years in prison, per the BBC.
Following the incident, Otto and Riessle continued their relationship. In March 2021, Riessle began pursuing archery.
“And I just thought, ‘Why not try archery?’ Ricky was like. ‘Your hands don’t work’, but I just thought we’d figure it out,” she said. “I did some research and found we have an adaptive archery course in our area. A week later I was shooting for the first time.”
If you or someone you know are experiencing domestic violence, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 for confidential support. If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).
