Laurent Lokoli
October 15, 2020
“I grew up with my parents and three older sisters in Corsica, a small island in the Mediterranean Sea. At age 10, life put me on my knees when one of my sisters was diagnosed with cancer. For two years, I watched her fight for her life. When she lost her hair she was crying and hugging me and I felt powerless. After a long and hard fight, she beat cancer and made me promise to never give up. At age 12, I left home to train. I struggled with tennis because I was alone and my parents were getting divorced. Finally, I found my rhythm but then I experienced the deepest pain of my life. At age 14, my oldest sister passed away in a car accident at 28 years old. I felt like someone took my heart from my chest and I couldn’t handle the pain. My sister was a lawyer and my role model and she left me without a landmark. I became a totally different person, fighting my pain in darkness and solitude. I was seen as an outsider in the French Federation. I was alone and struggled to make friends. I watched my family fall
“I grew up with my parents and three older sisters in Corsica, a small island in the Mediterranean Sea. At age 10, life put me on my knees when one of my sisters was diagnosed with cancer. For two years, I watched her fight for her life. When she lost her hair she was crying and hugging me and I felt powerless. After a long and hard fight, she beat cancer and made me promise to never give up. At age 12, I left home to train. I struggled with tennis because I was alone and my parents were getting divorced. Finally, I found my rhythm but then I experienced the deepest pain of my life. At age 14, my oldest sister passed away in a car accident at 28 years old. I felt like someone took my heart from my chest and I couldn’t handle the pain. My sister was a lawyer and my role model and she left me without a landmark. I became a totally different person, fighting my pain in darkness and solitude. I was seen as an outsider in the French Federation. I was alone and struggled to make friends. I watched my family fall