Egyptian fencer Nadar Hafez became one of the extraordinary stories of strength and determination at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games when she announced that she had been competing while seven months pregnant. 

Now a GB Paralympian is showing the same admirable resilience choosing to compete at the upcoming Paralympics despite being 28 weeks pregnant.

On Sunday, Jodie Grinham, who was born with a short left arm and no fingers and half a thumb on her left hand due to brachydactyly, will compete in the individual archery event at Esplanade Des Invalides while pregnant with her second child.

It will be her second Paralympics having won silver alongside John Stubbs eight years ago in the Archery - Mixed Team Compound Open at the 2016 Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The 31-year-old from Wales started archery when she was 14 despite doctors telling her that she wouldn't be able to due to her disability. Grinham and her father strove to find a solution and after experimenting with various ways of helping her hold a bow, they were able to find a manufacturer that made a specialised bow grip that fits into her hand.

She didn't want to let her pregnancy stop her from competing in her second Paralympics and has shown extraordinary resilience having experienced three miscarriages while hoping to give her son Christian a sibling.

“We decided we weren’t going to let a Games stop us from extending our family,” Grinham told The Athletic. “We didn’t know if we were even going to be able to conceive another one. This might not ever happen for us. Getting pregnant is not as easy as people believe. It’s not that simple.”

Christian, she explained, was delivered prematurely at 28 weeks and placed in an incubator with “severe jaundice.” 

“I didn’t really get to hold him for the first 10 days, he was under a little light in this little box, which was heartbreaking,” she said.

Doctors are worried that there's a chance Grinham’s left side may not be able to hold the weight of the baby and say she could go into labour prematurely but Grinham is resolute.

“My team have joked a few times that my waters could just break on the podium. That would be quite something,” she said. “I was aware I might not even get to these Games if I had the same problems as my last pregnancy but I’ve decided I want a family and a career, I want to be able to do both.”