US Paralympic record-breaker fires back after being accused of faking disability: ‘Pretty devastating’

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American Paralympic swimmer Christie Raleigh Crossley set a world record in her Paralympics debut in Paris on Thursday. 

The 37-year-old Tom's River, New Jersey native posted a 27.28-second time in the 50-meter freestyle for the S9 class, which includes athletes with weakness, limb loss or coordination difficulties, torching the previous record.

But then she went on social media.

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Crossley told reporters on Thursday that she had received a torrent of comments and messages on social media that accused her of faking her disability.

"I went from enjoying a world record to being utterly devastated that the entire world seems to think I was a cheater and that I was somehow faking the hole in my brain and the cyst in my spinal cord," she said. 

Crossley sustained a neck and back injury in 2007 after being hit by a drunk driver, and then a brain injury in 2008 as a pedestrian in a hit-and-run, according to her official Team USA profile. Then in 2018, she experienced paralysis on her left side due to the bleeding of a previously unknown blood tumor in her brain. 

She was previously training to compete as an Olympic swimmer, but her injuries put that dream out of reach. She decided to pursue the 2024 Paralympics after watching the Tokyo edition in 2021. She joined para-swimming the following year, and she claims that she has faced questions about her disability ever since. 

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Silver medallist Christie Raleigh-Crossley of Team United States reacts after the Women's 50m Freestyle S10 Final on day one of the Paris