The unsinkable Olivia Slivinski: Avon Lake swimmer earns Courage Award after refusing to let three major surgeries stop her

Olivia "Liv" Slivinski was so close she could smell the chlorine. The plunge had to wait … and wait … and wait. "She never even made it into the water," said Nicole, her mom. The sentence is sad enough. Then consider the circumstances. Slivinski was at a swim camp in North Carolina in 2022. She had already battled back from a torn right anterior cruciate ligament that required three surgeries. On the first night at camp she heard a familiar pop in the left knee while playing beach volleyball. The next day, before the torn left ACL had been confirmed, she was just feet away from entering the water. As she got up from the pool deck, the right arm slipped from underneath her, dislocating the shoulder and tearing the labrum. Two days, two major injuries, two more surgeries necessary. No pool time. "I was like, 'oh, man, how is this happening?'" Slivinski said. "I didn't know what to do and at that point I was like, 'am I ever going to get back to swim if all of this is worst-case scenario?' Trying to make positives out of it and hoping it wasn't worst-case scenario but, of course, it all was." The diagnoses didn't stop Slivinski. She continued to rehab and is back swimming for her senior season at Avon Lake High School. She'll be honored Tuesday night at the Greater Cleveland Sports Awards with The Cleveland Clinic Sports Medicine Courage Award, which is given to an athlete who inspires with actions off the playing field. "She's kind of a quiet kid but very quietly determined," said Dr. Lutul Farrow, her orthopedic surgeon. "Determined as an athlete, determined as a student. She's got that fierce fire and determination that I want in a daughter." One after another The first torn ACL came as a freshman in March 2021 on the lacrosse field when Slivinski was accidentally tripped. She had never had a serious injury. About six months after the initial surgery she had arthroscopic surgery to clean out the scar tissue, then about eight months later a debridement procedure to remove dead tissue. The swim camp disaster was in the summer of 2022. The left ACL was repaired in August, then the shoulder in January. The scheduling was complicated. "The general consensus is that you handle the knee first because whatever shoulder you have that's injured is typically still in better shape than a shoulder that is recently after surgery," Farrow said. "The issue is you have to be able to use crutches. So once she was able to be off crutches, then we could go and attack the shoulder. "When we're dealing with athletes, we're always on the clock. They know exactly when their season starts and when they need to be ready, and it's our job to also do that mental math. And so I said, 'we can get you back for swimming in great form, in good shape if we take this approach.' So that meant that she was then rehabbing both a knee and shoulder at the same time." Farrow has been in practice for 16 years and worked in orthopedics for six years before that. The one-two gut punch of the torn ACL and labrum was a new challenge. "I've never seen that happen before and I doubt that I will ever see it again happen in my career," he said. "It's one of those things where at the end of the day you kind of slap your head and say, there's no way, how in the world could this have happened? But it did." Slivinski, 17, was determined to resume her swim career and will compete next year at PennWest University-California in Pennsylvania. She attended approximately 140 sessions with physical therapist Kelly Kinsey to make the return possible. Slivinski said the most difficult physical part of all the injuries was the immediate aftermath of the first surgery. "Having to make sure I was consistently doing my exercises to make sure that scar tissue wouldn't build up, which unfortunately it did in the one knee," she said. One tough customer Slivinski and her family don't hide the hardships of the injuries, surgeries and recoveries. "It was really hard on me mentally and emotionally," she said. And physically. She lamented the length of the recovery from the first injury, and Nicole pointed out what Slivinski had purposely omitted when asked about the hardest part. "Olivia stopped taking pain medication within the first probably two days," Nicole said. "So there was a lot of physical pain that she doesn't really talk about, but she also as a 16-year-old just kept saying, 'I'm not going to get addicted.'" Slivinski also had to overcome flashbacks to the original ACL tear. "When I did try to play lacrosse again, they would happen then," she said. "And whenever I would see someone fall or possibly even hurt their knee, that's when I would get flashbacks." She gave up lacrosse but maintained her sense of humor, although acknowledging she can only now laugh about the camp horror. She designed custom surgical scrubs for her and Farrow and made posterboards to celebrate their second anniversary as patient-surgeon. "I don't think I really had to work to have that good attitude," Slivinski said. "I just wanted to get back to where I was and I knew that the only way I could do it was by doing everything that I was asked and even some more work." Avon Lake coach Dan Smith said Slivinski, who swims the 200- and 500-yard freestyle, is the first person on the bus and in the pool for every practice. He said she's getting back to the swimmer she was and expects her to flourish in college. "Luckily she's one of those athletes that won't change her mind and tough as nails and wouldn't bend her will to giving up on her goals," Smith said. "She's finally learned to trust her rehabilitated injuries. I think she could do anything she wants to now." Slivinski swam as a sophomore and junior but wasn't herself. She's closed the gap and expects to keep getting better. "Now that I'm able to swim that way, it feels awesome," she said. "I keep dropping time most meets that I'm at, and I just can't be happier that I'm finally getting back to where I was." Nicole was there every step of the way but wasn't always convinced the rehab and return would be successful. "I think initially yes, but then when things kept happening, I wondered," she said. "I wondered if she would just kind of give up and say it's not worth it or that I can't do it. But she very much did it and she did a lot of it very independently. "I'm a pretty proud mom. I'm not going to lie." With a little help Slivinski handled everything thrown her way but not without being dragged down by the enormity of it all. She didn't hesitate to see sports psychologist Matt Sacco. "Olivia's a very happy-go-lucky kid," Nicole said. "She always has a smile on her face. She's quick to greet people and you could truly see the depression in her. It was sad." Slivinski said it took awhile to notice her issues but realized she feared another injury. Avon Lake athletic trainer Matt Yonkof connected her with Sacco. "He definitely helped with the flashbacks that I was having," Slivinski said. "(He) helped me come up with techniques to help so I wouldn't get those flashbacks or if I did, it wouldn't be as traumatic for me to re-see." Sacco was a key piece of a large support system. Slivinski mentioned her dad, Dale, younger sister, Chloe, and friends Caitlin and Eilidh Allen. "They were definitely some of my biggest supporters," said Slivinski, who volunteered as a student athletic trainer. "They came over as much as they could all the time and sat with me for hours just to help keep me entertained and make sure I was in that good-spirited mind and to help keep me motivated." Kinsey, the physical therapist, also played an important role, seeing Slivinski through the pain, struggles and frustration. "You can have a great surgeon and bad PT and have a bad outcome, and you can even have a surgeon that's not all that great, but if you have a phenomenal PT, you can have a phenomenal outcome," Farrow said. "They spend a ton of time with them." The journey has been arduous, but Slivinski made it through to the other side. She'll be honored Tuesday at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse on one of Northeast Ohio's biggest sports nights. Avon Lake basketball player Maya Austerman won the courage award last year. "I am very honored to have been selected and I'm just blown away that I was chosen out of the applicants that could have been chosen," Slivinski said. "I'm also very thankful for the people who had nominated me, my doctors and physical therapists, and I'm just so overwhelmed with joy and happiness." Contact Scott Petrak at (440) 329-7253 or spetrak@chroniclet.com. Like him on Facebook and follow him @scottpetrak on X.