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LASIK For The Gold: Checking In With Kathy Darling of the USA Women’s Handball Team

December 11, 2013

Kathy gives OCLI an update on what’s new in her handball career.

Through OCLI’s LASIK For The Gold program, we have had the opportunity to work with some amazing athletes in all different sports and from all around the world as we help them achieve 20/20 vision through LASIK surgery. In November 2011, we first introduced our readers to Kathy Darling of the United State’s Women’s Handball Team and our latest addition to Team OCLI and LASIK for the Gold.

Kathy originally hails from Lincoln, Delaware and has always been very athletic. However, she has not always played handball. As an accomplished sportswoman, her size led her to play sports such as basketball, softball and track and field (specifically the disc and javelin where she acquired the formidable strength in her right arm). She then went on to discover handball in 2005 and continued to play all around the world, even competing professionally in France and Poland. She even played on the first place team at the 2011 US National Handball Championships.

However, since then, Kathy has been quite busy! After suffering from some injury troubles, she began playing handball again semi-professional in France. She plays in the National 1, which is essentially the third division, in a small French town called Le Pouzin. In the last year, their team moved up from the fourth vision and they are currently trying trying to “faire le maintien,” or just make sure that they finish in the middle of the pack in order to remain in the league for next season.

Kathy recently visited Dr. Cary Silverman to give him an update on how life has been post-LASIK surgery, and share a feature in the local newspaper on her handball career. Some of the highlights of the article by Jean-Marie Hubert include:

On the eve of receiving Nimes, what do you think of the French handball?

“Handball is not a highly developed sport in the States and is almost virtually unknown, so there’s no comparison.”

How do you see your role in the group?

“I was wonderfully welcomed here, too well even! So I enormously want to help the team. By my size, I am taller than all of them and I can bring something , especially as at home, in America, we play with a certain tenacity and it is our habit to never quit. I feel good in a team where ‘everyone supports everyone’ and where I want to get better. “

What do you think of your early season?

“It is only just starting and just as I heard it said, ‘There is still a packet of matches’ … (pronounced with the accent). The season is unfolding normally. From my side, I usually think in the present and manage each week as it comes and especially to manage myself. For my part, I am confident in our ability to meet the challenge of securing our position in National 1.”

To learn more about Kathy Darling and her experience with the LASIK For The Gold program, be sure to check out her LASIK surgery experience and thoughts on our OCLI YouTube page.

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