Mary Lou Retton, the former teen gymnast who became a star after winning a gold medal at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, is seriously ill and “fighting for her life,” her daughter McKenna Kelley said in a statement.
According to Kelley, Retton suffers from a “rare form of pneumonia” that makes her unable to breathe on her own. Retton has been in the intensive care unit for over a week. “Out of respect for her and her privacy, I will not reveal all the details,” she added.
The former star does not have insurance, her daughter wrote, asking for donations to cover the cost of her hospital bills. “We ask that if you could help in any way, 1) PRAY! and 2) if you could help us fund the hospital.” More than $120,000 had been donated as of early Wednesday.
Retton, now 55, won five medals at the 1984 Games, including a gold medal that made her the first American woman to win an Olympic individual all-around event. Her victories made her “America’s newest darling,” secured her a spot on the Wheaties cereal box, and increased the popularity of gymnastics – a sport once dominated by Eastern Europeans – in the United States.
In recent years, she has appeared in “Dancing with the Stars,” a Dairy Queen commercial and an ad for Colonial Penn Life Insurance Company that the company uploaded to YouTube last week. She served as an advisor to the President’s Council on Physical Fitness during the George H. W. Bush administration.