West High diver fights back from brain tumor

"Some day I'm going to be 5-foot-2," she told her parents.

At the time, it seemed like a far-fetched thing to say. She stood 4 feet, 6 inches tall, weighed only 55 pounds and was cooped up in a Seattle hospital bed, recovering from the removal of a brain tumor lodged behind her eyes. She had just finished eighth grade.

Now a 17-year-old senior at West High, RoseFigura is an inch shy from her goal. She's 5-foot-1 and a healthy 90 pounds.

All that's left on her to-do list is to prove she can be one heck of a performer on the 1-meter diving board at this weekend's state swimming and diving championships at Bartlett High. She enters the meet as Alaska's 17th-ranked diver, eager to measure her talent against the state's best.

"These are divers I had been looking up to for four seasons," she said. "And I still do."

Before the 2005 surgery, RoseFigura was slowly dying and her parents didn't know why.

She came home from school with headaches and just wanted to sleep. She stopped going to the pool to swim with friends and siblings.

She no longer had the energy to do what she loved.

"She was deathly ill," her father, Mark, said.

She had already been diagnosed with Celiac disease, which makes it hard for her to put on weight because it restricts her diet and keeps her body from producing nutrients.

But Celiac disease was the least of her concerns.

An MRI revealed craniopharyngioma, a brain tumor. RoseFigura needed four hours of brain surgery to relieve pressure on her pituitary gland, which had stopped producing thyroid and growth hormones.

"The doctors were responsible for her living," her father said. "But she has since taken control of the rest of her life."

Since the surgery, RoseFigura has grown 7 inches, and her dad said she's probably finished growing.

But as far as her emotional and intellectual growth -- well, that's a different story.

RoseFigura started diving as a freshman because it was the one sport where size didn't matter. As it turned out, diving became a springboard that helped her cope with her illness.

"Diving was a reason to get up in the morning," she said. "It's my way of saying, 'I'm small, I'm different, but I don't care.' "

As a freshman, kids in the West High hallways reminded her how different she was. They called out names like "midget," "leprechaun" and worse.

RoseFigura defied the words with her actions. She's a 2008 National Merit Scholarship finalist, a team captain for West High and a state qualifier for the second straight season.

West diving coach Mandy Morell said RoseFigura is a natural-born leader who doesn't use her illness as an excuse if she fails. The only health problems RoseFigura and her coach talk about is the toll of dry-land training.

"So much about health is mental," said Morell, an English teacher at West. "If you believe you're going to do something, you do it. And so much of diving is mental."

For instance, at 90 pounds, can RoseFigura really get enough spring to chuck a double somersault? Common sense says no. But she does, Morell said, despite the difference in height and weight from those of her competitors.

Last weekend's regional meet was RoseFigura's biggest challenge as a diver. She went toe-to-toe with much taller divers and still managed to place fourth out of 14.

The moment was grand. It marked the first time she had ever medaled in a sport. She needed a quick pinch just to know it was real, that she was had measured up to some of the top divers in the region.

"I've always looked at them and said, 'That could be me,' " she said. "The dream was always there."

Some may look at RoseFigura and find it hard to imagine she's state championship material. But Morell had no doubt when she started coaching RoseFigura this season.

"She's a determined kind of girl," Morell said. "I know it's not the end for her. If anything, it's just the beginning."

With a college diving scholarship out of reach, the state meet likely spells the end of RoseFigura's competitive diving career.

But she plans to handle her final dive with the same optimistic attitude she had when she woke up from brain surgery more than three years ago.

"When I get out of the pool, I just want to be happy," she said. "I want to make it count."

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Find Kevin Klott online at adn.com/contact/kklott or call 257-4335.