By Marc McGowan
Australian tennis star Ajla Tomljanovic hopes to educate both women and men about reproductive health after having surgery to remove fibroids from her uterus.
Tomljanovic will be sidelined from the tennis tour while she recovers from the operation.
The triple grand slam quarter-finalist, who is still on the path back to her best form after missing most of last year with a left knee injury, announced on Wednesday that she underwent surgery to remove uterine fibroids.
Ajla Tomljanovic shared this photo taken during her hospital stay.
“Unfortunately, I won’t be competing for a couple of weeks. [I] was very much looking forward to the next hard court events,” Tomljanovic said on Instagram.
“I had to get some uterine fibroids removed and will be watching from home while healing. Will be back soon.”
Tomljanovic, 30, also provided a link to the Cleveland Clinic website to offer an explanation for her procedure, for “all my girlies and men [too] who want to [should] learn more”.
That site defines uterine fibroids as a common type of non-cancerous tumour that can grow in, and on, a woman’s uterus.
Symptoms can include heavy menstrual bleeding, back pain, frequent urination, and pain during sex. Small fibroids often do not need treatment, but larger fibroids can require surgery or medication to remove them.
It is unclear exactly when Tomljanovic will be ready to play again, but the top-line WTA tournaments on this week and in the weeks ahead are in the Middle East, including the Abu Dhabi Open, the Doha Open and the Dubai Tennis Championships.
The former world No.32, now ranked 221 due to her injury lay-off, had planned to use her special ranking to play at Indian Wells, which starts on March 6.
She lost in three sets to in-form Latvian Jelena Ostapenko in the second round at last month’s Australian Open before losing to Hungarian Dalma Galfi in the Thailand Open last week.
Tomljanovic said after the Ostapenko defeat that she was heading in the right direction.
“If I can kind of summarise this Aussie summer; I’m pretty happy with where I’m at and how I’ve responded under pressure because as much as I’m kind of coming back, I did expect myself to play well,” Tomljanovic said.
“I definitely think I just need more court time, and it will come at some point. Without the constant work; it’s not going to come. I feel like I’m on the right track, but I have to keep working.
“I like that there’s a lot of room to improve ... the best thing [is] the knee is pain-free. I can be quicker out of the corners and a little bit more determined with my movement ... it’s still in my head a little bit, but that’s OK. I have to go through that.”
Before the Open, Tomjlanovic opened up to this masthead about her physical and emotional struggle to return to tennis from the knee injury, including a setback that caused her to miss Wimbledon.
“I felt it was unfair and would catch myself being mad at myself for calling it that because at the time there were so many awful things happening in the world,” she said.
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