Olympic gold medalist Tori Bowie was “seven to eight-months pregnant” when she died, according to neighbors and friends.
Bowie was found dead in her Orlando, Florida home by police during a wellness check on Tuesday. She was 32.
Neighbors told DailyMail.com Bowie was heavily pregnant, but underweight.
“She was a thin woman and it looked like she had half a basketball under her shirt,” said one neighbor.
Neighbors said Bowie’s behavior was erratic in the months leading up to her death, according to DailyMail.com.
One neighbor recalled encountering Bowie in the street wielding a knife and screaming at her boyfriend.
“I came out of my house one time, and she was standing there in the street clutching a knife and shouting at a man,” said next-door neighbor Zehra Ugurlu.
In another strange incident, Bowie threw eggs at the house opposite hers.
“We’ve heard shouting and screaming, loud music in the middle of the night. But what shocked me was that she appeared to have gotten much better lately,” said another neighbor and friend.
Bowie owed $22,000 to her homeowner’s association. Neighbors said her garage door had been left wide open for several months and the front door and windows were frequently left ajar, prompting speculation that the house was abandoned.
A preliminary investigation showed no foul play was involved in her death, according to TMZ.
Bowie was an NCAA long jump champion who won three medals at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. She won another relay gold at the World Athletics Championships in London and an individual gold in the 100 meter race.
She last competed at the 2019 World Championships held in Qatar.
Her friends on social media hinted that Bowie had a history of mental health problems.
In a Facebook post, Bowie’s sister wrote:
“People who pretend to be happy have some of the saddest souls and people who do not try to convince the world that they are happy have the most genuine souls, because they are content with just being them for them and nobody else.”
Bowie was raised by her grandmother in Sand Hill, Mississippi, with a population of less than 100 residents at the time.
“I remember just racing everywhere as a child, like in the trees, wherever … I raced all the time,” she told the Guardian in 2017.
“One day I hope that I can come to Sand Hill and there’s this huge sign that says, ‘Welcome to Sand Hill, home of Tori Bowie,'” she said in 2016.
