The Big Interview: Dessi Dupuy
The Bulgarian-born forward has been on an incredible journey to where she is now, enjoying a good season in the Swedish top division. She tells the story of how she went from orphan to pro player...
“I’m a bit tired…jet-lagged,” says Dessi Dupuy, who has just travelled home to Virginia in the USA.
The 31-year-old plays for Vaxjö DFF in Sweden yet was born in Bulgaria, but the striker - who is enjoying one of the best seasons of her career in the Damallsvenskan - has good reason for why the USA is where she now considers home.
Born in the Eastern European nation to a Turkish mother and Nigerian father, Dupuy, whose full name is Dessislava, was orphaned and eventually taken to a quaint, small town close to the east coast of the USA called Lynchburg by a single parent who brought Dupuy up herself.
Inadvertently, the move as a two-year-old to one of the world’s leading nations in the women’s football also put Dupuy on the path to where she is today, via countries such as Italy and France during an eclectic career path.
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“I don’t remember much, obviously,” admits Dupoy. “I grew up in this small town, but I remember being outside playing all the time. My mum worked a lot, she had a village of people helping her look after me! I remember moments like those a lot, but not too much from the early years.”
It means Dupuy has formed a “close bond” with the woman she now calls mum, who made various trips all the way from Virginia to Sofia and back to adopt her and give her a home in a more stable environment.
Dupuy did briefly represent Bulgaria at senior level during qualifiers for the 2023 World Cup, but beyond that has little link to the country she was born in.
“I definitely went through my phases of questioning ‘where did I come from? How did this happen?’ When I think about the fact my mum went through all that process to find me, coming to Bulgaria, going back from Bulgaria, doing all that all by herself just for me, I’m always very inspired by her for doing that.
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