On August 1, 2017, Ayanna Herrold got into her car and started driving. Around 8 a.m. while she was on the Lake Ontario State Parkway, her car somehow went off the road and slammed into several trees.
There was no texting or speeding before the accident.
“Seeing Ayanna was the things nightmares are made of for moms,” said Tanya, Ayanna’s mother. “Nobody wants to see their child on a ventilator, swollen. It was heartbreaking.”
Starting her recovery
On August 21, 2017, Ayanna was transferred to the Golisano Restorative Neurology & Rehabilitation Center at Unity Hospital.
“When Ayanna came to us, she was already almost three weeks from the point of her initial injury – still severely disabled and dependent in all aspects of care,” said Dr. Cecilia Ransom, who works in physical medicine and rehabilitation at Golisano. “Usually three weeks out, the injury and you’re dependent? The prognosis is not that great.”
“The day Ayanna went [to Golisano], she wasn’t talking, walking, communicating at all,” Tanya said. “She still almost looked like a shell of herself. Her primary nurse looked me in the eye and said, ‘You know she is going to walk out of here?’ I was almost taken aback by someone having so much faith in not only Ayanna but in what Golisano could do for her.”
Ayanna started physical therapy almost immediately.
“Quickly after she was admitted to us, we did our aggressive therapy treatment plant, started neurostimulant trials on her to wake up her brain,” Dr. Ransom said. “And within two weeks, she was starting to show remarkable progress. She was already starting to swallow, starting to follow some commands.”
Finding Ayanna's voice
“When Ayanna came to us, she had a trach, so she wasn’t breathing on her own,” said Angela Ferro, a speech pathologist at Golisano. “So we worked a lot on her breathing on her own – putting a speaking valve on to see if we could get her voice to turn on.”
“When we first heard her speak to us, it was…a blessing,” Tanya said. “It was something we didn’t know we would ever hear again. When you think that you’ll never be able to communicate with your child again, or more importantly that they will never be able to communicate with you again, that’s really hard for a parent. So it was just one more thing that Golisano gave us back in her.”
“Truly her progression was a lot of her determination and a lot of it was, at Golisano, they empower you,” Tanya said. “They make what’s important to you important to them and truly, truly gave us back our daughter.”
Starting to move
After weeks of hard work in therapy, Ayanna had a breakthrough.
“I actually fully remember the day that I moved my leg for the first time,” Ayanna said. “It was the first time 52 days that it had moved. I cried. I was like, ‘I just moved something that hasn’t worked in almost two months.’ After I moved it, I was like, ‘I’m going to walk. I’m going to walk. I can do whatever I put my mind to.’”
“Ayanna is a very special girl,” Ferro said. “She didn’t want to be told she couldn’t do something and she still doesn’t. She has her mind set. She knows what she wants to do and the dreams she has and she’s not going to stop until she gets there. I really admire her for that.”
“I was not supposed to walk away like I did,” Ayanna said. “And here I stand with a good outlook, with strength, with everything.”
“Golisano Rehab is truly a hidden gem,” Tanya said. “And it’s a gem that you hope people don’t ever need. But when you do need it, you are grateful to have access not only the care that they provide, but the technology that they have available to them, to offer hope in previously hopeless situations.”
“I was doing personal training to get ready for the Marines boot camp, that’s where I was actually heading. I was heading to personal training when I got into my car accident,” Ayanna said. “I was going into the Marines to prove I was strong. I am not weak. And I proved it – just not through the Marines. Through a different way.”
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