Riverdale student inspires in recovery from crash

This is the first in a series honoring outstanding high school student athletes during the 2014-15 school year.

Student athletes were nominated by representatives of their schools in the categories of Scholar-Athlete, Most Inspirational, Leadership and Community Service. A panel of Tennessean editors and reporters selected the winners in those categories, as well as Male and Female Athletes of the Year.

Caytie Gascoigne doesn't consider herself a special person. She just wants to be normal.

She doesn't believe she is an inspiration. She adamantly opposes throwing words like "miracle" around.

"I don't like to think of myself that way," said Caytie, a recent graduate of Riverdale High School, where she was a member of the swim team for two years. "I don't like to look at myself any different. I'm just like everyone else."

There are many who beg to differ. The events of Dec. 5, 2014, and everything that has occurred since is a glowing testimony.

Today, Caytie is like any other 17-year-old future college student who has summer jobs, a bright smile and an even brighter future.

There is nothing normal about the last six months of her life.

Every parent's nightmare

Shelly Gascoigne got the call from one of her daughter's friends about 3 p.m. on Dec. 5.

" 'Caytie is in the ditch,' is what she told me when I answered," Shelly said. "My first thought was, 'What did she do?' I figured it was the typical stuff. I hung up and called Caytie's phone."

Caytie didn't answer. That was the first bad sign.

"The woman who answered asked, 'Is this Caytie's mom? She's been in an accident,' " Shelly said. "I knew if she didn't answer, something was wrong. I asked the woman how she was. 'She's breathing' is what she said. OK ... I asked if she was going to be OK. 'She's breathing. We're trying to get her out of the car.'

"That's when I lost it. I just wanted her to say (Caytie) was OK."

What Shelly discovered upon arriving to the scene was a mangled Volkswagen and many emergency workers. The high school senior was on her way to her after-school job when she was hit head-on by a student from another high school who was trying to make a turn.

"My legs went out from under me," Shelly said.

Caytie suffered a broken back, neck, pelvis, sternum and knee and a fractured skull in the accident. That wasn't the worst of it.

" 'We can fix that,' the doctors told us," Shelly said. " 'It's the brain. We have no control over that.' "

Caytie's brain had swelled as the result of serious head trauma. After being rushed to Vanderbilt University Medical Center via ambulance — bad weather prohibited using a LifeFlight helicopter to transport her — doctors put her in an induced coma. Her chances for survival were not favorable.

"All her brain activity was shut off. The doctors said that's all they could do for her. That it was in God's hands. I've always believed in God but have never been that religious," Shelly said. "I got mad. I didn't want to give up that control. 'It's not in God's hands,' was my first thought. But I accepted it. All we did was pray. Everybody prayed."

Caytie was a front office assistant for Riverdale Principal Tom Nolan prior to the accident.

"She's such a great student and all-around kid," Nolan said. "When you get that phone call — the one you never want to get — it just breaks your heart. I went to the hospital that night, and my whole thinking was, 'What do I say to the parents?' But Caytie is a fighter. That's the kind of person she is."

Season for miracles

Caytie stayed in a coma for 21 days, including Christmas, when many relatives gathered around Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

The day after Christmas, she became responsive for the first time.

"I don't remember anything (about that day)," Caytie said. "When you wake up from a coma, you don't just stretch and yawn. I had no response at all for 21 days, and it took an additional three to four weeks to really emerge."

She was transferred in early January from Vanderbilt to Shepherd Center, a spinal cord and brain injury rehabilitation facility in Atlanta. It was mid-January when Caytie "emerged" fully from the coma.

"The first thing I fully remember is asking, 'Why am I here,' " Caytie said. "It was in the middle of the night and dark.

"I remember being told about the accident and that it wasn't my fault. When they told me I was in a rehab facility, I remember thinking, 'Do they think I'm an alcoholic?' I was confused about where I was and why."

The Gascoigne family was told rehabilitation could take up to two years or the rest of Caytie's life, but has accelerated beyond what most thought it would.

"I knew (after awakening) then that I was going to make it," Caytie said. "But I didn't know if I would be normal again. I didn't want people to look at me like I was crazy."

Full speed ahead

In addition to letting her body heal, the brain injury forced Caytie to re-learn simple tasks that most take for granted.

"She had to learn all over again, everything from talking — how to make sounds — to swallowing and eating," Shelly said.

"I felt like I knew how to do everything. It seemed easy," Caytie said. "But (therapists) kept saying, 'No, you're doing it wrong.' I would point and nod and look at things and they told me to verbalize my wants and needs. When I started doing that (her mother) was so excited."

Caytie's physical and mental progress was so good over the next couple of months that she was able to leave the Shepherd facility in mid-February and move around in a wheelchair by mid-March.

"She shocked everybody," Shelly said. "She never complained one time."

She completed occupational therapy in mid-April, and earlier this month, she finished physical therapy.

"I hated being dependent," Caytie said. "I kept telling myself, 'I can do this.' "

In between, she also was able to go back to school, first in a wheelchair, then two weeks later walking on her own.

"She worked her tail off to get better," Nolan said. "As soon as we got her back, I rolled her right back to the front office to work. It was so amazing. Just eating a McDonald's hamburger was a big step for her.

"To go from a wheelchair to the next week on a walker, to walking by herself three days later — that's a miracle."

Welcome back

The outpouring of support, including friends and teachers who helped her catch up to complete the necessary three credits left to graduate, was overwhelming for Caytie.

She was named prom queen in the spring and Best All-Around Senior Girl at graduation.

"I told Caytie (during a visit to Shepherd Center), I had three goals for her," Nolan said. " 'I want you to get back to Riverdale; I want to dance with you at prom; and I want you to walk across the stage at graduation.' She did all of them."

"(Best All-Around Senior Girl) humbled me," said Caytie, who was an honor student and active in school plays. "I didn't see myself as that, compared to everyone else who could have gotten it."

Her friends and classmates felt she was deserving of both honors.

"She kept making more and more progress," said recent Riverdale graduate Missi Wood, one of Caytie's close friends. "She's done so much better than anyone thought she would.

"I tell her every day how she is very special and very lucky. She always brushes it off. She's definitely an inspiration to a lot of people."

Normalcy

To talk with Caytie, one would have to look hard to notice signs that her body was mangled and she almost died less than seven months ago.

It's still a process. Her voice is a little raspier than before. She had to take a special test (given to those who have suffered brain injuries) in order to drive again. She also has discomfort when she walks or stands for long periods of time.

But she has recently completed lifeguard training, gone to the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival, has a summer job at a fireworks stand and is looking forward to starting at Middle Tennessee State University in the fall.

Inspired by the help she received in her recovery, she plans to study neuropsychology.

"I would say I'm normal now," she said. "I judge myself pretty close."

Normal is a relative term. But for Caytie Gascoigne, everything in her future is bright, compared to the previous six months. She doesn't like using the word "miracle," and she is too modest to consider herself an inspiration.

For now, she'll just take normal.

"She had a rebirth on Dec. 5," Shelly said. "Her life started all over again. I got to raise her twice. How many get to raise their daughter twice?

"Who she was before (the accident) is going to determine who she'll be down the road."

Cecil Joyce can be reached at 259-8017 and on Twitter @Cecil_Joyce.

A long six months

A look at the events that touched the lives of the Gascoigne family over the past several months:

• Dec. 5: Caytie Gascoigne is critically injured in a head-on collision and rushed by ambulance to Vanderbilt University Medical Center. She suffered a broken neck, back, pelvis, ankle and sternum, as well as a massive head injury. Her mother was told by doctors that she had a five to 10 percent of survival. She was placed in a coma because of swelling of the brain.

• Dec. 26: Gascoigne has movement in her eyes and body, showing the first signs of coming out of the coma.

• Jan. 2: Gascoigne is transferred from Vanderbilt University Medical Center to Shepherd Center in Atlanta, a rehab facility for those with spinal cord and brain injuries.

• Feb. 13: Gascoigne, after rapid progress in her rehabilitation, leaves Shepherd Center.

• March 13: Gascoigne returns to Riverdale High School. She is in a wheelchair the first week, followed by a walker and then walking on her own within two weeks.

• April 18: Gascoigne is named Riverdale prom queen.

• May 13: Gascoigne graduates from Riverdale and is named Best All-Around Senior Girl. She walked across the stage unassisted to receive her diploma.

Other most inspirational honorees

KeyArrah Cunningham, Martin Luther King Jr. Magnet School

Rontavius Groves, Pearl Cohn

Kue Htoo, Overton

Mike Mitchell, LEAD Academy