Commencement 2017 profile: Whitney Corby

Walking across the Events Center stage to receive a nursing degree will have added significance for Whitney Corby.

“I know my parents are going to cry because they didn’t think I would walk again, let alone graduate from college,” the Decker School of Nursing student said.

It has been nearly three and a half years since Corby’s life was forever changed. On the night of Dec. 26, 2013, Corby — a promising lacrosse player for the University at Albany — was traveling to a gym near her Corning home when her car slid on black ice and hit a tree.

“I broke my collarbone, fractured my skull, broke my cheekbone, bruised my lungs and had a traumatic brain injury,” she said. “I was moaning and my eyes were closed. I didn’t know what was going on.”

Corby was in a coma and said she does not remember anything until early February 2014, when she was transferred to Unity Hospital in Rochester, home to the Golisano Restorative Neurology and Rehabilitation Center. Corby returned to Corning in mid-February and began an extensive rehabilitation that lasted nearly six months.

“I had to learn how to walk, talk, eat and shower,” she said. “I didn’t know how to do all of the daily activities. I couldn’t even swallow: My favorite food was puréed meat loaf.”

Corby worked with a speech therapist, an occupational therapist and a physical therapist during outpatient rehabilitation.

“Knowing what I was once capable of and not being able to do it was one of the most frustrating things anyone could ever experience,” she said. “Essentially, it was like losing your identity.

“But my family and friends say my drive was what got me going (toward recovery). I was motivated. After a while, they worked my lacrosse stick into the therapy, so I was even tossing a lacrosse ball with a ‘bounce-back’ when I didn’t have therapy.”

Lacrosse has always been a major part of Corby’s life. She was nationally recruited and considered schools as far away as San Diego State before choosing Albany. After the accident, she would travel to Albany to watch her teammates.

“(Coach John Battaglino) emphasized that I was still part of the team,” she said. “They kept my locker and let me stand on the sidelines.”

It was during a lacrosse game in Albany when Corby made one of her most memorable post-accident breakthroughs.

“My teammates didn’t know I could walk, so I walked 50 yards to them without my walker,” she said. “That was the first time I walked a distance.”

Corby finished her rehabilitation and tried to return to Albany after taking an online class. But it was too much, too soon.

“My brain was overstimulated,” she said. “Albany wasn’t in my future anymore. I needed to make some changes.”

Around the first anniversary of the accident, Corby reached an important decision: “I’m going to nursing school to help people who are like me,” she told her family.

With guidance from Binghamton University alumna and former lacrosse player Lauren Lukefahr, Corby picked Binghamton and started in the Decker School Nursing in the fall of 2015.

“It’s rigorous,” Corby recalled. “It was difficult going back to school after a long time off. I had to change my study methods because I can’t study the same way I did before. I don’t learn the same way I used to. Some of my professors were aware of what happened and were good about it.”

Corby’s post-accident learning methods even extended to writing: She was right-handed before the accident, but became left-handed after rehabilitation.

Rosa Darling, an assistant professor of nursing, said Corby has been an excellent student at Decker.

“In the clinical setting, she has evidenced a level of empathy and compassion toward patients that it takes many students years to develop,” Darling said.

That empathy and compassion was in view when Corby returned to Unity Hospital in the summer of 2016 — this time as a nursing intern.

“I worked with the nurses who took care of me,” she said. “It was a rewarding feeling because (a neurological problem) can happen to the young or someone who is 99. It doesn’t matter what your age is.

“I had two young children (as patients) and it was fun to sit with them — feeding them and monitoring them. I told them: ‘If I can do it, you can do it.’ That’s been my (motto). To little girls getting frustrated catching the lacrosse ball: ‘If I can do it, you can do it.’ It applies to life.”

The 23-year-old also spent time in the neurology unit at SUNY Upstate Medical University in Syracuse during the past year. People noticed that Corby still has post-accident effects such as a hearing impairment and paralysis on one side of her face.

“Some people asked and I told them (the story),” she said. “I’m not ashamed of it. They responded: ‘That will make you a great nurse. You already know what it’s like to be a neuro patient.’ I do. I know what it’s like to lay in that bed — it’s not fun.”

Binghamton University also gave Corby the opportunity to come full circle and return to the lacrosse field. Her neurosurgeon cleared her to play club lacrosse with a helmet.

“It’s a team sport, but in a way I was playing for myself because I had to stop (after the accident),” said Corby, who also enjoys the outdoors and painting. “I took a little while to do it, but I went back and finished what I started.”

After graduation, Corby will move to Winchester, Va., where her family now resides. She will work on a neurology floor at the Winchester Medical Center.

“I’m not the same person I was before the accident,” she said. “Coming to terms with the new Whitney was difficult. But God dealt me this playing card — and I’m going to play it.”