After a college student's family nursed her back to health from a traumatic brain injury, she told them something that broke their hearts. Laura Van Ryn was known for her altruistic nature, positive attitude, and nurturing demeanor. Her family nursed her back to health after a horrific car accident, but they weren't prepared for what she had to tell them once she could finally talk again...
Family Tragedy
Laura Van Ryn was traveling for a school event when a sleepy truck driver drove into their van. There were nine people on board and five of them died. The scene of the accident was one of the worst the police had ever seen in the county, but no one was anticipating just how much worse this situation would get, even months later...
Taylor University and the Community
Taylor University is a private Christian college that is known for their altruism and good deeds done in the community. People who go to this school know what they’re getting into. They want to get a good education as well as learn how to help their local community. Laura Van Ryn was one of those students.
Laura and Her Classmates
Laura Van Ryn was 22-years-old when she was a senior at Taylor University when tragedy struck her small community. Laura was heavily involved at her school, even more than most. Laura's favorite thing to participate in was bettering the social welfare in the surrounding community. She had a knack for helping others in their time of need, so helping the poor was second-nature to her. Laura would always donate her time for those less fortunate, which is exactly what she was doing on that fateful day...
Going to Fort Wayne
Laura helped organize a trip to Fort Wayne with her fellow classmates for a social welfare trip. She tried getting some more people on the trip so they could have more helping hands, but her close friends refused for personal reasons. They would soon learn, this was the best choice they could have ever made...
Volunteering Day
The group set out to Fort Wayne on April 26, 2006. The volunteers loaded up the car and got ready for their day of service. The Fort Wayne homeless shelter was only an hour away from Taylor University, so it was a pretty easy drive. The day went by quickly and the food drive was perfect. The shelter employees were extremely impressed with the selflessness of these college students.
Road Tripping Home
The students left Fort Wayne feeling accomplished and good about the work that they did. After the van was loaded up, they set off on the short trip home. Unfortunately, this trip would have a heartbreaking end…
A Late Night
It was getting dark as they were heading home. Most of the students had nodded off to sleep while a few stayed up to chat about the event. They were so tired, and this hour-long trip was starting to feel like forever…
Laura’s Parents
Meanwhile, Laura's parents were waiting for her arrival at home. They knew how special this trip was to her and were looking forward to hearing about it. Her parents were proud of their daughter and what she could accomplish. While they were waiting at home, though, tragedy struck…
A Horrible Accident
The trip home was almost over and they were a few miles from campus. The van was traveling on a desolate road when they came face-to-face with a giant truck. Before they could react, the truck hit them head-on.
A Nightmare In Real Life
When first responders arrived at the scene, they were devastated. The van was a mangled mess and tangled within the trees. The truck’s front end was completely smashed and it blocked the entire roadway...
Calling For Help
Bystanders who witnessed the crash called 9-1-1 immediately, so first-responders got there within minutes. Unfortunately, it still wasn't fast enough. The scene was gruesome, and they knew just by looking at it that there would hardly be any survivors. EMT’s rushed to the victims to assess their needs.
The Result
Through all of the chaos of the scene, the EMTs were able to evaluate the survivors and the dead. Five people died at the scene: Monica Felver, Laurel Erb, Bradley Larson, Whitney Cerak, and Elizabeth Smith. Four were alive but in critical condition, and one of them was Lauren Van Ryn...
The Truck Driver
Robert Spencer was the driver of the truck who caused the accident. He claimed that he fell asleep when he struck and killed them. He was arrested at the scene and sentenced to five years in prison as he pleaded guilty on five counts of vehicular homicide.
At the Hospital
Lauren was rushed to the hospital in critical condition. They determined that she was bleeding internally and had horrific head injuries. Her parents were notified and they made their way over to be with their daughter. They had no idea that people had even died…
Comatose
Lauren wasn’t conscious when she was alive. Her parents weren’t able to see her before she was rushed into emergency surgery, so they waited and prayed. There wasn’t anything else that they could do…
Bleak Outlook
Lauren was in surgery for hours. The doctors did their best to stop the bleeding and to repair other parts of her body, but it was a difficult feat. After she was released from surgery, her doctor advised her parents that all they could do now was let her rest. Little did they know, there was another twist in this horrific ordeal...
Community Coming Together
News spread quickly throughout the school and Fort Wayne. People were donating their money and time to the families of the deceased and the survivors. Some people even helped pay for funeral services…
Laura Wakes Up
Days went by while Laura was asleep. While people were going on with their lives, Laura and her family simply stood still in time. They were just waiting for her to wake up. Finally, she opened her eyes, but she couldn’t speak…
Family Matters
Laura was never alone in her time of healing. Her family spent days on end with her while she was in the hospital. Although Laura was awake, she couldn’t take care of herself. She couldn’t even speak! It shook Laura’s mother to her core when she saw her daughters’ helpless expression every day…
She Started Vocalizing
After weeks of healing, Laura was able to start to talk. Her family couldn’t understand her, but they were happy with at least some sort of progress. Laura’s mother noticed that what she was trying to say felt urgent, but she couldn’t understand…
What Did She Say?
Lisa, Laura’s sister, was at her bedside one night when Laura tried to talk again. Lisa leaned in to try and make out what she was saying, but it was so quiet and jumbled. Laura repeated herself over and over again until Lisa could finally make out the words, “False parents.” Lisa immediately ran to her mother to tell her.
Asking the Doctor
The family was worried about what that meant. When they asked the doctor, he assured them that they had nothing to worry about. Random words were normal with brain injuries, and she might end up saying even stranger things. The family accepted that explanation for the time being…
Things Got Weirder as She Healed
When Laura started getting better, things were getting even weirder. Granted, the family had never dealt with someone who had a brain injury, but something felt wrong. Laura was desperately trying to tell them something…
Unusual Changes
One day as her mother was at her bedside, her mother noticed something weird about her teeth. They were different. Her teeth looked bigger than usual. Her mother flashed back to the “false parents” comment again, that’s when she checked her daughter’s belly button for a piercing… It wasn’t here.
Continuing to Heal
Her mother brushed it off. She convinced herself she was being overdramatic and possibly too stressed out to make sense of the situation. As time went on, Laura was getting better. She could move her arms and legs and talk a bit more.
Something Was Different
As Laura began to heal, she seemed different. Someone’s personality can change slightly as they make their way out of a brain injury, but it wasn’t just that. As parents, they could just feel that something was wrong. So, they began to test her...
Write It Out
They decided to give Laura a pen and paper. They told her to write out her name as best as she could. Laura eagerly took the writing utensils and wrote out her name…
Whitney, Not Laura
Laura handed the paper back to her parents with a completely different name on the card. Instead of writing ‘Laura,’ she wrote ‘Whitney.’ The couple broke down; this was not their daughter. Whitney was the name of a girl who had died in the accident, or so they thought…
Mistaken Identity
As it turns out, this was Whitney and not Laura. Richard McNally, a professor of psychiatry at Harvard University, did a study on this case. He said that it was pretty simple. This was a case of mistaken identity and intense grief. When the doctors told the grieving parents that this was their daughter, they were eager to believe it. Plus, the victim was extremely beaten up by the accident. It was hard to tell…
Breaking the News
Laura’s parents were heartbroken by the news. They had just lost their daughter and had to go through the grief process all over again. At the same time, they were able to tell two other parents that their daughter was alive and well. They made the call.
Calling Newell and Colleen
Laura’s father called Newell and Colleen, Whitney’s parents, to let them know what happened. At first, Newell assumed it was a cruel joke. They told Whitney’s parents to come over as soon as possible...
Insane Mistake
Newell and Colleen were able to confirm that this was, indeed, their daughter. They were so excited to see that their daughter was okay but also furious at the mistake that was made. How could someone be so careless and toy around with lives that that?
Started At The Crime Scene
The person in charge of inspecting the bodies at the crime scene ended up making the grave error, but it wasn’t out of negligence. The crime scene was so horrible that it was a total mess. Laura’s wallet ended up next to Whitney, which is what they used to identify her. Their faces were so beat up that it was hard to tell…
Complete Disbelief
Newell said, “It was such an unbelievable moment for us because we were at a moment in our life when we thought this would never be a possibility.” The two families ended up getting very close to each other through the tragedy. The Van Ryn’s did nurse Whitney back to health, after all. Whitney said, “The Van Ryn’s, they loved me like I was their daughter because they believed that I was their daughter.”
Her Own Funeral
Whitney added to her story that it’s extremely creepy to have lived through your own funeral. “My family had a funeral for me. A lot of people wonder what will people say about you at your funeral…. My sister, Carly, told my entire campus that I didn’t shower enough. And one of my pastors back in Michigan, he told everyone who came to the funeral that I wasn’t very good at sports. So I learned all these things out. But how often you expect the person to come back and confront you about that”
Changing Her Life
Despite going through a horrific tragedy, Whitney says that her life had been changed. “Coming back to school was really hard. Nothing was making sense to me. My identity before the accident was no longer. I thought I was really social and funny, I had a lot of friends. But after April 26, those things changed.”
The Van Ryn’s Were Happy
Despite losing a daughter, the family was happy to see another family be reunited with theirs. “There are just some things that can't be explained, but the faith that we have in God has gone so deep,” Lauren’s father said.
Whitney Now
Now, Whitney is graduated from school and all grown up! She has three kids and a wonderful husband. She took this accident as a sign to enjoy life to the fullest.
Life Experience
If anything, this taught Whitney the true meaning of life, and that's being kind to one another no matter what. She said, "Even after I wrote 'Whitney' [on the notecard] and their world changed and they knew that I wasn't their daughter, they still treated me like I was their family."