CHARLOTTE, N.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) – One thing you’ll notice right away if you meet Sarah Pritzker is that she has a lot of spirit.
“Yay!” she exclaimed at her latest physical therapy session.
Her natural exuberance might explain her dream.
“I don’t know anything about football, but I always wanted to be a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader,” she told Queen City News.
She also wanted to be a ballerina.
Sarah is a weekly ray of sunshine at Performance Rehab in Charlotte. She’s made huge strides over the year with physical therapy.
“So much better than it used to be,” Dr. Kristin Royen told her.
“Hooray!” Pritzker says.
“She was wheelchair-bound for quite some time, unable to walk. She’s progressed to the point where she can walk just fine,” says Dr. Royen.
Pritzker is driven to live her best life despite what happened in 2006, days after she turned 13.
“I went to a dance class on Tuesday night, I was really big into ballet and jazz, and then I went home, and my back was just in shooting pains,” she remembers.
The former dancer faced suddenly life as an incomplete paraplegic.
She was diagnosed with inflammation of the spinal cord, which is called transverse myelitis.
“It’s basically an attack on your spinal cord,” Dr. Royen explained. “It’s your own system that does it, it can be triggered by a virus or a vaccine.”
“I almost had to mourn my life even though I was still alive,” Pritzker recalled. “Which was kind of a weird thing to go through, especially in the eighth grade. But it kind of has led me to where I am today.”
When you see her today, it’s hard to believe there were doubts she’d ever walk again.
“I get stuck here!” she says, working through an exercise.
“See, I can hold it down, I just can’t pull it up,” she told Dr. Royen.
“Sarah has persevered,” Dr. Royen says of her positive patient.
“The quote that got me through the hospital was, ‘Life isn’t waiting for the storm to pass. It’s about learning to dance in the rain,’” said Pritzker. “Because I couldn’t dance anymore, so how could I dance anymore, so how could I dance in my new rainstorm.”
Sarah was one of the first to use a Bioness electrical stimulation device to improve her mobility.
“Science is so cool. I don’t get it, but it’s so cool!” she says, explaining the device to us.
“My muscles forget to do their job, and so what do you do when you need to remind something? You go, ‘Tap tap, wake up!’” said Pritzker, who works as a teacher and enjoys helping special needs students.
“When she’s got the Bioness on she’s got that assistance for the muscles. She’s able to walk for a longer duration with less pain,” says Dr. Royen.
Technology has helped improve her quality of life. But Sarah’s irrepressible personality and positive outlook helped give her new life.
“I quite like this life,” Pritzker says. “I feel that knowing that took me a long time to get to where I am today I can be an advocate for others.”
Sarah never became a Cowboys cheerleader, but she’s super easy to cheer for.
“She’s extremely positive,” says Dr. Royen.
And these days, she has just enough dance moves to be dangerous.
