Asmussen | Hayden Schaumburg: The ultimate comeback story (2024)

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You say you’ve been dealt some bad breaks. Maybe health-related, perhaps an accident.

Let me share a tale of hope and optimism. The story of Hayden Schaumburg.

I’m going to start with the happy ending. Hayden just turned 26. He’s married to his high school sweetheart, Blair, and the Champaign couple has a 7-month-old son, Landon. Blair runs a thriving dance studio in Watseka.

Hayden remains close to parents Clint and Jolyn and younger brother Evan.

Hayden is a University of Illinois graduate (two degrees) and works a job he loves in the agriculture industry.

Your basic man who has everything.

But 10 years ago on Oct. 17, Hayden’s life got turned upside down.

Then a junior on the Watseka High School football team, Hayden ran down for a second-half kickoff return in a game at Clifton Central.

“It was a picturesque football night in a small town,” Hayden said.

Here’s what happened next:

“I remember this vividly: I came up to make a block on another player,” Hayden said. “When I did that, I dropped my head, one of the key things they tell football players ‘Don’t do. Don’t drop your head.’ I hit this other player just right in such a way that I had dislocated my C4 and C5 vertebrae in my neck, which pinched my spinal cord.

“Immediately on impact, I fell into a pile. I was paralyzed from the neck down.

“I couldn’t feel anything at all. The feeling when your arm falls asleep, it felt like that times 10.”

He asked for his dad, Clint, and told him “I’m scared.”

The first instinct for the coaches and personnel on hand was to turn Hayden on his back to get him prepped for transportation to the hospital.

Fortunately, trainer Katie Lisko was working the game and knew better. She recognized the severity of the injury and didn’t allow him to be moved.

“Thank God she was there,” Hayden said. “If they would have rolled me over, I could have severed my spinal cord.”

Normally, the medical trainer is there to deal with sprained ankles and dislocated shoulders.

“What she witnessed is what they probably all fear they never have to,” Hayden said.

In ideal conditions, Hayden would have been taken by helicopter to the hospital. But it was October in the Midwest, too windy for the chopper to make it.

Hayden was loaded into an ambulance bound for St. Mary’s Hospital in Kankakee. Doctors there knew they weren’t equipped to handle the high-level procedure required, so he was quickly and carefully moved to Chicago’s Loyola University Medical Center.

Hayden doesn’t remember much of what happened next.

“It really started to get hazy after I left the field,” he said.

Like with trainer Lisko, Hayden again drew an ace when it came to his doctor. Doug Anderson was on call and performed the lengthy spinal fusion.

“In the back of my neck, I have two rods and eight screws,” Hayden said. “In the front, I have a plate and four screws.”

The span of time from injury to fusion surgery was 12 to 16 hours.

“When it comes to spinal-cord injuries, timeliness is really critical,” Hayden said. “Twenty-four hours is really that threshold for the best chance of recovery.

“I had so many angels watching over me.”

Following the surgery, Hayden was in a coma for 21 days. That allowed time for his body to heal.

“That paralysis persists as long as there is swelling going on with the spinal cord, and that’s what it was,” Hayden said.

Long road back

Early on, Hayden learned the odds for a full recovery from his type of injury were long. Very long.

“The percentage of folks that make it back to their feet is about 5 percent, and the quality of life even being on your feet is pretty grim,” he said.

A person his wife calls “hopelessly optimistic,” Hayden didn’t let the odds deter him.

He spent 30 to 40 days at Loyola. Next, Hayden moved to Shriners Children’s Chicago, which is renowned for its work with spinal-cord injuries. Hayden was in the right place.

He started rehab during the week of Thanksgiving 2014. His family celebrated the holiday at Shriners.

He stayed there until early February. At first, he was simply trying to lift his arm.

“It was like learning how to use my body all over again,” Hayden said. “I had a pretty successful rehab.”

In one part of the facility, there is a staircase that goes from the main level to the lower level, where the recreation area is located. Hayden came up with a simple goal: “Walk up those stairs by myself. I met that goal.”

His rehab continued while he returned to the life of a high school student.

Hayden went back to school in March 2015. He did rehab work for another year-plus.

Hayden had long planned to attend the UI to study agriculture, which he did.

He finished both his undergraduate and master’s degrees in four years. He began interning with Granular in the UI Research Park during his college days, which eventually led to his current job.

He is a senior data analyst for Corteva Agriscience. The company is based in Indianapolis, but Hayden is able to work from home.

Hayden and his family live in north Champaign. He still spends time in Watseka, where his dad farms.

Acts of kindness

Hayden appreciates all the help he received after his injury.

“I feel like I owe about 10,000 thank-you letters,” he said. “There was such an outpouring from the community. I was so blessed.”

Hayden was injured during what would normally be harvest season. The Schaumburg family was obviously solely focused on Hayden’s injury and recovery. There was nobody at home to the do the farm work.

So family members and friends got together and took care of it. They brought 17 combines and 25 trucks to harvest in about a day.

“That’s something that’s beautiful about a small town: We seem to come together when somebody’s down on their luck.” Hayden said. “I think about that pretty often. I hold that close to my heart. Pretty grateful.”

The support extended beyond the farm fields.

Proper perspective

If you saw Hayden on the street today, “I’d like to think you’d probably never think anything was wrong with me,” Hayden said. “I can’t quite run yet. I have a lack of dexterity in my right hand.” (He’s a lefty.)

Hayden doesn’t dwell on the accident.

He has been back to the field where he got hurt a time or two. No hard feelings.

“While it was a really trying time, it’s also a great reminder of how far I came,” he said.

Football fan

Though he got hurt playing the sport, “I still love football,” Hayden said.

“I don’t blame the sport itself for what happened,” Hayden said.

He spent part of Sunday watching the Chicago Bears and follows Illinois football closely. He likes the new NFL kickoff rule put in to make the play safer.

“I really think it’s a great move for the game,” he said.

Because of his own experiences, Hayden hears from others who have suffered similar injuries.

“There’s so much adversity when you’re facing it,” Hayden said. “A lot of folks have reached out to me.”

He’s talked with a man in Wales who suffered a spinal-cord injury in soccer match.

“He’s still going strong,” Hayden said. “He’s an inspirational young man.”

So is Hayden.