Taylor Everson’s Injury Odyssey

David Vick — August 1, 2023

It was only the third game of the season for Yale. The Bulldogs traveled to Long Island to take on, at the time, No. 5 Stony Brook.

Taylor Everson was coming off a two-goal, one-assist performance three days earlier. The season was young and full of hope for players and teams across the country.

Little did anyone know a player would suffer a life-threatening injury on that Saturday in late February.

The player was Taylor Everson. The injury was her left kidney split in half.

Instead of competing until the end, Taylor exited and ended up in the intensive care unit (ICU) at Stony Brook University Hospital.

“I was super overwhelmed, super scared,” Taylor said.

Despite the pain she was in and uncertainty of what her injury was early on, Taylor expected to leave the ICU the next day.

One day in the ICU turned into 12 between two different hospitals.

In total, Taylor underwent more than 75 blood draws, nine catheters, eight X-rays, three CT scans, two angiograms, one blood transfusion and an embolization.

Along with her split kidney, she was treated for a partially collapsed lung, concussion, whiplash from the cross check, ileus and anemia. Through it all, her mom, Carolyn, and dad, Douglas, were by her side.

“I cried a lot in the middle of the night when all you could hear were the beeps of the machines she was connected to. It was only after I started to gain confidence she would eventually start to heal that I then thought maybe this happened for a reason,” Carolyn said.

While under the supervision of doctors, Taylor did not eat any solid food for nearly a week and a half. During this time, she was only eating soup.

Because of the trauma her body had been through and lack of food, Taylor was sleeping 22-23 hours a day. Her body was exhausted.

Taylor maintained a day-by-day approach. On certain days she received good news, but on others, she did not. Nevertheless, she slowly improved thanks to the wonderful care of the doctors watching over her.

“I was lucky enough to have amazing doctors who got me to where I needed to get to,” she said.

After all that, Taylor returned home on March 10. She described her time at home as the hardest part of her recovery; she felt alone.

While she had made progress in the early stages of her rehabilitation process, Taylor lost 15-20 pounds and could not lift anything heavier than a milk carton. The Montclair, New Jersey native needed assistance walking up the stairs and showering to avoid the risk of falling.

Those were not the only challenges she faced.

“It’s also hard being a 20-year-old college student seeing all your friends going to school, going to practice, living a life that you were just living,” Taylor said.

Never in a million years did Taylor expect her sophomore season to take such a wildly unexpected and unfortunate road.

She did not return to playing lacrosse in 2023 following her injuries against Stony Brook on February 25. Taylor’s teammates and best friends took the field 14 times without her, finishing with an 11-6 record.

The game toughest for Taylor to watch was Yale at Duke on March 14. It was supposed to be an Everson sister versus sister matchup, her Yale Bulldogs against her sister Kennedy’s Duke Blue Devils.

The game was played with neither Everson on the field as both missed due to injury. Kennedy, a goalie, missed the entire season after undergoing surgery on a torn hip labrum.

Kennedy witnessed the action from the sideline while Taylor viewed it from home nearly 500 miles away.

“My parents and I watched every minute of it on our couch with the dogs,” Taylor said.

With Taylor and Kennedy attending different high schools, it would have been the first time the two were on the same field since their club days.

Instead of bonding over a shared experience on the field, it was what they shared off it that brought the sisters closer together.

Taylor, who already had a strong relationship with her sister, felt lucky to be able to lean on Kennedy for advice and coping mechanisms; both found comfort in their conversations.

“The two of us certainly grew closer as we were able to talk about something that a lot of others did not understand: what it’s like to be out for an entire season,” Kennedy said.

Three weeks after returning home, Taylor traveled back to New Haven, Connecticut, to finish the semester and rejoin her teammates.

“At that point I was so excited to try to feel normal again,” she said.

Taylor stayed in a hotel for the remainder of the spring semester, which her roommates and teammates decorated before her arrival, making for an even more emotional return.

It had been five weeks since she attended her classes at Yale. With two of those being spring break, Taylor had missed three full weeks of classwork.

She resumed classes upon returning, but her daily schedule still revolved around sleep because of the low amount of energy she possessed. While not ideal and extremely challenging, she was happy to be back.

The sophomore attacker worked hard and was able to finish the school year on schedule.

“The fact that she was able to eventually get back to school, finish her semester, strongly at that, and intern in investment banking this summer, which is an intense program, is a testament to her ability to bounce back from adversity,” her mom said.

This year has been tough on Taylor, Kennedy and their parents. However, the squad of four, as described by Taylor, grew closer as a result of the hardships.

“They dropped everything for me and for Kennedy,” she said when speaking about her parents.

Unfortunately, Taylor’s experience was not the first time Carolyn and Douglas Everson were in the ICU looking over one of their daughters. Twenty years ago, Taylor and Kennedy were both in a neonatal intensive care unit for more than two months after being born at 27 weeks.

This time, being by her side again in the direst of circumstances, allowed Carolyn to witness the person Taylor has grown into.

“That time was incredibly precious to me because I saw how she dealt with such a horrific situation with grace, positivity, determination and strength,” Carolyn said.

Along with the support from her family, the support from others did not go unnoticed by Taylor.

“It meant a lot to me when people from all walks of time in my life reached out and checked in on me,” she said.

More than five months since her life changed on February 25, Taylor is very grateful to be a fully functioning person again with 80% of her left kidney remaining.

She is not physically ready to play lacrosse yet and has not been cleared for strenuous activities, but that could change soon. Taylor visited the doctor at the end of July and will get the results from her visit before heading back to Yale for the fall semester.

As of now, Taylor is planning on playing in 2024.

“I just want to be back with my team, so in whatever capacity I can do that, that’s the most important thing for me,” she said.

Through all she has been through this year, Taylor has realized the importance of living in the present and enjoying all that she has.

_{After the publishing of this story, doctors cleared Taylor to return to lacrosse.}