A sudden illness is keeping a Fremont teacher from starting school.
While Brianna Deines’ students are in the classroom, she’s been recovering from Guillain Barre Syndrome at Madonna Rehabilitation Hospital.
The Sunday before she was set to go back to school in Fremont this year, she was admitted to the ICU.
"I had tingliness of my extremities," Deines said. "Then it got to a point where I couldn’t walk, and paralysis."
She’s still learning to walk, and even use her voice again.
"Currently I’m not in school," Deines said. "Right, Thomas we haven’t started school yet this year. Neither of us have."
Her partner in recovery, Thomas Reynolds, is helping her get back to teaching again.
In July, Thomas was in a bad car accident with his brother in South Dakota.
“Really bad roads,” Reynolds said. And the car flipped over and part of my head was out of the car and got scraped.”
Reynolds is teaching his eyes to read again after being in a coma for 44 days.
“Two therapies going on at the same time,” he said. “Would that be occupational therapy for you?”
“Speech,” Deines said. “I think it’s going pretty well. What do you think?”
“We couldn’t have asked for a better pair between the two of them,” Kasia Richardson, Speech Language Pathologist at Madonna Rehabilitation Hospital said. “I’ve seen Bri’s confidence improve with seeing that she can get back to work and can get back to teaching. And watching his reading comprehension improve, his vision improve.”
Deines is now doing rehab as an outpatient. Thomas is expected to be released Oct. 12 just in time to celebrate South Dakota State University’s homecoming game.
