NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Janae Edmondson signed Wednesday to play volleyball at Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro, Tennesseee, this fall, WSMV-Nashville reports.
On Feb. 18, the 17-year-old athlete was walking back to her hotel room from a volleyball tournament at the Dome at America's Center when a car ran a yield sign, crashed and pinned Edmondson against another car. She was critically injured and lost both of her legs.
Edmondson was supposed to play college volleyball for the University of Tennesee Southern prior to the crash, and the team's coach said the school was still going to honor her scholarship. However, the teen couldn't pass up on an offer from MTSU to join its volleyball team as a manager.
While Edmondson is back home in Tennessee and has garnered support across the country, she still has some healing to do.
Marilyn Edmondson, Janae's mother, shared the following update Tuesday on a GoFundMe page about her daughter's recovery and the exciting moments ahead as her senior year comes to a close:
"I want to thank everyone for continuing to pray for Janae and our family. She has had many (appointments) filling her days. Most have went well but a couple of things she is still fighting to heal well before she can move to getting into prosthetics eventually and we ask for unspoken prayers for those things please and continued emotional healing for us all as well. She/ we take it one day at a time still but it still feels so devastating at times. She is a fighter though and I'm so proud of her strength and determination.
"She has so many good people in her life and she is continuing to try to live her senior year the best that she can. She told me two things she didn't want to miss out on and wanted to do and one was graduation and one was prom. I wanted to share a picture of her promposal. This was a good day for her! She was so happy.
"Again, I want to thank you all for continuing to love her and showing her you care. Thank you so much! Please continue to pray for her. We need it so much to carry forward."
As of Thursday, the GoFundMe campaign to help fund Edmondson's journey to recovery had raised nearly $809,000.
The man who allegedly caused the crash that injured Edmondson, 21-year-old Daniel Riley, was on house arrest at the time for a 2020 robbery and had violated his GPS monitoring dozens of times.
Riley pleaded not guilty and was assigned a new judge earlier this month.
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