Auto accident ended former East Windsor resident’s cutting-edge career in stem cell research and left her in a wheelchair.
By: Michael Ross
EAST WINDSOR A once promising researcher and former East Windsor resident has found a sliver of solace on a remote peninsula, far from the Middlesex County roadway where her life violently changed nearly three years ago.
Dr. Catherine Blankenship, now 45, was driving home from work on Feb. 11, 2002, when her car collided with a tractor-trailer on Interstate 287. The accident ended the doctor’s cutting-edge career in stem cell research and left her in a wheelchair.
"It was a great day," Dr. Blankenship recalled this week, speaking about the day of the accident by phone from her home in Alburg, Vt., a strip of land that traverses Lake Champlain, roughly three miles from the Canadian border. "I went home that night really excited," she said of advancements made that day in her field of stem cell research. "Everything was beautiful."
Dr. Blankenship was driving in the center lane of Interstate 287 southbound in Edison when a tractor-trailer behind her veered into the right lane. The truck cut off and struck a car, which in turn, struck the doctor’s car, forcing her into the truck. Dr. Blankenship said she "volleyballed" three times between the car and the truck.
As a result of the accident, the 45-year-old doctor has torticollis, which is a contracted state of the neck muscles that causes the head to tilt to one side. She also incurred double and blurry vision and a traumatic spinal cord injury that required a rare surgery at Allegheny Medical Center in Pittsburgh, Pa.
"I made a lot of sacrifices to provide, to have security," Dr. Blankenship said. "Now I’m some stranger in some stranger’s body," she added. "It took my life."
On Dec. 2, the parties involved reached a $2 million settlement in Dr. Blankenship’s favor. The deal involved defendants Olexion Rubbish Haulers and Tyler Trucking (related companies located in Middlesex County), which were insured by Scottsdale Insurance Co. (Scottsdale, Ariz.) on behalf of the truck driver, Armando Guardiola; and Alex Bellafronte, the other car driver, who was insured by The Allstate Corp. (Northbrook, Ill.).
Attorney Mark Bayles of the Toms River-based firm Novins, York & Pen- tony, who represented Mr. Bellafronte, declined comment. Susana J. Morris, a lawyer with the firm Budd Larner of Cherry Hill, representing the truck driver defendants, did not immediately return a phone call this week.
"At the time of the injury, Catherine Blankenship, Ph.D. was a promising post-doctoral fellow conducting original molecular bio-chemical research through the Johnson & Johnson neurology and drug discovery group (Raritan)," Jed S. Kadish, Dr. Blankenship’s attorney, said in a December press release. "She was also pursing stem cell research in collaboration with another company.
"Dr. Blankenship was a vibrant, productive, athletic woman prior to the accident," Mr. Kadish added. Now, "She is mostly confined to a wheelchair. Perhaps someday she will benefit from the stem cell research she helped to further."
Dr. Blankenship moved, with husband, Scott, from New Orleans to Princeton in 1994 to pursue her Ph.D. in molecular biology at Princeton University. In 1998, the couple moved to East Windsor after purchasing a Cape Cod-style home on Old York Road.
"We were ready to spend the rest of our lives in (East Windsor)," Mr. Blankenship said. "We were very happy there."
One year after the accident, the couple found themselves battling financial hardship.
"They say the average American family is one health crisis away from bankruptcy," Mr. Blankenship said. "In order to live in the Princeton corridor, you pretty much need a two-family income," the professional social worker added. "We had our house foreclosed on and taken from us."
In October, the financial strain forced the Blankenships to temporarily relocate to a family cabin located in the mountains in Bakersville, N.C.
"We had nowhere else to live," Dr. Blankenship said. "We lost every single thing," she said, adding they were overextended on credit cards and 10 days away from filing for bankruptcy when the settlement was reached. "We liquidated our lives."
Upon reaching the settlement, the couple found their new home, visited the location and made the purchase within one week.
It was a kind of "shotgun wedding" approach to buying a house, said Mr. Blankenship, who spent Christmas moving in. "Before you knew it, we were here."
"It’s in the middle of nowhere with very little traffic around," Dr. Blankenship said. "I can’t stand to be around that many cars," she added. The community offers a "peaceful life" with no trucks "barreling by."
"We love the Lake Champlain area," Mr. Blankenship said. "We live a very shutout existence so we want to be in a very nice place if we’re going to be shut out.
"We don’t want the world. We just want a little bit of happiness after three years of suffering."
Post-traumatic stress syndrome plagues Dr. Blankenship and she routinely takes pain medication for her head, shoulders and back.
"I’m actually in tremendous pain," said Dr. Blankenship, whose head tilts toward her left shoulder, which is bent upward at the neck.
"It’s very uncomfortable for her," Mr. Blankenship said. The truck rolled over the hood of her car, which had a "coffee grinder" effect on her body.
"It’s like going through life looking at the world sideways," Mr. Blankenship added. The condition "messes with her balance," he said. "She can’t walk at all."
Mr. Blankenship said his wife often feels nauseated and overwhelmed by visual images.
"I don’t have the clarity of thought I used to have," Dr. Blankenship said, adding that she has difficulty reading and comprehending words because they appear to move or "swim on the page."
"I’m a stranger and a lump of a body, a lump of a mind and none of me," said the doctor, who said she now fears riding in the front seat of a car and sits in the backseat whenever travelling. "I’ve lost myself."
The greatest chance to walk again came within the first year-and-a-half of the accident, Dr. Blankenship said. "I expired the window," she added.
But even though more than a year-and-a half has passed, Dr. Blankenship still is optimistic.
"My prognosis is hopeful. It’s guarded hopeful."
"She has to live kind of a very sheltered life," Mr. Blankenship said. "She’s generally an optimistic person," he added. "She hopes that she can get her head up off the neck and walk again."
Of the $2 million awarded, Dr. Blankenship said, the couple banked $1.3 million after insurance payments and legal bills. If invested well, she said, the money will allow the couple to live a modest life, which is all she wants.
"It’s not like I’ve won the lottery and I’m queen of the hill," Dr. Blankenship said. "Personally, I just wanted it over," she added. "I wanted my life back."
Now, Dr. Blankenship spends time writing in her journal, surfing the Internet and decorating her new home.
"He spends his day waiting on me hand and foot," the doctor said of her 40-year-old husband, to whom she has been married for 13 years.
Mr. Blankenship said he is considering starting a private social-work practice and may begin working 20 hours per week with five to six clients. In the meantime, he cooks meals, cleans the home, gives medications to his wife and helps her bathe.
"I think what we’re living through is a great deal of isolation," Mr. Blankenship said.
A difference of opinion, over how best to treat Dr. Blankenship’s condition, has left the Blankenships disenfranchised from some family members. "In many ways, we’re all we’ve got," Mr. Blankenship said.
"It’s not just circumstance that keeps Cathy and I together," Mr. Blankenship added. "We admire each other a great deal," he said. "We do love each other very, very deeply."