Waimea High School volleyball player Kaylee Reeves said Shyann Freitas is more than just a teammate, she is an inspirational figure who never intended to be one, and became one of the catalysts that inadvertently lifted her team to an undefeated season.
Shyann Freitas, who is on the junior varsity roster of Waimea High School, lost her right foot in an ATV accident Labor Day of 2018 near the Old Kola Sugar Mill, endured multiple surgeries and now has adjusted to a prosthetic.
Freitas has good days and bad, and eventually returned to the volleyball court to return to normalcy after enduring months of surgeries and physical therapies.
Inspired by Shyann’s courageous nature, the Menehune volleyball team, in a competitive Kauai Interscholastic Federation pool, is perfect through the first and second-round en route to a flawless 12-0 record.
Reeves said the courage Shyann displayed sparked the varsity team to perfection, and now the Menehune are on the doorstep of achievement find themselves two victories away capturing the 2019 New City Nissan Girls Volleyball championship series Thursday at 5 p.m. in Farrington.
As of press time, the Menehune will be either playing the winner of Hawaii Preparatory Academy and Molokai in the quarterfinals.
“She has given everyone on the team strength and showed us what we could accomplish if we push ourselves,” Reeves said. “We have pushed ourselves, and have dedicated the season to her recovery. Her injury affected the players and coaches as well.”
Shyann’s injury and ongoing recovery process provided perspective for a young Menehune team on the quest for a Division II state championship title.
“It has made me realize just how privileged I am because I didn’t have to go through all of that, and it showed me the struggles that I through during the day are minimal to what she had to go through, and it pushes me to be a better person and teaches me to be positive in hard situations.”
Coming out of the dark
Since Shyann was five years old, she was involved with volleyball, and after the injury, doctors weren’t sure what her lifestyle was going to be like, much less returning to the court.
Reading inspirational biblical quotes every day or newspaper articles about marathon runners who had both of their legs amputated, and returned to competition her mother Melissa Frietas, and the rest of her family would conjure up to power Shy through the psychological component of the injury.
“We say each and every day is a new day, and there is always a new challenge especially with physical therapy, occupational therapy, we would find a quote that would pertain to that,” Melissa Freitas said. “Each day, she would say something different and read it and read something, and that would pertain to her recovery, and you know it helped a lot, and it helped her cope with a lot of stuff.”
Her family admittedly viewed Shyann as one of the weaker members of her athletically-inclined family, which included three siblings.
After Shy went through the rehabilitation process, she changed the perception of her family.
“Growing up, we always thought of her as one of the weaker members of the family,” Melissa admitted. “She was thought to be one of the weaker ones, and what she overcame is profound; it has made her and the whole family so much stronger.”
Her attitude and demeanor behind the support of the family, the community continue to remain positive through the surgeries, the adversity, and all Shy did was stay positive throughout everything, with one main goal in mind: to get back on the volleyball court.
Mind over matter
Shy’s primary focus was on returning to the volleyball court, but there was a chance might never see the volleyball court but may never return to normalcy.
Overcoming the injury was secondary to the volleyball court, and her determination allowed her to maintain motivation in physical therapy, which is ongoing.
“I would say the hardest thing I’ve seen her go through personally is just obviously learning how to walk again with her new foot,” Mellisa Freitas said. “She had to learn how to do things without, and just getting back to how she was before the injury, and she was positive throughout the thing, and going through an injury like that would change anyone that happened to.”
Another aspect Reeves had to overcome is the emotional component of her injury.
“She was insecure about it, and as a friend, I tried to embrace it, and I told her, ‘you are a survivor.’ I tried to help her realize what she went through, and had to overcome something at such a young age that not even most adults could go through, and she is staying as positive as she was.”
Against all odds
Shy was determined not to be wheelchair-bound the rest of her life, and to return to the volleyball court to not only try out for the senior high volleyball but with aspirations of playing collegiate volleyball.
“I didn’t want to be stuck in a wheelchair forever, and I guess I just loved volleyball, and I wanted to play, and I just told myself I had to push myself,” Shy said.
Working with Jesse R. Pasag and his wife Jennifer, who both run the rehabilitation and orthopedic center of Kaua’i.
Working together with Shy, Jesse, and Jennifer formed a small team to help her go through the entire rehabilitation process.
“When she was coming in, my wife and I didn’t know what to expect,” Jesse admitted. “When you have someone as young as her we didn’t know what to expect, would be reserved, would she be depressed about the situation, and instead she was very motivated, and always pleasant to work with, and always had a good demeanor about her, and was willing to try a positive attitude which was great for us, and helped us push her to get better.”
An island of support
Jennifer Pasag admitted retaining normalcy for the Shy is an ongoing battle.
“She got back on the court, and routinely someone like her who had her kind of amputation it takes a year before the prosthesis can be fitted properly,” Jennifer said. “It took six to eight months for hers, and she had to relearn everything, and that is a pretty fast process. You would have thought September would allow her time for healing and swelling.”
During the process of developing their team of doctors that came into Oahu to create a more mobile leg that would allow her to be more mobile in athletics.
“Sometimes, limbs change over time, and it’s always a constant battle to make sure the prosthetic is fitting, and everything is working properly,” Jennifer Pasag said.
During the rehab process patients generally, go up and down in their progression.
“A lot of times they will go into a depressional state because they lost part of the body or their upper extremity and they have to learn how to use their arm again, and it took a toll on the athlete mentally,” Jesse said. “You have to relearn how to walk and trust the leg again physically, and there is a lot of learning and relearning again and again.”
The big reason both Jesse and Jennifer attributed to her rapid progression was the support mechanism she had in place.
Shy has developed a lot of response through Facebook pages, and raised over $18,000 of her goal of $30,000 to pay for the cost of the prosthetics.
Shy’s club coach Makamae Compoc- Dela Cruz has overcome traumatic injuries in volleyball herself throughout her years as a player, and she can’t imagine overcoming the trauma of Shy’s magnitude.
“She doesn’t let it stop her or put a limit to her leg, she does what she can do.”
Denise Moriguchi, who is parent support for both the varsity and junior varsity team, said Shy provided plenty of spirit for her team moving forward.
“She is a fighter, and then had to get her amputation it was pretty devastating for all of the girls, and we knew she is kind of like a tiger spirit, and she continues to fight,” Moriguchi said.
It is the fighting spirit of Shy, and the team, that has put them two victories from capturing the volleyball championship series, and through that spirit the rest of her team has vicariously channeled they will try to bring home a state volleyball championship title back home to Kauai.
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Jason Blasco, sports reporter, can be reached at 245-0437 or jblasco@thegardenisland.com.
