Doug Pryor slumped
to the forest floor, exhausted. Was this the last time search parties would be
sent out to look for his twenty-one-year-old daughter?
“God, I can’t go
on.” He prayed. “I just need to know. Is Taylor safe?”
Just then, he
spotted three deer not too far away.
“Lord, if she’s
safe, bring one of those deer to me.”
The deer took off.
That’s when Doug
knew.
Taylor Pryor was
well known for her spunk and enthusiasm, her love for God, and her compassion
for the downtrodden. As a student at Canadian Mennonite University in Winnipeg,
she was in her element—encouraging the other girls and leading a Bible study.
Video footage from a 2017 Missions trip to Guatemala reveals a vivacious young
woman ready to take on the world. More than anything, she desired to make a
difference in the lives of those God placed in her path.
Ending her first
year at university with a round of written exams, Taylor flew immediately to
Ontario to work in an asparagus-packing plant. Already exhausted, the
isolation, long hours, and “no music” rule quickly took their toll on this
extroverted young woman. When anxiety and suicidal thoughts began to surface,
she returned to Manitoba and worked the rest of the summer as a camp counselor—for
which she was far better suited. She returned to school in the fall.
During a college
soccer game in October of 2018, Taylor collided mid-air with another player
when both jumped for the ball. In the weeks that followed, she began to exhibit
physical symptoms such as blurred vision, hearing problems, and an inability to
stay focused or sleep. She saw a concussion specialist at a sports clinic where
she received physiotherapy for her eyes.
Gradually,
personality changes became apparent to her family and even more so to her
friends in residence. She displayed anger and anxiety they hadn’t seen in
Taylor before. She used language she would not typically use. She began to push
her parents away, insisting that she could deal with it on her own.
“We let her do
that for a while,” her mother Darseen said. “But it was really hard.”
“She distanced
herself out of shame. She was embarrassed about where she was at,” Doug added.
Taylor pushed
through that first term and came home for Christmas break, but her parents were
beginning to see an entirely different person than the girl they knew. Back at
school, things began to snowball. In February, she made her first suicide
attempt. By March, Taylor had been in and out of hospitals numerous times. Her
parents decided to find her an emotional support dog. Leaving the hospital on
the day she was given a pass to go pick out her puppy, Taylor admitted to her
roommate that she had no idea how to pick out a dog.
“Just sit back and
wait. Your dog will pick you,” was the advice she received.
 |
Taylor with her "baby"
|
So she did. Sure
enough, as Taylor watched the little fur balls wrestle and play, one dog broke
away from its siblings and waddled straight to Taylor, later falling asleep in
Taylor’s lap. Although the dog’s name is officially Everly, Taylor’s main name
for her was always, “My Baby.”
While the dog
helped, the chaos escalated. It seemed the vigilance required simply to keep
Taylor alive was becoming a full-time job. When Taylor was asked to leave the
dorm because of all the disruptions, her parents began to look for an
apartment. Finding a suitable one seemed impossible. They needed a place on
ground level, near Taylor’s school, that accepted pets, and that was nice
(putting someone struggling with anxiety in a run-down space is not helpful).
With that sort of laundry list, the odds seemed impossible. But when a friend
of a friend told them there was one available apartment in her building and
they went to check it out, Doug and Darseen were able to check off all their
boxes. In mid-April, they’d secured the apartment and Darseen moved into it
with Taylor. As a bonus, their building was surrounded with lovely biking
trails, one of which led to Taylor’s school in a ten-minute ride. It definitely
felt like an answer to prayer.
To be continued
next week.
