Body
Lorie Cashdollar, 24, was a serious runner who had set records at Chicago’s DePaul University in women’s track events including the 600-meter dash and the 4x400-meter relay. She was majoring in psychology and looking for ways to help athletes recover both mentally and physically from major injuries. “I know personally how difficult it is to get to a high level and then when you get injured, it can impact your life and family. A brain injury could potentially ruin your life,” Cashdollar says. “There has to be a way to do the thing you love and for it not to have a lifelong negative effect on your health.”
While in college, she considered becoming a trainer or physical therapist but decided she didn’t want to treat or diagnose other people. What really interested her was behind-the-scenes research. Clinical psychology was also an option but she discovered the field was hyper-competitive. Thinking through her options, Cashdollar decided to include some science classes in her schedule and add a concentration in cognitive neuroscience, which combines the social and scientific parts of helping people recover. “You can know as much chemistry as you want but if you don’t understand the person at the core, that’s a big missing piece.” She also decided that rehabilitation research “was a good way to impact future generations of athletes. I don’t want to treat anybody but I still want to help them.”
After graduating from DePaul in 2022, Cashdollar enrolled in a master’s degree program in public health at the University of San Francisco, where she continued to run track. But then she tore the plantar fascia in one of her feet, which put an end to that. The program also wasn’t giving her as many research opportunities as she had hoped, so in the summer of 2023, when she learned her mother’s cancer had come back, Cashdollar left the program and returned to Minooka, Illinois. Her father was working full-time in construction and her only sibling, a sister, lived in Colorado. “It made the most sense for me to be the person who stepped up,” she says.
Cashdollar started looking for a hybrid job that would allow her the flexibility to care for her mother while working. She began working as a research assistant at the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab’s Center for Rehabilitation Outcomes Research (CROR) in February 2024. Sadly, her mother died only two months later, in April. “I’m glad she got to see the beginning of my career,” Cashdollar says. She is still dealing with loss and grief but says she couldn’t imagine working in a more supportive environment. “Everyone is very welcoming, from my boss to my colleagues to the physicians and nurses. You see the mission of the place in how people carry themselves. Everyone is working to help people.”
In a few years, Cashdollar plans to pursue a PhD in behavioral neuroscience but in the meantime, she loves the variety of working on four different CROR projects ranging from spinal cord injuries to wellness programs. Outside of work, she is back to running and currently training for a marathon. She didn’t win a spot in the lottery for the 2024 New York City Marathon, so Cashdollar is running local races around the Chicago area. She also moved to Chicago to be closer to work and social activities like amateur sports leagues and the Chicago Bears. “I’m excited to be back to living in a place that feels the most like home to me,” she says.