Head-on collision strengthens educator’s faith

By Anne Marie Amacher
The Catholic Messenger

DAVENPORT — Driving to work on May 23, 2025, Madilyn Lemke was looking forward to the close of the 2024-25 school year. But her pleasant thoughts came to a sudden halt as she had a head-on vehicle collision.

“I remember everything,” said the director of student success at All Saints Catholic School. “I was blessed a bystander checked on me. After she asked me how I was, my first question was ‘is the other person okay?’” To her relief, the other driver was okay. Lemke then asked the woman to call her dad. “We tried 13 times,” Lemke said. Her dad finally picked up the phone and he came to the scene of the accident.

Lemke remembers right after the crash evaluating herself for injuries. “Can I wiggles my toes? Yes. Can I move my legs? Yes. I looked at my hand (which had several cuts) and thought that was the worst of it.” There were no other visible signs of bleeding that she could see and she did not hit her head.

When the fire department arrived and needed to use the Jaws of Life — a hydraulic tool that pulls a vehicle apart so that first responders can extract a trapped person — she knew something was wrong. With her adrenaline pumping from the accident, Lemke did not realize she had broken her femur. She was helicoptered from the accident scene to University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City.

“I remember being wheeled into the trauma room. There were people moving around and poking me. I asked if someone could pull my hair out of my face. A nurse braided my hair. That moment meant a lot to me, and my dad too,” Lemke said.

She was sent off to surgery where a titanium rod was inserted into her femur and several pins were placed in her leg and hip. She received 21 stitches in various parts of her body — including the hand wound she had seen in the car. She also tore her ACL and PCL ligaments.

That same day, after surgery, she took her first steps. “It was a blessing,” Lemke said.

She spent five days in the hospital and had a blood transfusion. “I was blessed with a best-case scenario of no head or spinal injuries,” she said. Memories of those five days in the hospital are not totally clear, because the painkillers did not agree with her. But lying in her bed or sitting up gave Lemke time to reflect. “The power of prayer — I know it worked for me,” she said. “I could feel it.” She knew her family, her second family at All Saints, fellow parishioners and friends were praying for her. “In my heart, even though my mind was unclear, people were praying for my recovery, safety and health.”

When she was released from the hospital, Lemke stopped her prescription medications and chose to take ibuprofen instead. “Things were so much clearer.”

The oldest of eight kids, Lemke said she often helped take care of her siblings. Now the roles were reversed when she went home. “They brought me food. They helped me. They took care of me.”

Students and families from All Saints stopped by her dad’s house to visit, bring meals for the whole family, gift baskets, books and word searches. “So many sweet things,” she said.

Over the past year, Lemke said “there has been so much love and a strong sense of community for me. It’s humbling.”

A member of Sacred Heart Cathedral in Davenport, she knows that God has taught her a lot about patience over the past year. “I have been working on this a lot,” she said.

When she was a college athlete at Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa, she played basketball and earned her bachelor’s degree in psychological sciences. “My body is not back to that college athlete status” but she continues to improve.

She went through physical therapy for seven months. Her physical therapist “took care of me. She cried with me. Laughed with me. She was like a friend and encouraging.”

Her leg was immobilized for six weeks after the accident to allow her ligaments to heal. First, she had an ACL brace. She started range of motion exercises. Then to a PCL brace used to guard her ligaments while they continued to heal.

She had instability in her knee at first. “It’s pretty strong now,” Lemke reflected.

And with that physical therapy, Lemke went from a wheelchair to a walker to crutches to walking on her own with a brace in three months. Now she is training for a half marathon in October. This July she also plans to run the Bix 7 road race. “It’s only seven miles,” she laughed.

Physical therapy and training for her half marathon “have brought me back to patience, time and discipline,” she said. “I’ve leaned on patience and prayer. I’ve learned so much about the human body and healing,” she said.

Part of that healing also involved therapy, she said. She had nightmares which involved remembering the whole accident. “I’m grieving my old body. But with the support I have I am proud of myself and getting there mentally.”

She is back to driving.

Since the accident, Lemke says she has never felt closer to God as now. “I am blessed  that I have my health, have healing and am able to still serve my students. God has a plan.”

Each morning she begins with prayer. “I hit a low point in my life (after the accident). The best thing I did was turn to my faith. God carried me through a lot of hard times.”

Since the close of the school year May 29 this year, Lemke is not sitting back. She leads a Bible study for students, will host a volleyball camp and continues to work at a camp for foster children — something she has done for years. “I think helping them started my passion to serve children.”

Lemke just finished the classroom work for her master’s degree online through Liberty University out of Lynchburg, Virginia. All she has left is her practicum this coming school year at All Saints. Then she will become a school counselor.

“I have grown so much in the past year.”