Fayetteville High School senior Kat Holley always keeps a bag of snacks nearby, especially in the dugout during softball games or on the sideline during basketball games.

Don’t expect Holley, however, to pull out her favorite chocolate bar or trail mix.

“It’s stuff no one else wants,” she said. “Who wants to eat only pickles and soy sauce packets? It’s disgusting and I hate it, but it helps me.”

Holley battles a form dysautonomia, a largely unknown nervous system disorder that disrupts autonomic body processes. In Holley’s case, she has a form of dysautonomia called vasovagal syncope, which causes rapid and unexpected drops in blood pressure. The quick change in blood pressure leads to reduced blood flow to the brain, causing Kat to briefly lose consciousness.

The condition hasn’t slowed her down, however. Holley learned this spring that she’s Fayetteville’s valedictorian, and she scored 30 on the ACT. She joined the varsity basketball and softball teams as a seventh grader, earned All-County honors in both sports, and spent a season on the volleyball team. She’s been extremely active in community service projects through various campus organizations.

Holley is also one of 52 regional winners in the Bryant-Jordan Scholarship Program’s Scholar-Athlete category – selected in class 2A, Region 4. A total of 102 high school senior student-athletes – 52 in the Bryant-Jordan Scholar-Athlete Program and 52 in the Bryant-Jordan Student Achievement Program – have advanced from area nominations. All will be recognized at the 37th annual Bryant-Jordan Awards Banquet to be held tonight at the Sheraton Birmingham Hotel.

Each regional recipient will receive a $3,000 scholarship. From the regional recipients, the Bryant-Jordan Selection Committee selects class winners and the overall recipients of the Larry D. Striplin, Jr., Scholar-Athlete state award and the Ken & Betty Joy Blankenship Achievement state award. The class award recipients will receive an additional $3,500 scholarship, and the two individuals named the state award recipients each receive an additional $4,000 scholarship as the overall state winners. More than $12 million in scholarship funds has been distributed to student recipients by the Bryant-Jordan Scholarship Program since its inception in 1988.

“On most days, you’d never know she even has a disease,” Fayetteville Principal Lynn Ritchie said. “You never know there’s a hardship. She’s just very quiet and respectful about it. There are times medically that she must have time off or have a doctor’s appointment, but she perseveres like no one else I know. She is going to do her best to be at that game, be at that activity, take that test, whatever is on her agenda. That’s what I think is great about Kat. She works hard and perseveres.”

Dealing with dysautonomia

Kat remembers suffering her first mysterious fainting spell in a local pharmacy parking lot a few weeks before starting the seventh grade. At first, she worried the condition would force her to give up sports altogether. Since then, she’s developed strategies for dealing with her condition and staving off what she calls “spells.” Because most people have never heard of dysautonomia, Holley and her family had to educate teachers and coaches about her condition and how to manage it. That’s why she always has her snack bag and a bottle of water with her.

Prescription medication helps, but doctors also mandated that Kat consume large amounts of sodium and water every day. Sodium helps the body retain fluid, and elevated fluid levels increase blood volume, which in turn increases blood pressure.

When she feels an attack coming on, she’s learned to quickly consume something salty and drink water. That led to drinking soy sauce and pickle juice as quick pick-me-ups. She eats a lot of deli meat, because it often contains elevated sodium levels, and now takes 1,000-milligram salt tablets to supplement her diet. Her snack chip of choice is Cool Ranch Doritos. “Those are really salty,” she said.

Each vasovagal syncope patient responds to specific triggers. In Kat’s case, her triggers include stress, anxiety, heat and physical exertion, all of which athletes face in virtually every practice and game. The stress surrounding Kat’s senior year of high school, including picking a college destination, amplified her triggers and made them harder to control.

Beyond the physical symptoms, she said she faced psychological battles brought on by her condition. Like most athletes, she didn’t want special treatment from coaches, even as she learned over time that there are some activities she simply can’t do.

For instance, she found burpees and squats could cause a case of lightheadedness. That meant those training exercises had to be curtailed or eliminated. “I haven’t done a burpee in years,” she said.

And there’s no way to know when she’ll feel a spell coming on, a byproduct of a condition that causes unexpected dips in blood pressure.

“I don’t want people to think I’m trying to get out of something or I’m making an excuse,” she said. “That’s probably honestly the biggest challenge for me.”

In addition, dysautonomia is rare, which caused more mental strain as coaches worried about her health until she learned the best way to explain her symptoms and convince them that she could be trusted to ask for a break when necessary.

“I think because people don’t understand it, they are scared of it,” said Leigh Holley, Kat’s mom and a teacher at Fayetteville who is a former softball coach. “When you’re talking about a coach who is trying to make sure a kid is safe and it’s something you don’t understand, it’s like, ‘Do I trust them? Do I not trust them?’ It’s been a really great avenue for her to learn how to be an advocate for herself in a lot of different ways, and that’s rolled over into all aspects of life.”

Leigh added, “She does a really good job of talking to adults. She does a better job of talking to adults than I do most of the time, and I think a lot of that has come from having to be an advocate for herself and explain things.”

Kat has spent the past six years figuring out the best way to manage her condition – often through trial-and-error – and that’s forced her to mature and develop self-awareness. This spring, she sat out a softball game after passing out while job-shadowing at the local hospital. She said playing in the game would hurt the team more than playing.

“She’s gotten really good at picking up signs that something is off,” Leigh Holley said.

What’s next?

Kat is slated to attend the University of Alabama, with plans to earn a degree in nursing and eventually a graduate degree to become a physician’s assistant. She’s already earned more than 20 college credits through dual enrollment and said job-shadowing at the local hospital this spring helped inspire her to pursue a medical career.

“I like helping people and seeing them live a fuller life,” she said. “I think that makes me happy because of my condition.”

Those who know Kat best see a bright future ahead for her.

“She does not have a bone in her body that will let her halfway do something. She doesn’t know how,” her mom said. “She’s the world’s worst liar. She cannot lie to you, and she cannot let herself cut corners. I think you pair all of those things together, and I think she ends up being successful in whatever she ends up doing.”

Added Principal Ritchie: “I think she’s an amazing, young woman and will go to college and do great things. Most importantly, she’s going to help the world we’re all living in and make it a better place.”