Reiner and her husband, Jim, had settled into a nice neighborhood in her hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. Two of their three children were in elementary school, and a toddler was at home. They had a daily system in place. She worked evenings as a charge nurse so she could spend daytime with the children and see the two older ones home from school until Jim arrived and took over parenting duties for the night.

 

Having endured three pregnancies to term without a blip, she was excited to add a fourth child to the Reiner clan.

 

But in the fourth month of her fourth pregnancy, Reiner was walking down the basement stairs when the fibula and tibia bones snapped in one leg, sending her tumbling to the bottom. Fortunately, the fetus was unharmed, yet the freak accident put Reiner in a wheelchair and on crutches. 

 

Unfazed, Reiner continued to work full-time, with the help of her dad shuttling her to and from work daily. Then one afternoon, she was in a wheelchair at home with the 18-month-old on her lap, trying to finish folding a load of laundry before getting ready for work. Without warning, she was blind. Remaining calm, she dialed her obstetrician, who directed a rescue squad to take Reiner and the baby to the hospital, where her husband met them.

 

"They thought I had a bleeder in the brain, which statistics show usually happens with pregnant women, but it turned out I'd had a spasm of an artery that fed the optic nerve in the brain," recalled Reiner, who also endured unusual skin problems during the pregnancy. "I'd lost my central vision and it was a week before I got my eyesight back."

 

Despite the many obstacles, Reiner continued working full-time and her fourth child was born healthy.

 

However, an obstacle remained. Reiner's leg had not yet healed.

 

"My background is a surgical nurse," explained Reiner. "The personality of a surgical nurse differs from the personality of medical nurse, just like doctors' personalities differ, according to their specialty. When you work on the surgical side, your frame of reference is six weeks from surgery to being back on your feet."

 

That's why Reiner was so surprised to learn her leg would require 18 months of healing.

 

"I thought that can't be right," recalled Reiner. "But it was. You learn a lot of patience, and to tap into those people who want to support you, even though you want to remain independent. It's very humbling when you find out you need help and you need to ask for help to get through day by day."

 

Reiner also admitted that "you learn a lot about yourself when you're really faced with adversity."

 

"It gives you a whole different perspective about life," she said. "The quote, 'don't sweat the small stuff,' is very applicable. Over the years, I've found that since that pregnancy, stuff that used to get under my skin doesn't bother me whatsoever anymore."

  

Reiner initially considered being a career woman when she was a child, helping her mom, a schoolteacher, with ironing duties-mainly all-cotton shirts and pants for her dad, who worked for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, and two younger brothers.

 

"Back in those days, being the oldest child and only girl meant I had to do a lot of ironing as one of my chores," said Reiner, adding after a pause, "To this day, I hate ironing."

 

Reiner learned early on to trust her instincts. In high school, she had a choice of running for president of her class or the school's athletic association. Teachers urged her to run for the class post, but she wanted to participate in athletic leadership, so she pursued that post and won.

 

"I was very active in sports, playing volleyball, baseball, softball, and then track and field into college," said Reiner, who also followed her love of dancing.

 

When she participates in icebreaker games that require telling three things about one's self that are true and one that isn't, she pulls the ballerina card.

 

"It always throws people," she said. "I think it's so uncommon for an athlete to also be a ballerina that people think it couldn't possibly be true."

 

When Reiner was old enough to understand, her parents shared important information. They had adopted her at six weeks of age through a New York agency. Even though New York State maintains its policy of permanently sealing adoption records, Reiner learned that her father was a professional football player and her mother was a ballerina.
"My mother didn't push me in one direction or another and she always found it very interesting that sports and ballet were my loves," she recalled. "After my mother passed away, I contacted an agency in New York and learned that all you can really do to find your birth parents is to hire a private investigator. But with no name, it was such a challenge that I said forget it."

 

When she was a 19-year-old college student, Reiner took a part-time job as a clerical worker in a doctor's office. "I didn't necessarily like the clerical part, but as I came in contact with patients and the whole medical field, I realized I enjoyed helping people when they were sick," she said. "Nursing really interested me."

 

Reiner obtained a master's degree in nursing from Kent State University, and began working in nursing posts and advanced to leadership positions in the Cleveland area. Now her children—Michael, Katie, Colleen and Kevin; none are in the medical profession—are leading their own lives while the Reiners are wading through a garage full of boxes in their new Central Florida home. Reiner took the post of vice president and chief nursing officer of Florida Hospital Waterman in February.