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INTRODUCING JAY AND ANNA SEDORY

October 11, 2014

In each issue of The First Aider, we profile and tell the story of an athletic trainer. For this issue, you’ll get to know two athletic trainers, Jay and Anna Sedory, whose lives changed forever when they met at an NATA conference!

MEET ANNA

Anna grew up in Corona, Ca., and graduated from Corona High in 1997. As a sophomore at Cal State Fullerton, she took an introduction to athletic training class, and loved it. “I was hooked!” she says. After graduating in 2001 with a degree in kinesiology, Anna went on to the Arizona School of Health Sciences, where she earned a master’s degree in sports health care in 2003.

After getting her master’s, Anna taught and worked as an assistant athletic trainer for one year at Whittier College in Whittier, Ca. From 2004-2006 she was at Chapman University as assistant head athletic trainer and ATEP professor. From there she was hired as head athletic trainer at American River College in Sacramento.

MEET JAY

Jay’s hometown is Tucson, Az. During high school, he played sports and got to know the school’s athletic trainer, Scott Linaker. Scott inspired Jay’s career choice. After graduating in 1999, Jay attended the University of Arizona for two years, then transferred to Southern Illinois University in Carbondale and graduated in 2003. While earning a master’s degree from the University of Virginia, Jay was a graduate assistant at Fork Union Military Academy—a secondary private school in Fork Union, Virginia.

After getting his master’s in 2005, Jay went to work as a head athletic trainer for the Department of Justice in Quantico, Va., working with the staff, students, and special agents of the Drug Enforcement Agency and the FBI. After working there for two years, he took a position with the United States Marine Corps, also in Quantico.

THEY MEET EACH OTHER

That summer of 2009, both Jay and Anna attended the NATA national convention in San Antonio. According to Anna, “It was the second year that the Young Professionals group met at the conference. I was asked to sit on a panel discussion for one of their meetings, and Jay was there, representing District 3.”

Jay adds, “We met and traded contact information. After the conference Anna sent me a networking email—something like, ‘Hey, nice to meet you. Look forward to talking with you some day.’ Although she still claims it was just an innocent networking email, I read between the lines and started calling her. We kept talking, and it worked out!”

Continuing the story, Anna says, “We dated cross country for two years, then in the summer of 2011 we decided I should move to Virginia. That October, he proposed on the top of Old Rag Mountain in Shenandoah National Park on the edge of West Virginia. It’s a popular hiking trail, and you can look down in the valley and see all these colors in the fall. It was beautiful and I had no idea he was going to propose! We got married Sept. 3, 2012.”

Upon moving to Virginia to be with Jay in 2011, Anna accepted a position with the Drug Enforcement Administration Training Academy. “It’s the same job Jay had before going to the Marine Corps,” Anna explains, “but it has changed somewhat since he left. Special agents go through a 4½-month program where they learn things like martial arts, firearms, boxing, wrestling, and other methods of self-defense. They also learn to break down doors and clear a room! My job is to keep them physically well so they can complete the program. It’s a challenge, because they wear 40-pound tactical vests and train for 12 hours a day.”

AN IMPRESSIVE PAIR

Anna and Jay are passionate about their careers and about contributing to the athletic training profession. Jay is a licensed EMT and volunteers for the county rescue squad. He is certified as a tactical medic and is an instructor for the Counter Terrorism and Operational Medicine Support program. He’s in his second year as president of the Virginia Athletic Trainer’s Association; serves on the BOC reinstatement committee; serves on the BOC Role of Delineation Study; and is an adjunct instructor at George Mason University.

Anna teaches at Germanna Community College, is the District 3 Chair/National Committee member for the NATA Governmental Affairs Committee; a member of NATA’s Most Distinguished Athletic Trainer committee; on the Virginia Athletic Trainer’s Association scholarship committee; and serves on the BOC’s Athletic Training Regulatory Conference Advisory Panel.

“We also enjoy going to state, district, and national conferences together,” Jay says. “We don’t have a ton of free time, but we’re fortunate that neither of us travels with our jobs. We like going to movies, backpacking and hiking, and occasionally running 5Ks and half marathons.”

“It’s been a wild ride,” Anna says. “Jay never wanted to date another athletic trainer, and I don’t know if it was super high on my list either. That NATA meeting when we met, I was just excited to see my friends. I had just bought a house in Sacramento, and thought I’d live there a long time. I never imagined I’d meet my future husband there!”