ExCU kicker Hnida has lifethreatening reaction

Katie Hnida, who made U.S. history as the first woman to play and score in Division IA college football, has suffered a lifethreatening reaction to antibiotics, her family says.

Hnida, an athlete turned advocate for survivors of sexual assault, became ill in September after taking an antibiotic often prescribed for a common illness, her father, Dave Hnida, said. He said Thursday in a phone interview that Hnida had an adverse reaction that caused her kidneys and liver to start shutting down and her bone marrow to stop functioning properly.

After weeks of treatment, including emergency dialysis, Hnida is stable and expected to recover, though her father called her prognosis “cautious.”

Hnida’s father did not explain why his 37yearold daughter was prescribed the antibiotics in September, but said that within days she had become seriously ill.

Hnida said his daughter was taken to a hospital, where doctors learned that she had “almost no platelets,” meaning her blood would not clot. Hnida was admitted into the intensive care unit, where she underwent treatment.

He said that Hnida was in the hospital for weeks. His daughter, who attended Chatfield High School, is now making a “very slow recovery” at her family home in the Denver area, Hnida said.

Hnida gained national attention almost two decades ago when she joined the Uni versity of Colorado’s football team as a placekicker and then, in the early 2000s, transferred to the University of New Mexico Lobos, where she became the first woman to play and score in an NCAA Division IA game. In 2003, she kicked two extra points in a game against Texas State University, according to her website.

But in 2004 Hnida made headlines for a different reason. The college football player came forward with sexual assault allegations against a former teammate at the University of Colorado — during a time when the team was embroiled in controversy over accusations that it had used alcohol and sex to impress recruits. Hnida told Sports Illustrated that she was a virgin when a teammate raped her in 2000.

A decade later — around the same time as Rolling Stone’s debunked story of a gang rape at the University of Virginia but before the #MeToo movement — Hnida told The Washington Post that people were still calling her a liar.

“Sometimes I wish they could be there when I get so nauseous and sick that I’m throwing up and nights I can’t sleep and when I got into a depressive funk. Those times are rare now — it does get better, I want people to know that — but they are still around because it never truly goes away. It changes you,” she said in 2014.

According to a GoFundMe page set up for Hnida’s family, Hnida will be unable to work for four to six months while she completes rehabilitation. The page has raised more than $11,000.