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As a child, Jordyn Grabenhorst accompanied her little brother to his occupational therapy sessions; now she’s pursuing a career in pediatric occupational therapy.

In 2024, Jordyn Grabenhorst enrolled in the first cohort of occupational therapy doctorate students at Â鶹´«Ã½ Fox. But her interest in occupational therapy began long before that – when she was just 8 years old. 

At the time, her 6-year-old brother had childhood epilepsy and suffered from poor motor function. To develop his fine motor skills, he attended occupational therapy. 

“I would go with my mom and my brother to his occupational therapy appointments because I was still pretty young,” Jordyn says. “As a result, I got to see a lot of OT work in action as a kid, and I always thought it looked super fun and interesting. I was only 8, but after that, OT was always in the back of my mind.”

As the years passed, Jordyn’s interest in occupational therapy began to grow.

“When I got older, I did some job shadowing and began to see behind the scenes of OT work,” she says. “That's when I knew I wanted to do OT.”

For Jordyn, occupational therapy isn’t just a career choice; it’s a way to pay forward the care and kindness her brother received all those years ago.

“I’m passionate about OT because I've been able to see it firsthand through my brother,” Jordyn says. “I’ve seen the impact it’s made for him and how much it’s helped him. I want to help others in the same way that he was helped.”  

Jordyn chose to study OT at Â鶹´«Ã½ Fox because it’s relatively close to her home in Toutle, Washington, and because the campus and community had the tight-knit quality she was looking for. 

“I liked the idea of a small campus and a small cohort,” she says. “I’m from a small town, so I really like that kind of feeling.”

However, Jordyn is most impressed with how dedicated her professors are to the OT program and its success.  

“The professors just seem so much more invested because they have invested so much into the program,” Jordyn says. “You can feel how much they care.”

The OT faculty are committed to educating and cultivating occupational therapists that care about the very personhood of the people they serve. Everything about a patient matters, not just their diagnosis or disability. 

“Knowing a patient’s background and environment is important because those things have a role in what their intervention or treatment process will look like,” Jordyn says. “They are so much more than their medical diagnosis, and it’s important to treat your patients holistically.”

Jordyn has always loved helping people, and occupational therapy is just another way to help those in need. The feeling she gets when she helps others is one she carries close to her heart.

“It’s very similar to that feeling you get when you give somebody a gift,” she says. “It’s that feeling of enjoyment and excitement you get when they open it.” 

Jordyn recalls a particularly formative moment where she got to help someone in need while shadowing a hand therapist. One day a couple came into the practice she was volunteering at with a set of tiny, prematurely born twin babies.

“The boy was fine, but the girl’s thumbs were stuck in a bent position, which we call trigger finger,” she says. “Her parents didn’t want to do surgery, so they brought her to us. We actually made baby splints for her thumbs, and it was one of the coolest things ever.”

Occupational therapy helped change that little girl’s life, just like it helped change Jordyn’s brother’s life. OT isn’t just about fixing what’s broken; it’s about opening the door to new possibilities.

“I’m excited to start doing more hands-on learning, and to learn how to apply my book knowledge in a clinical setting,” Jordyn says. “I think we’re all just really excited to be here in this grad program.”