SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. — For Shannon Zisa, the choices are only getting harder to make.
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With the weight of a five-year legal battle finally off her shoulders, Zisa is now looking ahead to a future that she’ll have to navigate for herself, her husband, and the memory of her 17-month-old daughter, Adalyn.
Zisa’s life was first thrown into chaos in 2019 when an intoxicated Shona Wallace drove into the family as they biked down the sidewalk near their home. Adalyn was killed, and her husband, Dane, was permanently disabled.
He no longer remembers Shannon or his daughter.
“There’s about a 10-year gap prior to the crash that’s missing,” Zisa said. “The most unfortunate part of that… in that 10 years is when I met him.”
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Dane’s care costs $5,000 per month, which has been almost exclusively covered by donations from generous community members. The money, though, is almost depleted. Wallace wasn’t insured, and Dane and Shannon’s combined disability income is too much for them to qualify for Medicaid.
However, Dane doesn’t earn enough to cover his medical costs. Experts advised Shannon, who also serves as Dane’s legal guardian, that divorce is their only option, especially if Shannon wants to save the house they once occupied together.
“I will never be okay with the fact that I have to get divorced because it’s the only way for him to get the care he needs,” Shannon explained. “At the same time, I’m more I’m more than willing to accept that if that’s the only way that I can protect him, then that’s the best thing that I can do for him.”
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Shannon said the best thing for Dane is to move back south to his childhood friends, who he still remembers.
Shannon sees her new life as one of advocacy. She’s working to get multiple laws changed to ensure other families don’t have to bear pain similar to what she’s gone through.
She wants to see the amount of time toxicology reports cut down from six weeks and to allow routine drug testing for people out on bond if that’s a condition of their release. She was haunted by the fact that Wallace remained free during her trial, able to get behind the wheel again.
“For five years, she walked free to do whatever she wanted,” Shannon said. “Basically, as long as she didn’t light up a crack pipe in front of an officer, we had no way of proving whether or not she was adhering to the rules.”
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She also wants to change Medicaid so crime victims can more easily qualify, especially if the criminal wasn’t insured, and GoFundMe donations don’t count against them.
“The only money that we received was what our uninsured motorist coverage was, which was $50,000 total,” she explained. “That $50,000 paid for probably the first three hours we were in the trauma bay.”
Finally, she’s continuing her Acts for Adalyn nonprofit, which sends stuffed rabbits to families who lose toddlers and provides a network of support, including retreats. She said she’s already helped more than 200 families worldwide, some of whom have already begun their own nonprofits.
She spoke about a Texas family whose child drowned, and she met during a benefit.
“Her parents invited me to visit her grave to meet her,” Shannon recalled. That was one of the most humbling experiences of your life—to know that you mattered that much to somebody that they would take you on that journey with them.”
Finally, she advises people to protect themselves and their family members in case tragedy strikes by creating living wills, assigning powers of attorney, ensuring spouses have access to credit cards and bills, and discussing scenarios with their partners, from life to death and everything in between.
“Dane didn’t want to die,” she said. “So I honored what he had asked, but the problem is that we never discussed what would happen if he would be left the way that he is now. Dane was a proud man, he was a self-made man. I struggle to believe that he would want this life.”
Zisa’s GoFundMe is still actively collecting donations for anyone who wants to support Dane’s care. You can find it here.
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