Cailin Joyce is pictured performing with the Ohio State Club Dance Team. Credit: Courtesy of Vicky Strom
Cailin Joyce showed up to dance practice the same way she showed up to life — with her whole heart.
Whether it was dancing alongside her teammates, setting an example during practice or watching them dance from a Zoom call in her hospital bed, teammates, Maysen Ernst and Vicky Strom, said Joyce had a way of making everyone around her feel seen, supported and energized.
On Dec. 4, Joyce, a second-year in interior design and member of the Ohio State Club Dance Team, died after months of fighting a rare blood disorder that stemmed from Epstein-Barr virus, according to a GoFundMe created to support her and her family.
“She connected with everyone so deeply on a level that not most people do,” said Ernst, a dance teammate, close friend of Joyce and a second-year in health and rehabilitation science. “She cared so much about her relationships with people. I think that’s why people felt her so deeply. She really wanted to get to know everyone and who they were.”
The Epstein-Barr virus is a common viral infection that spreads through saliva and body fluids and, while most cases result in little to no symptoms, it can lead to infectious mononucleosis in adolescents and young adults, according to the Cleveland Clinic.
According to the GoFundMe, Joyce’s treatment compromised her immune system and caused severe inflammation, ultimately leading to complications that her body could not overcome.
Strom, another teammate, friend of Joyce and a third-year in aviation engineering, said Joyce was also known for her sense of humor and unapologetic need to be herself, regardless of who was watching. Always showing up to practice with a new joke, Joyce completed the team with her comedy bits.
“Right before we went to Nationals, we were all studying in the library, and she would be dancing full out, doing lifts and sliding on the ground in the library, just because she wouldn’t care,” Strom said.
Whether it was talking about Labubus, “John Pork,” Chicken Jockey or most notably, Grimace, a purple McDonald’s character, Strom said Joyce was always trying to get a laugh from her teammates and it always worked.
Beyond her jokes, Joyce left a lasting impression through her passion and talent for dance.
Strom said Joyce excelled in every style and was considered one of the strongest dancers on the team. During tryouts, the coaches made a statement along the lines of “if we get 10 Cailin’s auditioning, we will take all 10 of them, because we know that they’ll be insane.”
Ernst echoed Joyce’s commitment and said before the team’s national competition in Spring of 2025, coaches once asked everyone to sit down and watch her perform alone.
“I feel like [that experience] pushed us to be better, not even just dancing, but in everything we did,” Ernst said. “She was just always giving her all, and that was so special for all of us, and it was definitely emotional too, but I think that just changed our perspective on a lot of things.”
Even as Joyce’s health declined in the fall semester, her dedication to the team never wavered.
While hospitalized, Strom said Joyce attended practices over Zoom and did motions from her hospital room whenever she could.
Ernst said Joyce remained present in any way possible, even when she could no longer physically participate.
“I think she was just such a light,” Ernst said. “In everything she did, she was so positive, she just loved life so much. Everything she did was 100 percent because, for her, 90 percent was not enough.”
Strom said the dance team will continue to let Cailin’s bright light shine on the dancefloor as they honor her with a framed photo of her kept at the center of the practice room, a place they say she will always belong. In addition, this season’s hip-hop routine was choreographed in her honor, incorporating solos she performed last year and features a “C” on the team’s costume design.
“She was always front and center,” Strom said. “So she will be front and center forever.”
