At just 24 years old, Ryan Sirek spends four months in the hospital with COVID

The following story was written by Robin Huebner (Fargo), March 19, 2021. Ryan and Chelsey Sirek are from Euclid, MN, but are currently staying with Chelsey’s family while Ryan continues to recover. Chelsey (Peters) Sirek is an alumna of Grygla High School. 

The last time Ryan Sirek slept in his own bed, Thanksgiving 2020 hadn’t yet happened. Christmas and New Year’s were a ways down the road.

Just after St. Patrick’s Day 2021, he still isn’t home but is out of the hospital, at least.

Sirek, 24, was discharged from inpatient rehabilitation this week and is recuperating at his in-laws’ home after four months of battling COVID-19 and its aftermath.

“It was awesome,” he said, after finally being able to break free.

For nine weeks, Sirek was on a ventilator. He also had a tracheostomy, a procedure where an incision is made in the windpipe.

Doctors at Sanford Broadway Clinic in downtown Fargo said he was the youngest COVID-19 patient they’ve had who required that kind of serious intervention.

His journey brought him through four different facilities to receive various levels of care.

Besides being overweight, Ryan said he has no underlying medical conditions. Obesity, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and prevention, is one of the known risk factors for serious illness from COVID-19.

Before getting sick, Ryan said he was a “disbeliever” in the virus.

“I didn’t think I was ever gonna get it, but it just takes one screw-up or one problem,” he said.

His wife, Chelsey, 23, who was also sick with the virus, couldn’t visit him for almost a month while he was on the so-called COVID floor. 

“Every day, I was scared to get that phone call,” she said.

Virus strikes, despite precautions

The saga for this couple from Euclid, Minn., began late last fall.

Chelsey, an elementary education major at University of Minnesota-Crookston, said she made sure the two were taking precautions against the virus by constantly sanitizing and making sure they wore masks.

Ryan had lined up a seasonal job at American Crystal Sugar, to start in mid-November.

On Halloween, Ryan wanted to test out a new grill he’d bought, so they invited two friends over, one of whom would later test positive for COVID-19.

Chelsey got sick first with a dry cough, followed by terrible body aches.

“I don’t have arthritis ... but it felt like someone was stabbing my knees and my ankles,” she said.

What she described as “hardcore” shortness of breath soon followed.

Ryan didn’t feel well, either, but his wife ended up in the hospital first, on day 10 of her illness, just in time to receive monoclonal antibody and convalescent plasma treatments.

He joined her at Sanford in Thief River Falls soon after, when his oxygen saturation level taken at home was only 62%.

Ryan lasted just one night there.

The same day Chelsey was released from the hospital, her husband was sedated, put on a ventilator and flown to Sanford in Fargo.

Progress comes in ‘tiny steps’

On day 11 at Sanford Broadway, Chelsey was told Ryan was not getting better. Doctors suggested sending him to Minneapolis for more invasive treatment.

“I didn’t really know what to do. … You don’t want your husband to die,” she said.

She asked family and friends for prayers, and the next day, she said, a miracle came in the form of improved blood work and reduced inflammation.

“After that, it was just very, very slow progress. Just tiny steps,” she said.

Ryan was moved to the regular intensive care unit, but then things took a turn for the worse when his left lung collapsed.

Instead of risking him fighting the ventilator, he was sedated again, a day before the couple’s second wedding anniversary on Dec. 15.

The next time he woke up, nothing looked familiar.

“I was like, ‘This doesn’t look like the same room I fell asleep in,’” Ryan said.

He was surprised to learn a new year had come and gone, and it was already January.

Chelsey had to fill her husband in gradually about everything that had happened.

“They didn’t want to freak me out when I couldn’t talk,” he said.

It was a difficult stretch in the hospital, a time Chelsey saw multiple families with a loved one losing the battle against COVID-19.

“The only thing you can do is just go back to your person and hold their hand and pray that there’s a good outcome,” she said.

‘Lucky to be here’

In mid-January, Ryan was moved to Vibra Hospital on the seventh floor of Sanford Medical Center along I-94.

There, medical staff were able to wean him from the ventilator and remove his trach.

In early February, he was transferred to the fourth stop on his COVID-19 journey — Altru in Grand Forks for inpatient rehabilitation.

It would be a full month of intensive physical and occupational therapy before he was released this week.

“What we’re really working on now is getting Ryan’s strength back to be able to walk … so he can have his life back again,” his wife said.

Chelsey put off her graduation for at least a year to help Ryan get better.

He’s had a change of heart about the virus and advises people to wear masks out in public for the safety of others.

He wants friends his age to know that the coronavirus and COVID-19 are real.

“You can get it, and something bad can happen. I’m lucky to be here today. Very lucky,” he said.

A GoFundMe account has been set up to help the couple with ongoing medical expenses. It can be found at www.gofundme.com, searching “Ryan Sirek-Fight Against COVID-19.” As of Sunday, March 21st, $5,000 had been raised with an initial goal of $5,500.