LAKE CITY — After a scary few days, family and friends of Lake City High School graduate and UW-Eau Claire wrestler Jon Harvey are asking everyone to keep the four-time state qualifier in thoughts and prayers.
Harvey — a 2022 graduate of Lake City — was having a stellar sophomore season for the Blugolds, winning a pair of tournament titles, including at Wheaton (Ill.) College on Jan. 27.
He was on the mat as recently as Feb. 3, placing seventh at the Don Parker Open, which UW-Eau Claire hosted. But the following Tuesday, Harvey fell ill.
He missed practice the following three days, before returning home to Lake City to recover. He seemed to make progress but early this past Sunday morning, he was struggling to breathe.
He was rushed to the Emergency Room at Mayo Clinic Hospital, Saint Marys Campus.
Initial tests showed he had Influenza A and severe pneumonia. Additional testing showed he had a staph infection as well. It was a battle for Harvey to maintain oxygen levels.
Harvey had respiratory rates of 35-50 and a heart rate of 135-150 for about 20 hours according to the
site set up by family members.
The normal respiratory rate for an adult male is 12-18, with the normal heart rate being 60-100.
The decision was made to sedate him in an effort to help him relax and reduce the trauma of breathing. Further testing on Monday showed he had staph infection throughout his body and organs. Thankfully, initial antibiotics have been able to treat it, but the infection had caused inflammation in his heart muscles and tissues. Tests showed his heart was functioning at 15-20%. As of Tuesday, those numbers had improved to 45%. Harvey's doctors said 55% is the goal.
The good news is it appears Harvey's body is healing.
According to the CaringBridge post he is still in sedated, but is brought out of it at least once a day. The Johnny Cash fan even has his favorite classic country music station on.
"The last few times he has been more relaxed, opening his eyes a little and nodding yes and no," the post read. "We believe he can hear us and does respond to some of our conversation by taking additional breaths.
"... It is a slow process to heal and build up enough strength to come out of sedation and remove the breathing tubes. We are doing a balancing act right now and looking for a little improvement each day."
That improvement has been buoyed by the amount of support the Harveys have received from a multitude of communities.
"We have been blessed with a lot of help during these past few days," the most recent post on read on Thursday morning, Feb. 15. "Thank you to the whole Eau Claire Blugold wrestling team and coach (Tim) Fader for taking care of arrangements at school. Thank you and gratitude for all the prayers and well wishes from all of you. It means a lot to us, and I know Jon would be humbly thankful as well. He does not like pomp and circumstance or spotlight, so this is all a lot. We just need you to know how he is doing as we know you are concerned. We really do not need any other resources other than to know you are with us in thoughts and prayers."
Many have reached out to ask how they can best help the Harveys. In addition to continued positive thoughts, the family has asked to give blood or plasma as it has been a major part of Jon's recovery — one that will be long but has made small gains in the past 36 hours. Now the hard part: They wait as Harvey's body battles the infections.
"As (Lake City) Coach (Doug) Vaith drilled into the kids, positive attitude and best effort," the post said. "Jon is certainly doing that now."
