West Jessamine junior dies from MRSA (w/story)

Ryan Robinson, a junior at West, succumbed to MRSA this morning after falling ill late Thursday night. Here’s the final draft of the story I did for this week’s Journal:

Patti Brown knew her son was well-liked among his peers at West Jessamine High School, but to see how many people surrounded his hospital bed during his final days nearly took her breath away.

“I was overwhelmed by the support,” she said Tuesday afternoon, just a couple of hours after her son, Ryan Robinson, 17, passed away from complications from MRSA. “It made me more proud of him than I already was that he was so well-respected and liked. He was good-hearted and kind to everyone.”

The junior at West Jessamine went to soccer practice Thursday night feeling fine, but that night he woke up sick. Brown took him to see the doctor Friday, where he was diagnosed with the flu.

“They told us what we needed to do,” Brown said. “We got him excused from school through Monday, but we went home, and through the night it got worse. So Saturday at lunch I took him to the emergency room at Saint Joseph Jessamine.”

The doctors there said that Ryan was dehydrated from the vomiting. They took an X-ray on his lungs, which showed that Ryan had contracted pneumonia, so they transferred him to the University of Kentucky Hospital. From there, he started declining rapidly and was put on life support.

Sunday, the doctors at UK confirmed that it was MRSA, which stands for Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcal aureus, a form of common bacterium that exists on the body and has developed resistance to certain antibiotics.

By Monday, he had gone septic, which usually means the bacteria has gotten into the patient’s blood stream.

“They said the flu had weakened him to the point where it allowed the pneumonia to take over,” Brown said. “It had done too much damage.”

Ryan passed away Tuesday morning.

Ryan, who was a starting forward for the high school team and a member of the ‘92 Jessamine Storm and the Kentucky Olympic Development Program team, had always loved soccer and had planned to use it to get to college after he graduated.

“Everyone who knew him knew he had a passion for soccer,” Brown said. “He had recently been speaking with college coaches about his opportunities when he graduated. He was happy to know that he was going on to play.”

“He was a great soccer player,” best friend and West teammate Jake Hedrick said. “Soccer was his life. That’s about all we did — chilled with each other and played soccer.”

Adrian Parrish, who coached Ryan’s ODP soccer team for the past two years, said Ryan’s love for the sport drove him in all areas of his life — even in his illness.

“I had the opportunity to speak to his mom Monday before Ryan passed away, and she was still saying how he was hoping that he would be fit and ready to go because we’ve got a session Sunday to Sunday, and hopefully for a trip that we’ve got coming up to Alabama in a couple of weeks,” Parrish said. “Even all the way up to the last minute, soccer was the first thing in his mind. He will certainly be sadly missed by myself and the members of our ODP team.”

“He was obviously a great kid,” West Coach Nate Andrews said. “Being around the situation now, I’m learning that he was more impactful on a lot of people than I even thought — an all-around great kid. We’re not going to forget Ryan.”

The kid who loved rock bands Modest Mouse and The Strokes left behind a group of pals that wanted to do something to honor their friend.

“Some of us are going to get tattoos of RTR — Ryan Thomas Robinson — somewhere on our bodies,” Hedrick said. “I’m getting mine on my hand so that’s the first thing people see when they meet me because I always want people to know about him.”

“He was a big-hearted, happy boy that enjoyed life and soccer and school — he really loved school,” Brown said. “He had a lot of friends. There were a lot of kids at the hospital. It made me proud to know that he surrounded himself with really good people.

“It made me a stronger person.”

There will be a gathering for family and friends Friday from 1 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Clark Legacy Center in Brannon Crossing, and the funeral will be held at 11 a.m. Saturday at Southland Christian Church. The burial will follow at Lexington Cemetery.

Friends and family have also set up the Ryan Robinson Memorial Fund to help the family pay for medical bills and funeral costs. Brown asked that in lieu of flowers, donations be made to the fund at Town Square Bank. Students will also be able to donate at East and West Jessamine High Schools.

So soon after Ralph Sallee passed away — I hate that a community like this one has to see two of its friends die so closely together. I could tell from my conversation with Ryan’s mother, though, that living in such a tight-knit community goes such a long way toward the grieving process. These are the kinds of days you go your whole life hoping that you don’t have to deal with.

Please keep Patti and the rest of Ryan’s friends and family in your prayers.