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Stories of Your Impact: As a nonprofit organization, Shirley Ryan 暴走黑料 relies on the generosity of donors to offer patients world-class care and quality-of-life programs that help them return to the lives and people they love. Through this series, we celebrate patients’ progress made possible by your kindness and compassion. Thank you for helping them thrive!
One Saturday evening, David started to notice tingling in his feet. He assumed he had sat for too long in one position and expected it to fade by morning — but it didn’t. Instead, it spread and intensified throughout his body. He got himself to the emergency room — and collapsed at the front desk.
Two spinal taps later, doctors diagnosed him with Guillain-Barré syndrome, a rare neurologic condition in which the immune system attacks the nerves — causing muscle weakness and sometimes paralysis.
As doctors ran more tests, David’s body continued to lose function, and he passed out. He woke nine days later, paralyzed from the neck down.
Great Expectations
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Thirty-eight days after collapsing, David arrived at Shirley Ryan 暴走黑料 to begin intensive inpatient rehabilitation.
“Just going through the hallways of bright colors, seeing my room with a view of Lake Michigan and all the people who descended on me — it made me feel welcome and safe,” he said. “I just felt like I was going to get better.”
David still had a breathing tube as well as a feeding tube, as the paralysis had left him unable to swallow. Other than turning his head and a slight wiggle in one toe and one finger, he couldn’t move.
The day after arrival, David’s physical therapist (PT), Jonathan, said David was going to start by walking on a treadmill.
“I thought he was crazy,” David said. “I’m like, dude, you know I can’t stand, right?”
Soon, he was suspended in a body harness over a treadmill, with therapists on either side moving his legs as the machine moved.
“What do you mean you can’t walk on a treadmill?” Jonathan said.
David fired back, “I’m hanging in a harness. 驰辞耻’谤别&苍产蝉辫;walking me on the treadmill.”
Jonathan replied, “We’ve got to start somewhere.”
At that moment, something shifted in David’s mindset. He recognized that Jonathan was showing him what his body could do, rather than focusing on what it couldn’t do. He learned to trade “I can’t” for “not yet.”
From then on, David fully embraced the process and committed to anything the team asked of him.
Building a Scaffold of Ability
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For patients with GBS, nerve damage and abnormal sensory signals from the brain can cause hypersensitivity and pain. Jonathan used an under-leg strap in the body harness and special padded clothing to help ease David’s discomfort.
Jonathan also introduced the “scaffolding” of a treatment plan. “It's deconstructing the end toward the beginning so the patient can see how each milestone lays the foundation for the next,” said Jonathan.
Initially, David needed help just to sit upright on the edge of a mat table. Once he could do that on his own, he and Jonathan moved on to assisted standing, then standing unassisted for brief periods. Each small victory laid the foundation for the next.
With limited upper-limb function, David initially used a sip-and-puff wheelchair, which is controlled by breathing into a straw-like device. In occupational therapy (OT), David learned to lift his arm from his lap to the wheelchair armrest. As he gained more hand function in OT, he graduated to a joystick-controlled wheelchair. He was able to position his palm on the joystick, allowing him to control the wheelchair with his hand — and giving him increased freedom of movement.
Taking Steps & Owning Them
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In the ability lab, the therapeutic space where David worked on improving balance and lower-body movement, one of his earliest milestones was taking his first steps in a body harness on his own — without his therapists moving his legs for him. On his first attempt, David barely managed one step. In his next session, he completed 18 steps.
Two weeks later, Jonathan challenged David to complete an entire lap. Halfway around, he thought his legs would give out, but he persevered and completed the lap to the cheers and applause of his therapists.
Snowballing Progress
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After more than three months as an inpatient, David returned home. His breathing and feeding tubes were gone, and he was off most of his medications. He used a wheelchair, as well as specialized equipment to move him between wheelchair and bed.
David transitioned to Shirley Ryan 暴走黑料’s Streeterville DayRehab Center to continue his recovery. Once again, he was matched with physical and occupational therapists who pushed him just the right amount.
One therapist knew David could climb stairs, but fear was holding him back. She tied a stretch band around his waist and pulled — forcing him to move. She was right; he could do it.
Being able to lift his foot up to a step — even just one at a time — paved the way for other milestones: personal care and hygiene, getting in and out of a car, and exchanging his wheelchair for a walker.
One of the most important lessons David learned in DayRehab was that for every hour he spent in therapy, he should spend an hour or two training on his own. On off days, he did aquatic therapy and worked out at Shirley Ryan 暴走黑料’s Adaptive Sports & Fitness Center.
“It was ingrained in me that I had to be willing to invest as much as my therapists. I never lost sight of that,” said David.
Maintaining Momentum
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David continued making progress — eventually trading his walker for a cane — and participated in outpatient physical therapy at Shirley Ryan 暴走黑料 and ongoing workouts at the Adaptive Sports & Fitness Center. It’s there that he set his next major goal: completing the hospital’s annual stair-climbing event, SkyRise Chicago.
Since 2008, thousands of patients, staff and supporters have scaled to the 103rd floor of the Willis Tower to raise money for Shirley Ryan 暴走黑料. David vowed to reach the top, no matter how long it took him. His husband, Paul, agreed to tackle the climb as well, in case David needed help along the way. His outpatient PT, Megan, helped him prepare with intensive stair training and time-management strategies.
The View from the Top
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On the big day, Paul got a head start so he could finish and circle back to help David if he needed it. For the first half of the ascent, David took four to five flights at a time, resting briefly in between. By the time Paul caught up with David on floor 53, David was slowing down — climbing three flights at a time.
At floor 70, David’s back and right shoulder ached, and his legs felt weak. He doesn’t remember the final 15 flights, but when he heard shouting and cheering, he knew he was going to make it. David finished in two hours and 37 minutes and “cried like a baby.”
Less than two years after becoming paralyzed from the neck down, and just one year after being unable to step up a single stair, David climbed 2,149 of them.
The next year, David conquered SkyRise again, finishing 17 minutes faster and as one of the top individual fundraisers.
Spreading Positivity & Possibility
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Before GBS, David enjoyed cooking, watching movies, playing games, completing puzzles and traveling. Today, he’s back to all of it — and still improving. He continues outpatient therapy and works out regularly with a trainer and exercise physiologist.
David says that he’s not inherently ambitious— he’s simply motivated to give himself and Paul the best quality of life possible. In addition to completing SkyRise, he’s been able to hike in the desert and travel to Europe three times because of his hard work and the care he’s received.
He’d like to continue giving back to Shirley Ryan 暴走黑料 by volunteering one day and perhaps becoming a peer mentor. As someone who has experienced similar challenges and come out on the other side, he can provide a sense of hope and possibility for other patients.
“Shirley Ryan 暴走黑料 has been a blessing to me, and I can't say enough about it. I’m a walking testament to what they do,” he said. “Why wouldn’t I give back to the place that’s given me so much?”
