'A friend to a lot of people.' Galesburg father, 46, dies from COVID-related complications
GALESBURG — Josh Kilpatrick told his mother he thought it was just a chest cold the day he was brought to the hospital on Dec.13, 2021. He was having trouble breathing and doctors at OSF St. Mary Medical Center determined he had COVID-pneumonia.
Kilpatrick turned 46 inside the intensive care unit on Dec. 20. He died 58 days later.
“I don't know, I just thought that he would always come home,” Mary Lydic said, Kilpatrick’s mother. “But he just couldn't get off that 100 percent oxygen. I think his lungs had already been scarred.”
Obituary: Josh M. Kilpatrick - Dec. 20, 1975 - Feb. 16, 2022
Kilpatrick leaves two sons, two daughters
The local father, real estate agent and Army veteran is survived by Lydic, his two daughters Shannley and Abigail Kilpatrick, his two sons Kian and Kholby Kilpatrick, and the mothers of his children, Nicole Kilpatrick and Brandy Kilpatrick. He was preceded in death by his father Shannon in 2014 and his sister, Jaymie Kilpatrick in 2021.
A number of people close to Kilpatrick first learned he was sick mid-December.
Randy Wilson, Kilpatrick’s friend and business partner, remembers dropping off some medicine on his porch a few days before he was taken to the hospital. Wilson said the two texted because at that time, Kilpatrick was having such trouble breathing that he couldn’t talk.
Lydic visited her son at his house on Dec. 13 and told him he should go see a doctor. Kilpatrick’s ex-wife Brandy Jo drove him to OSF St. Mary’s later that day.
Lydic said the doctors determined from the start Kilpatrick was in bad shape.
During the approximate nine weeks Kilpatrick spent in the hospital, he technically never left the intensive care unit. Lydic said he was moved to another bed about three weeks after he was first administered, but that was to make room for other patients.
Rich Humes, Kilpatrick’s friend and former co-worker from National Woodforest Bank, said he had seen Kilpatrick just two weeks before he entered the hospital.
Humes said that Kilpatrick had shown him and his wife a house they were potentially interested in buying. Humes said he didn’t realize how serious Kilpatrick’s illness was until several weeks had passed and he heard his friend still hadn’t recovered.
“It was just one of those — I heard in early January, I was like, 'Gosh he's still in there?'” Humes said. “That's when I was texting him and he's like, 'Pray for me.' And that's when I knew, that's when I started getting worried.”
Mother read verses of Bible to him
After Christmas, Lydic was able to visit her son every day in the hospital. She said he never stopped working from his laptop and didn’t look sick except for his breathing. Once he could no longer communicate, she read aloud to him verses from the Bible and played Christian songs that friends had sent on Facebook.
During his last week, Lydic said her son couldn’t breathe at all. Kilpatrick was placed on a ventilator and though the doctors tried giving him some new medicine, the treatment, Lydic said, didn’t work.
As kid, Kilpatrick shy until nephew arrived
Lydic described her son as a shy and quiet kid when he was growing up in Abingdon. She said he wasn’t very athletic and struggled in classes — but that changed after his nephew came to live with the family during Kilpatrick’s freshman year of high school.
“He kind of just pulled Josh out of his shell,” Lydic said. After high school, she said her son blossomed.
Kilpatrick worked at a Rent-A-Center, first as a delivery driver, then rose through the ranks to eventually own his own store in DeKalb. There he married his first wife, had his first son and decided to enlist in the U.S. Army.
“I thought at the time, 'Oh boy, you've been on your own and had your own store and everything and you're going to go to the service and have someone tell you what to do?’” Lydic said. “But he did really well and he was very proud of his time in the service.”
After he was honorably discharged from the Army in 2001, Kilpatrick became a bank manager at Woodforest National Bank, the branch located inside Galesburg’s Walmart Supercenter. It was there that he hired Humes.
Hitting the gym, running marathons
Though Kilpatrick may not have been athletic when he was younger, within a year the two men were working out together three to four times a week, training for legs of the Quad Cities Marathon and lifting weights.
“Somebody was saying that that time in his life, along with being in the Army and stuff, that was some of the best times of his life. So it kind of choked me up a little bit,” Humes said. “We had fun — it’s tough building up to 13 miles.”
Humes said that he and Kilpatrick would change into their workout clothes after work and then run laps around Hawthorne Park. Eventually, once they each had children and less time, the sessions fizzled out.
Humes still runs two to three times a week, something he said he probably wouldn't have started if it wasn’t for Kilpatrick pushing him along their jogs and during weight-lifting sessions.
"He would put five pounds on, five pounds more on. Where I was just kind of content doing what I needed to do,” Humes said. “That was just him, he was constantly trying to drive you to do better.”
Finding his passion for real estate
After his father died, Kilpatrick got his real estate license in Illinois and Iowa with the intention to sell houses on the side. But Humes and Lydic both said Kilpatrick just fell in love with the business.
Around 2015 Kilpatrick left the bank and plunged into real estate full time. Before long, Kilpatrick owned and operated his own real-estate business, The Bold Group EXP.
“He just was so giving and kind and helpful,” Lydic said. “He sold a house to a lady one time and she didn't have any family or anybody to help her move and so he moved her himself.”
Kilpatrick had been in the real-estate business for about two years already when he met Wilson through mutual friends. They hit it off around 2018 and by the summer of 2020, Kilpatrick had urged Wilson to join him in the real estate business. The two became partners.
"Times were a little tight when I was starting the real-estate business and it's fairly costly to get started,” Wilson said. “He loaned me the money to start. It was instrumental. Anytime I'd call, he'd answer the phone. If I needed to talk I could come by.”
Grabbed his hand and said 'I love you'
Despite the circumstances, Lydic said the time she was able to spend with her son every day in the hospital, having many heart-to-heart talks.
"You know you get older and you know your son loves you and your son knows you love him, but it's just a different kind of feeling when it's like that, when you know you need somebody and they're there for you," Lydic said.
During that time, Wilson said that he and Brandy Jo also were also repeatedly visiting Kilpatrick.
"He was the same positive attitude, determined to get better and see his kids and get back home again," Wilson said.
Humes and his wife visited Kilpatrick on Jan. 30. At that time, Humes said, Kilpatrick thought he was out of the woods. The two friends talked for a while, remembering old times.
It was the final time Humes would talk to Kilpatrick.
"That was the last thing. I went up and grabbed his hand and said 'I love you' and he said 'I love you' and my wife did the same thing and that was it,” Humes said.
In a Facebook post announcing Kilpatrick’s funeral, Brandy Jo, the mother to three of Kilpatrick’s children, addressed her ex-husband.
“I’m so sad and mad and confused. Trying to navigate this loss and guide these children along the way too. You are so loved Josh, and you made such an impact on so many people,” Brandy Jo wrote.
Kilpatrick’s funeral was Feb. 20 at Watson Thomas Funeral Home.
Lydic said the ceremony was a blur because there were so many people in attendance. Though Kilpatrick had been religious all his life, Lydic said he became more involved near the end of his life. Wilson and a pastor from Kilpatrick's church, the Calvary Assembly of God Church, read eulogies.
“He was a friend to a lot of people,” Wilson said. “I've been overwhelmed with the number of people who have reached out, just saying how much he meant to them and how good he was to them. I'd say hundreds of people, not exaggerating.”
This article originally appeared on Galesburg Register-Mail: Galesburg father, 46, dies from COVID after 58 days in ICU
