Pastor, Father of 2 Suffers Fatal Heart Attack After Knee Replacement Surgery
A day before he died on Saturday, Kim Taylor, wife of Quest Church Pastor Ed Taylor, 52, was publicly hoping her husband and father of their two children would come home to her.
Pastor Taylor was admitted to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, Illinois, days earlier, according to the Daily Herald. He had gone in for double knee replacement surgery. He was in recovery from the procedure, his wife said, when complications including a blood clot interrupted everything.
"Ed has another complication — Heparin Induced Thrombocytopenia. His platelet count is greatly reduced as a result of his allergic reaction to the heparin they have been giving him. They now believe that is why he got the blood clot. They have changed his meds, and they expect it to improve. However, they will not medically release him for the rehab center until this is under control. So still waiting to see what will happen next! Prayers always appreciated!" she wrote at 12:03 p.m. on Facebook last Friday.
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Three hours later Kim, who is a cancer survivor, was brimming with hope about her husband's future.
"Okay, so change that. Ed Taylor's physical therapy is going so well, that they feel he doesn't need rehab. So if they get his platelets under control, they will send him home. Could be as early as Saturday or Sunday," she wrote with a smiley face emoji.
Then Saturday came.
Pastor Taylor suffered a heart attack. Doctors tried to save him, Kim said, but they couldn't bring him back. He was gone for good. It was several hours before she could break the news on social media.
"I have tried to let people know," she began in another post at 9:13 p.m. Saturday. "Ed Taylor went into cardiac arrest this morning, and they did all they could to bring him back to us. We will greatly miss him, and I know many of you out there will as well. Everyone has been wonderful so far, and thank you everyone for your love and support. I'm trying to reply to calls and texts, but please don't be offended if I don't answer, or don't call back right away. I am trying to handle things as best I can."
Quest Church did not own a formal church building. The small congregation, started by the Pastor Taylor four years ago, worships on Sunday mornings at the Mug Coffee Co. in Rolling Meadows. He was known for doing nice things in the community like showing up at a local laundromat with rolls of quarters to help those in need, the Daily Herald said.
"He was always available, at all kinds of hours, day and night," Doug Picirillo, a member of the church and Arlington Heights resident told the Daily Herald. "He was a hands-on kind of guy."
Arlington Heights Mayor Thomas Hayes remembered the late pastor as a "strong man of faith" who loved his community.
"He was a strong man of faith and wanted to get involved in the community in a number of different ways, and we very much appreciated everything that he did for the community," Thomas said.
Kim told the Daily Herald that her husband worked very hard to lead a church that was engaging and felt a special connection with the homeless.
"He was always trying to think outside the box and kind of break through what you traditionally see the church as," she said.
Along with his wife, Pastor Ed Taylor leaves behind a son, Edwin, and a daughter, Ellis. A 3 p.m. visitation and 5 p.m. memorial service and a dinner will be held on Wednesday at Cross and Crown Lutheran Church, 1122 W. Rand Road, Arlington Heights.
On Tuesday morning Kim wrote on Facebook post about her husband, saying, "I wake up around 5, no matter what time I go to bed. And I start thinking about my day, and then it hits me — that he's not there. I can't ask his advice on something. I can't tell him a funny story, or have him irritate me with something. And then I start crying, and I might as well get up because there's no going back to sleep."
