Our daughter recovered quickly from winter bugs like any other little girl. She then had no bad symptoms for SIX months… now she’s dying. Here’s what we missed
When Brinley Wyczalek came down with a smattering of winter bugs, her family expected her to bounce back quickly.
The 18-month-old from Ohio had been diagnosed in 2024 with COVID and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), illnesses that commonly circulate after the holidays and can be particularly grim for young children who have yet to build up their immune systems.
But Brinley was spunky girly girl, who loves everything pink and Paw Patrol. And when she recovered ‘perfectly fine’ from both viruses after about a week, and quickly returned to her normal self, her mother, Berlyn Wyczalek, thought little of it.
Roughly six months later, however, Wyczalek found herself rushing her daughter to the doctor with a case of croup – an upper airway infection that mostly affects young children and causes shortness of breath and a harsh, barking cough.
Wyczalek, who works as a respiratory therapist, insisted doctors perform a chest X-ray, which showed Brinley had an enlarged heart, medically known as cardiomegaly. She was born healthy with no pre-existing heart conditions.
Doctors immediately transferred Brinley to Cleveland Clinic, where further testing revealed dilated cardiomyopathy, which causes the heart’s chambers to thin and stretch out, making them grow larger.
At just two years old, Brinley was in heart failure, meaning her heart could not pump enough blood to the rest of her body. Despite the condition usually causing difficulty breathing, issues gaining weight and bluish tints in the skin, Brinley had presented no warning signs.
‘She was perfectly happy and fine, but then internally, [COVID and RSV] were attacking the heart, and we didn’t know about it,’ Wyczalek told the Daily Mail. ‘Had she not gotten croup, I never would have taken her in. Who knows where we’d be? We probably would have been planning a funeral.’
Brinley Wyczalek was just two years old when she was diagnosed with heart failure. Doctors believe one of two winter viruses was to blame
Doctors told Wyczalek and her husband, Travis, that either COVID or RSV led to myocarditis, or inflammation of the heart’s muscle called the myocardium.
Usually caused by infections, myocarditis is a rare complication of COVID, affecting about 0.2 per 1,000 patients, according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Experts also estimate it occurs in between 0.1 and 1.4 percent of people hospitalized with RSV.
Because both viruses occurred at the same time, Wyczalek said it is unclear which one triggered the myocarditis.
Doctors believe the inflammation from myocarditis then led to lasting damage in Brinley’s heart, resulting in dilated cardiomyopathy and heart failure.
‘Our whole world basically got flipped upside down,’ Wyczalek said. ‘How can one little sickness do that?’
When diagnosed early, heart failure can be significantly improved or reversed with medication. These typically include beta blockers to lower blood pressure and slow heart rate, ACE inhibitors that allow blood vessels to relax and lower blood pressure, and diuretics to reduce fluid buildup in the body, improving breathing and alleviating swelling.
Brinley was able to spend about a year at home taking the oral medications in a bid to reverse her condition. But by October 2025, she was failing to gain weight, and the damage to her heart continued to progress.
She was admitted to Cleveland Clinic Children’s Hospital on October 31, 2025, where she has remained ever since.
Brinley is pictured above with her parents, Travis and Berlyn Wyczalek. Berlyn told the Daily Mail if she had not insisted on her daughter getting a chest X-ray when she had a bout of croup, the family likely would be planning a funeral
Doctors believe Brinley suffered myocarditis from either COVID or RSV, which in turn resulted in heart failure
In November 2025, she underwent a nine-and-a-half-hour surgery to be fitted with a Berlin heart – a type of ventricular assist device (VAD) used for children with severe heart failure.
The open-heart procedure is meant to act as a ‘bridge’ for an eventual heart transplant, using a large external pump to help circulate blood and prevent further organ damage.
While the implant itself is around the size of a small orange, the pump can be larger than a cooler or mini fridge. Brinley can only be disconnected from the pump for about 30 minutes at a time, leaving the once active preschooler bound to her hospital room.
Brinley’s condition has improved since being fitted with a Berlin heart.
When she was first admitted to the hospital, her level of Brain Natriuretic Peptide (BNP), a hormone produced by the heart’s ventricles to indicate pressure, was 35,000 picograms per milliliter (pg/ml), far higher than the typical 100 to 400pg/ml range. Now it hovers around 600pg/ml. She has also gained 15lbs since surgery.
‘I think it’s saved her,’ Wyczalek said.
However, the Berlin heart is not a permanent solution.
Now four years old, Brinley is one of 1,200 US children on the waiting list for a heart transplant.
Children in need of a heart transplant must receive the organ from a deceased child of similar size and the same blood type, giving Brinley and other kids a limited pool of donors compared to adults.
‘It has to be a perfect match on all levels,’ Wyczalek told the Daily Mail. ‘So it could be any day, or it could be another 200 days. We don’t know.’
Brinley is pictured above with Cleveland Clinic therapy dog Trotter. She has spent more than 100 days hospitalized waiting for a heart transplant
As Brinley waits for her ‘hero heart,’ her mother is encouraging other parents to trust their guts and advocate for cardiac screening for their children
As Brinley waits for what she calls her ‘hero heart,’ she takes seven different medications including blood thinners to alleviate stress on her heart. She also receives daily physical therapy to keep her mobile and reduce recovery time after the transplant.
Wyczalek said Brinley has been a ‘rock star’ throughout her ordeal and knows all of her nurses by name. ‘She always asks, “When my new heart comes, will you bring me back to see all my friends?”‘ Wyczalek said.
‘She keeps saying God is making her special heart and he’s going to send it to her. She’s meant to do great things.’
Her hospital room is also completely decked out in her favorite color, pink, including decorations celebrating American Heart Month, which takes place every February.
Brinley’s family is raising money for medical expenses through a GoFundMe page.
Wyczalek is now encouraging other parents to trust their guts and advocate for any medical tests they feel their children need, even for run-of-the-mill viruses like COVID and RSV.
‘Viruses are scary, and they can do a lot of damage without being seen,’ she told the Daily Mail. ‘We have got to do routine cardiac screenings – these kids [often] don’t have any symptoms.’
