Xico Chef Kelly Myers Suffers Massive Stroke

Nostrana alum and Xico chef Kelly Myers is recovering from a massive stroke due to complications during surgery. The Mexican restaurant tweeted out the news this morning, directing readers to the chef’s YouCaring page. Recovery is expected to take several months, with three months of intensive physical therapy to regain her motor function and ability to speak.

After returning from a reforestation project in Oaxaca, the chef was experiencing severe pain that started while she was in Mexico. “She just had this thunderclap of pain. She wasn’t able to move or open her eyes,” Xico owner Elizabeth Davis recalls. “We thought it was altitude sickness, which we were prepared for, but Kelly wasn’t the person I was worried about.” Doctors found an aneurysm that her family decided to treat with surgery, during which she suffered a stroke. Davis says the stroke doesn’t seem to have affected her cognitive ability or memory. “I was talking to her husband... and when she sees her daughter, he can really see the fight in her,” Davis says.

Davis organized the YouCaring page to help Myers’ family as she recovers. “We’re trying to get them a half a year of salary up front so they don’t have to worry about it,” Davis says. The restaurant will stay open as she recovers, so she can reclaim her spot in the kitchen when she’s ready. “She was responsible for a lot at Xico. We have two really strong, amazing sous chefs, and we’re hiring cooks now — i think everyone in Portland is — but the best thing is to keep coming in, help us keep going so she has something to come back to.”

• Xico [Twitter]
• Help Chef Kelly Myers get back to it [YouCaring]
• Nostrana Alum Kelly Myers to Open Xico on SE Division [EPDX]
• All Xico coverage [EPDX]