After nearly dying as infant, unique Holstege grown into key Purdue cog
Something was wrong with the infant son of Kim and Todd Holstege.
Very wrong.
The Holsteges' 28-day old baby Spencer was puffy and swollen, which prompted a trip to an emergency clinic on an October day in 2000.
That's when a nurse grabbed Kim Holstege’s son.
“I'm like, ‘Oh, wait a minute. What are we doing?’ She was running down the hallway to admit him and I was trying to catch up.”
Fear swept through Kim. Was her baby going to be OK?
"Before I could barely get a word out, the nurse looked at him, grabbed him and sprinted down the hallway with us sprinting after asking: 'What's wrong? Where are we going?' " added Todd Holstege.
The concern: meningitis.
Before a test could be administered, medical personnel started a program to combat it.
“I'm crying,” said Kim. “And then you hear them trying to do the spinal tap and his cry was just not a normal infant cry. It was just like a cat. It was weird. I'm just bawling in the hallway.”
The quick action was fortuitous. It saved Spencer Holstege's life. Looking at the strapping 6-5, 310-pound Purdue offensive lineman today--the Boilermakers' projected No. 1 left guard--you’d never know his life was in peril as a baby.
“He was very sick,” said Todd Holstege. “He had E. coli meningitis. How he contracted that, we'll never know. I just have no idea and neither do the doctors and the nurses.”
The next morning, the baby Kim lovingly called “Spencer-roni” was sent to the ICU.
“Boy, that was rough,” said Todd. “Because, it's awfully, awfully serious. Hearing loss can occur. The child can be learning impaired.
“He was in the ICU for four days. They gave him a 50-50 chance of survival. And he pulled through. Power of prayer and God's love and His grace. He pulled through and then he spent the next month in the Children's Hospital.”
Spencer Holstege not only survived his harrowing introduction to the world, but he has thrived with no debilitating effects from meningitis.
“The hearing was a big thing,” said Kim Holstege. “We had to do hearing tests for the first two years of his life."
Holstege will begin his third season as a starting guard on the Boilermaker offensive line, a key cog for a Purdue team that has high hopes in 2022.
His 18 career starts are second most among Purdue offensive players. Holstege will be an anchor for a front that welcomes back two other starters in center Gus Hartwig and tackle Eric Miller.
"They know what we expect of them and develop and bring them along," Purdue offensive line coach Dale Williams said of his veteran front that must replace right guard Tyler Witt and left tackle Greg Long. "It is important to have older guys. We have older guys who are invested in the program. They will help develop the kids.”
Purdue averaged nearly 439.1 yards per game and 355.1 through the air last season, the most in Williams' five years on staff.
“Me, Gus and Eric Miller are stepping up and being leaders in the group,” said Holstege this spring.
Holstege’s journey to Purdue has been well-planned, just like every other aspect of his buttoned-up life.
Impromptu? Off the cuff? That’s not Spencer Holstege. He craves order.
The third of five Holstege children, he’s unabashedly boring. And, it’s a beautiful thing. Spencer Holstege is a decidedly dull goal-setter who plows ahead in life. Then, he does it again. And, again.
He checks every box of the quintessential grinding, blue-collar offensive lineman.
Holstege knew back at South Christian High in Grand Rapids, Mich., that he needed to give up basketball and baseball and focus on football if he wanted to play in college. Holstege was a power-hitting corner infielder who doubled as a better-than-you-think hoopster who tangled with area foe and current Memphis Grizzly Xavier Tillman.
He did that after his sophomore year.
Holstege knew he wanted to graduate early and get to his college destination for spring ball.
He did that, making the 3.5-hour drive to West Lafayette in January 2019 to get a jump-start on his college career.
It's all paid off.
“He is very disciplined,” said Todd Holstege, a retired school teacher. “And he's always been that way with his academics, with his training for sports, even at a young age. He always had his goals and he wanted to achieve them and that drove him.”
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So, it’s no surprise to learn that Holstege earned his Purdue degree in organizational leadership in 3.5 years and is set to begin grad school work in business. Holstege is mature beyond his years and as exciting as bowl of vanilla ice cream, which just happens to be one of the few treats he enjoys.
“I can't tell you if that's a side effect or not (from meningitis), but he has strange taste buds,” said Todd Holstege. “He can't stand anything but the taste of vanilla. He's never had chocolate. Never had a can of pop. As a kid playing sports, everybody brings Gatorade for after the game. He'd rather have a glass of milk.”
Are you ready for this? Spencer Holstege has only drank water and milk ... his entire life. That has earned him the nickname "Milkman" from Boilermaker teammates.
”I don't go out at all," he fessed. "So, (milk is) all I drink, along with water. I just like to stay disciplined with what I'm eating in my diet."
Holstege’s aversion to sweets made Halloween an interesting time as a youth.
“When we ended up going trick or treating, he'd hope for getting pretzels,” said Todd Holstege, “because he didn't like anything else. He wouldn't eat it and it just didn't taste good to him. It's just a strange thing. We offered him $20 to eat one M&M, and he wouldn't do it. He just would not do it. Just did not appeal to him at all.”
Added Kim Holstege: “I think he's stubborn. Come on. Who doesn't want to try a M&M? Seriously, I get when you're 3, or whatever. But you're 18. You can't try a M&M? Really? You can't try a sip of Coke? You could try.”
What about eating fruit, which is naturally sweet?
“He won't eat it at all, just doesn't taste good to him,” said Todd Holstege.
And then there was the time Holstege had his tonsils taken out.
“He was like 5,” said Kim Holstege. “Give him applesauce? No. Give him Jello? Nope. Give him a Popsicle? Nope. There's nothing to give the dumb kid. C’mon.”
And don’t even ask Kim about the time her parents took young Spencer to a parade.
“They were throwing candy,” she said. “He went out to see, ’Oh, what did they throw?” It was candy, and he threw it back at the parade people! The little kid next to him looked at him with huge eyes, like, what are you doing?”
Holstege also has no appetite for parties.
“It's just not him,” said Todd Holstege. “If the guys at his house are having a big party, he's up in his bedroom doing his thing. It's not so much that he's a nerd that way or against it or anything like that. He's not. He has just high goals for himself. And he doesn't want to take any chances of screwing up or making a mistake or getting in trouble or anything like that.”
Spencer Holstege has come too far, worked too hard and overcome too much to get to this point.
"He is an amazing young man who we are proud of," said Todd Holstege.
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