After the Ambulance Pulls AwayA True Story of Attempting to Save a Life

three years ago

i walked outside of my rather typical

looking office building

on an unusually warm january morning

i look over my shoulder and across the

parking lot is a man

lying on his back with two construction

workers

standing above him one of the

construction workers kind of

leaned down and pushed the man on the

chest and then

gave up i can’t tell you exactly what

happened next but i remember

running to them screaming something

about cpr in 9-1-1

and one of them saying i think he might

still be breathing

i had taken cpr classes in the past but

never did any of that information come

in handy until

that morning bent down and grabbed him

by the wrist

to see if i could find a pulse and

couldn’t

i laid my head on his chest to see if i

could hear him breathing

but couldn’t because my own heart was

beating so fast that was the only sound

i could hear

his eyes were open but rolled towards

the back of his head

i put my hand to his mouth to see if i

could feel breath and couldn’t

and then i placed the palm of my hand on

his sternum

and the other one on top of it and

together i began to push

push so hard that i thought i was going

to break his ribs

as you are supposed to do pushing so

hard on the

chest of a man whose name i didn’t even

know

push push push wait how many of these do

i do before i deliver the two rescue

breasts

push push push is it 30 it is 30 but

how many have i done thus far push push

yeah and i’m supposed to do it like

really fast like to that bg song staying

alive

ha ha staying alive staying alive this

is insane

push push push it’s time to stop and

deliver the two rescue breaths

i put one hand on his forehead and the

other on his chin and i

i tilted his head back so that the

airway would be sure to be open

i opened his mouth to see if i could see

any obstruction in his throat but

couldn’t

then i leaned down i put my lips to his

and i blew

do you ever have those moments where you

touch something and your mind is

instantly transported back

to a memory from long ago

when i put my lips to his his mustache

tickled my face and i was

instantly transported back to when i was

a kid

of five or six years old and we used to

kiss my dad good night before he went to

bed and

his mustache would tickle my face

my dad had passed away about

10 months prior to this due to a massive

stroke

it was my siblings and i that made the

decision

to terminate his life support it’s a

very difficult decision

to end someone’s life

but now here was this man this man who

was about my dad’s age and who

kind of looked like my dad and his

life was in my hands i had a

second chance to maybe save a life

instead of end one and i wasn’t going to

let him

a man whose name i didn’t even know

die

one thing they don’t teach you in cpr

class

is that when you involuntarily force air

into someone’s lungs

the body’s natural reaction is to fight

and it coughs and it spits back in your

face even though

the body is unconscious

and then you have to go back in a second

time to deliver a second rescue breath

and as you do you have to watch the

chest rise

to ensure that air is getting to the

lungs

there’s more coughing and spitting in my

face and it’s back to reality it’s time

to push again

hand over hand right over the breastbone

where the ribs come together

push damn it push push keep count this

time

push push please breathe again please

wake up

push push please dad please wake up dad

is that sirens in the background please

be siren’s dad

wake up please dad push

push do not stop pushing with cycles of

rescue breath

until help arrives

the ambulance came screeching into the

parking lot

and the paramedics jumped out and they

did their chest compressions and they

shocked him twice

with the defibrillator

and they couldn’t get his heart

restarted

they loaded the man into the back of the

ambulance with the two construction

workers and off they sped

and then all of a sudden i was alone

in that parking lot as if nothing

ever happened

i fell to the ground in tears

and i couldn’t stand up i cried for this

stranger

and i cried all over again for my dad

later that day

i went to the closest er

to find out if the man whose name

i didn’t even know had lived or died

it was the same hospital

the same er room that they took my dad

to

during his stroke and in that same

little nurse’s window i was now asking

about the life

of a different man

the nurse asked for his name

i i said i did not know

she said well are you his family

no i’m not

i’m sorry if you’re not his family

there’s nothing i can tell you

please i said

i did cpr on him in the parking lot and

i just want to know if he lived or died

i’m sorry she said i can’t tell you

anything

and then she turned to the nurse next to

her and rather loudly said hey

that cardiac from earlier they took him

to surgery right

we need to call his family

and that was all i knew

i was tore up inside

and i began to obsess about the

survivability of cpr

according to several studies and

information from the american heart

association

40 to 45 percent of persons who receive

out of hospital cpr where a bystander

is the one performing the cpr survive

long enough to get to the hospital

of those 40 only 20

will live to be discharged

of the 20 that live to be discharged 15

to 18 of them will suffer moderate to

severe brain damage from lack of oxygen

and have their lives their mobility

their functionality

negatively impacted

only two to five will ever return

to normal lives

there’s a lot they teach you in cpr

class

about saving lives

there’s a lot they don’t they don’t

teach you what to do

after the ambulance pulls away they

don’t teach you

how to be brave and act like a hero and

not

regret your actions

the few people i told about this told me

i was brave and i was

a hero but i didn’t feel like

any of those things

based on this guy’s very slim chances of

survival

i felt like a failure

and i didn’t even know if he was alive

or dead

if he was alive based on my obsessive

research

he might have had brain damage that

would require a ton of costly medical

care

and what if his family couldn’t live

with that additional burden in his lives

if he did make a full recovery

what if that hospital stay was so

expensive that it drove him to

bankruptcy

if he were alive did he wish

he were dead

there’s a lot they teach you in cpr

class about how to save lives

but how to live with yourself after

trying to save a life

isn’t one of them three months

after that incident without ever

learning

what happened to the man whose name i

didn’t know

i walked back into that rather typical

looking office building

and there he stood upright and alive

he asked if i was ryan

because it turned out i was a stranger

to him too

i said yes and he grabbed me and he put

me in this big bear hug

and he thanked me

he told me that he had learned that i

was the one that had performed cpr on

him

and without that cpr he wouldn’t be

standing here today

it turned out he had a massive blockage

in his heart

and the surgeons were able to quickly

remove it in time

that his heart just started right back

up

he was one of those lucky two to five

percent

the return to a normal life and was

already back to work as a carpenter

if it were you lying on that ground

suffering from cardiac arrest and

knowing what you know

now would you want a stranger to perform

cpr on you

and could you be that stranger

for someone else

the man and i hugged and he thanked me

one more time and i

i finally got to learn his name

thank you