Pete and Melissa talk of the time she saved the runner's life

Shropshire Star

Transcript

00:00 Hi, my name is Pete. Hi, I'm Melissa and in September 2019 I saved Pete's life when he

00:09 had an out of hospital cardiac arrest.

00:15 On the 12th of September in 2019 I was out running in my local area in Telford when I

00:21 suffered an out of hospital cardiac arrest.

00:24 I was also going for a run and where I was running was kind of up a hill, so I was going

00:29 up the hill as I saw Pete running across the top of the road and I noticed that he'd sort

00:35 of slowed down and was stumbling and then he fell backwards and hit his head.

00:39 At this point somebody else had already stopped and they were on the phone to the ambulance

00:44 so I'd run over to Pete and noticed that he'd stopped breathing and had to do something

00:50 and that's when I started CPR.

00:51 It's given me a second chance, so shortly afterwards I started to refer to this as life

01:00 part two and it's given me much more opportunity to do things with my family.

01:06 It makes me really treasure every day that I have and I've got into a really nice habit

01:12 at the end of the day of just lying in bed and just thinking back through to all the

01:16 things that have happened in the day that are quite positive or that I've enjoyed just

01:20 to sort of remember them and reflect on them.

01:22 The only downside is that it's made me a little bit impulsive with wanting to do things or

01:27 spend money.

01:29 If my kids suggest that we should do something I'm possibly a bit inclined to say yeah go

01:34 on then because I don't want to have any regrets.

01:39 And I just feel eternally grateful, I think there's just a continued sense of how lucky

01:43 I am I think.

01:48 So what was really amazing was meeting Pete not long after the event happened.

01:53 So a few days later when Pete was still in hospital I went to the hospital and I met

01:58 Pete's wife and his children and I think seeing the impact that what I did had on the family

02:04 was amazing that I'd given their husband back and their dad back and meeting his children

02:11 and thinking about the ripple effect of that, that he's going to get to see them grow older

02:15 and he's not going to miss out on such important life events.

02:19 Yeah I still think about it a lot now and it's great because we get to meet up and we

02:25 sort of always talk about it when we meet up and reflect and we have a coffee and on

02:32 the 12th of September every year Pete sends me cupcakes which is great and this year we

02:37 were just saying it's the fifth year since it happened so we're going to go up the Reek

02:42 in which Pete does every year but I'm going to join you this year.

02:45 Yeah go and watch the sunrise.

02:47 Yeah go and watch the sunrise.

02:52 I would really encourage anyone in my position just to give it a go you don't necessarily

02:57 have to be first aid trained, just try.

03:01 I always thought it was better to do something instead of nothing and I think that really

03:05 paid off in this story.

03:08 The ambulance service can be really helpful and give you advice and guidance over the

03:12 phone so you don't feel like you're in that situation on your own.

03:20 In my case the person phoning the ambulance service was given directions to find their

03:26 local AED and it's really important that any AEDs that are out there in the community are

03:33 registered on something called the circuit and the circuit is a system that allows the

03:39 ambulance service to know where AEDs are and also has the passcodes for the locked cabinets

03:46 so it can allow a passerby to get in to access the AED because that's crucial to shock and

03:53 restart the heart.

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