NOT BAD FOR BEING DEAD:
How the man whose life I saved showed me there's more to living than just being Alive.
I got this message earlier this year. The man whose life I helped saved text me and told me he just medalled at his first martial arts Competition.
Let me give you some Context.
About 18 months ago. In the middle of Exile that continues to this day after Sirin Kale, Lucy Osbourne and their newspaper, The Guardian, ruined my life I decided to start training again. I’d been doing Jujitsu and Kickboxing for years, swapping out MMA classes after getting beat up a little too much but with Filming schedules and things, there were times when I wasn’t there for months.
But now with not much to do. I was training a lot more just to keep myself sane from some very dark times and places. It was a Friday morning and I decided I’d do the 7am Jujitsu class, the 8am class and then do Kickboxing at 9am. I didn’t want to get up that day but forced myself out of bed jumped in the car and headed there. I actually nearly turned back as I wasn’t feeling it.
I got there and did the first class where I was pretty lacklustre to be honest. In the break before the next class I saw a black guy I’d never seen before, he was about my complexion and looked in good shape. He had a nice black Gi from another Gym (The outfit you wear when doing Jujitsu or most Martial arts) and sat quietly waiting for the class. When you train a fair bit you recognise people who are regulars and who aren’t.
We got on the mats and were told by the professor to do a slow jog around then do hip escapes where you drop on your back and shuffle away as if escaping an opponent. The jog was simple and the new guy was right behind me. We got to the end and I dropped to my back to do the hip escape. SLAM! the man dropped to his back as well…
Only he didn’t get up.
Or move. I immediately knew something was wrong. I sat up to look at him and he was stiff, eyes rolling. I jumped up called for help and started putting him into the recovery postion as it looked like he was having a seizure. Other people now in our class started standing and watching but nobody else was doing anything. Then a man called George stepped in and started helping me and that’s when it happened.
I don’t know if you’ve ever seen anyone take their last breath but it’s like something leaves you. Like your soul leaves you. And that’s what happened.
While George and I were trying to make sure he had not swallowed his tongue. This guy exhaled longer than is possible to exhale if you tried, and died right there.
There was about 5 seconds where we looked at him not sure if we saw what we just saw. Then we looked at each other and knew. We lay him on his back, opened up his Gi, ripped his T-shirt and started doing CPR. I’d had learned it before as a lifeguard and fitness instructor back in the day and George also used to work in that area.
By now everyone is watching us as we are going at it, and someone brings a phone on speaker to the emergency services. But the call had turned from seizure, to us telling the emergency services operator this guy has just died in front of us. She told us she was escalating the call and that the ambulance was on the way. I looked up to see all these people I train with standing and just watching George and I go at it
12 minutes later and nothing hass happened. The man is grey, (Hard for a man my colour) His eyes had no light and his tongue was flopping. He was gone, and we were not sure if we were making any progress on him or if we are even doing the right thing. Again what surprised me was others just watching. Just standing there stressed, shocked, a couple of guys in tears. Although now, I think about it I don’t know what else they could have done.
Eventually George takes over so I can talk to the ambulance woman, as the difibulator finally arrived. The emergency service woman tells me what to do and I start putting it on. Just as we are getting ready to shock him. The first paramedic arrives on a push bike and rushes inside.
We swap our defibrillator for hers quickly and all step back.
SHOOOOM - she shocks him. His body does that flop you see in movies except this time it’s real life.
Nothing!
SHOOOOM - She shocks him again.
Nothing!
SHOOOOM - She shocks him a third time.
Beep! -
HEARTBEAT
The paramedic rushes back towards him and gets George back on chest compressions, and gives me a mask to place and hold over his nose and mouth while squeezing air into his lungs. Another guy who just arrived now comes and helps and about 5 minutes after that the full Ambulance crew arrive and take over.
Once they take him we just hang out chatting about how crazy it all was. I think mostly we were in shock. One thing that surprised me though was one person saying to me that they were glad I did something because they would not have done anything in fear of breaking a rib and getting sued by the family.
I hadn’t even thought about that.
My first thought when I knew what happened was save this life and that was my only thought the whole time.
I drive home almost catatonic and casually tell the story to people not realising how it had affected me. Even when this message came through about 4 days later I didn’t really process it.
He was alive, but this didn’t mean he was going to live. He was still unconscious. I didn’t know if everything we did had made a difference or not. Even if he woke up what would happen?
12 minutes. 12 minutes he was gone. 12 minutes. He could be brain damaged or anything.
It was another two days before I got called from an unknown number and picked up which I don’t usually do. It was his brother in law. The guy had woken up and on top of that he was fine and was going to make a fully recovery. I came off that phone and told my wife and then started to breakdown.
WTF? I didn’t know why I did. If it was everything I was going through in my life or the fact we finally knew that what we’d done had actually saved this guys life but whatever it was. In that moment it overwhelmed me.
A few days later he called me and couldn’t remember everything that happened. I said i’d never forget it and told him to stay off the McDonalds and we laughed, with him telling me he doesn’t eat that stuff anyway.
—
Fast forward a year and one day from the day we saved him and he sends that text at the top telling me he got on the podium at that competition. I was in awe. It felt amazing that he was able to do that after us saving him. And that he messaged to tell me. He also said he used to be Lazy, but he wasn’t anymore. It had changed him.
Over the last 3 years I’ve felt dead many times. I’ve been suffering at times more than I’ve let on. More than you know. More than you can imagine. And trust me. Just like that guy, most people have just stood around and watched me laying there.
But this man was dead. He was. And he came back.
Not just came back. But came back fighting. Figuratively and literally.
You gotta rate that. Even if it took a heart attack to spur him on.
He’s not just Alive.
He’s Living.
Like we all should be.
Not bad for being Dead.
That's really impressive Noel, what you and George did. Even with training, it takes guts to step in and it's brilliant how he's recovered. Fate is very strange. Have you listened to any post-cancellation Armie Hammer interviews? He spoke about the unforeseen benefits of being cancelled (based on hearsay/ vindictive allegations), he stopped fighting it eventually because he had no choice.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/armie-hammer-breaks-silence-overcoming-adversity-and/id1729973942?i=1000659175068