re: Anyone here ever saved someone's life? Tell me your story.

I saved my ex-wife's life when I decided it's probably not a good idea to kill her.

My little sister fell into the pool when she was an infant and I only 7 or 8.

None of my aunts saw her and I wasn't even there when she went in, I just saw her semi - floating and jumped in and grabbed her. She was laughing when she got out. Apparently she thought it was exhilarating.

In 2008, four days after being certified in CPR, a co-worker and I were having lunch at a local restaurant. We had just been served our food when a lady with a little boy in tow approached and asked if one of us knew CPR. I said I did and she told me her Uncle needed help and had me follow her to the back room. I expected to find an elderly person struggling to breath or having some other issue...nope, this man was dead. His nephew and I maneuvered him to the ground and began CPR for what seemed like forever. The ambulance arrived and the paramedics instructed me to continue with the compressions until they got the breathing bag inserted and the defibrillator connected. The whole time I could hear his wife crying behind me. They hit him 4 times before you could see the steady beat of his heart on the monitor. The paramedics carted him off in the ambulance to an undisclosed hospital. When I got back to the office, the same day, I was informed that my best friend had a stroke and had been taken to a hospital. The next morning I went to visit him and to see if there was anything I could do for his family. Imagine my surprise when I got there and his room was next door to the guy from the restaurant. Sadly, the older gentleman never fully recovered and passed shortly afterwards. My friend passed several days later. I got to speak to "Bill's" family for about an hour before I left, wonderful people. His wife told me if he had made it he would have loved to have bought me a beer and to sit and talk about what happened. For months afterwards I would suddenly become very depressed and tear up thinking about him and second guessing everything I did. It took me a full year to be able to think about it without getting emotional. Typing this for everyone to read is not easy, six years after the fact.

I found an old lady in her bed during a fire. I had a rookie carry her out while he followed me. She seemed ok before ems tool her away. Fire was almost out but still pretty smoky, she wasn't in super duper danger, but close enough.
I have seen a bunch of people saved, but that was the only one I found in 16 years.

I never did but my SIL saved a little kid choking on day when we were at the hospital visiting a relative. Kid started choking on a candy in the waiting area and the kids mom freaked. My SIL grabs kids, bends him over her left arm and starts hitting him on the upper back and candy pops out. Was a pretty cool thing to witness. Everyone in the waiting area started clapping .

Did it routinely when I was in ER. The most surprising part is how chill everyone is while it's going down.

I've saved my handicapped sister twice.

First time was a few weeks after she had come home after having to have a trach installed. We had only recently been shown how to use the suction machine for clearing an airway and had never actually used it. I had been bringing my older son to school at the time, and had my younger one with me in my arm when I got back. when I walked in, I could hear my nephew who is her caretaker hollering. As I walked in, I could tell she had stopped breathing entirely, her eyes were rolled back into her head and her lips were blue.

I took over attempting to suction her, but I wasn't clearing anything. it was really clear that if something didn;t happen soon she'd be gone, and after all she's been through and all the years she's suffered, there was almost a relief in feeling that for her.

Then I thought of Louis C.K. No lie.

He had an old bit about things he hated from most movies...tropes basically. One of them being how you'll see someone dying in a movie and someone else is trying to save them, and after a bit a few of the rest of the group will try and stop them , saying stuff like, "Stop...they're gone!" He then says, "Why stop? What's the worst that could happen? Sure...you MAY save their life, but you're arms are gonna get very tired!!! So, what stop exactly?

I had been listening to that recently and it popped into my head just then...so I tried. when I did, I regained my focus and I realized I had actually been holding the suction catheter incorrectly and had not been holding my thumb down over part of it to create the suction. When I did, I cleared an airway and within 30 seconds her eyes rolled back to the front and within a minute or two she was back.

It was way more terrifying than thrilling. I've done that twice, but both were years ago thankfully.

So...that's the story of how me and Louis C.K. saved my sister.

When I was a teenager me and 2 other friends were swimming in a farm pond. We decided to swim across the pond to the levee. I was the smallest and fastest swimmer so I got there first as I reached the bank I turned around and saw one of my friends going under and the other was struggling to help him. I swam back out and grabbed the one that was drowning and pulled him to shore. The other one got out on his own. If it had been just those two they both may have drowned. The one that was going under had blue jeans on and they wore him out.

Well, my story isn't quite as exciting, but nonetheless significant.

When I was first dating my wife, she had a 16 year old son complete suicide. Her going through the grieving process was enormously difficult for her. There was a time when she didn't want to continue and was considering joining her child.

She later told me that my attention, love and caring for her was the deciding factor.

Fished a coupla Vietnamese chicks out of the ocean off Cape Canaveral. If I hadn't seem 'em, no one else would've and they'd have gone under pretty quick.

I put my arm around each one, and fortunately they were young and good looking, or else I probably wouldn't have bothered. I hauled the three of us in on our backs, and the morons in their group didn't even know they were out in the sea. As we floated to shore, I fondled a tit or two in payment for my kindness.