CPR Training Helps Mother Save Daughter’s Life
When you give to BGR, you rarely get to see firsthand the impact your gifts make in people’s lives. But you trust that God has a plan far beyond what you can see. And you’d be right.
God had a plan when you helped fund a CPR training class in Noy’s village.
Noy and several other Christian men and women sat cross-legged in an open-air room, holding plastic baby mannequins. The trainers showed them how to cradle the babies along one arm and use the other to press two fingers into the babies’ chests.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five…. All the way to thirty.
Breathe. Breathe.
It’s serious stuff, but a mother like Noy tries not to think about needing to use this skill in a real situation. That’s a mother’s worst nightmare.
To say Noy’s village relies on water is an understatement. Every family, including hers, lives on boats in a huge freshwater lake. There are so many boats grouped together that they form a literal floating village. As primarily fishermen, there’s rarely a need to go on dry land. Everything they need is on the water. There are shops and mechanics—even temples—all floating on boats or barges.
One day, Noy’s life on the water came with a cost.
Noy’s two-year-old daughter was playing in the front of their boat. Noy and her husband were in the stern. When they came back around, their daughter was gone. Horror washed over them as they realized what must have happened. Noy’s husband dove three times before he finally found their daughter tangled in the grass underwater. When he brought her on the boat, she was unconscious, limp.
Noy was hysterical. Non-believers who had arrived on the scene held her back, keeping her from holding her daughter. They said to put her back into the water so her soul could return to her body.
Noy wouldn’t listen. She pushed through them to get to her daughter. The CPR training rushed back to her, but her mind was frantic with panic. She flipped her daughter over, held her head, and gave three sharp whacks to her back. Immediately, the girl sputtered up water and grass. But she still wasn’t breathing.
Another woman who had attended the CPR training jumped into action, placed her hands on the girl’s chest, and started compressions.
One. Two. Three. Four. Five…
Breathe. Breathe.
Then, finally, the girl gasped a breath.
Praise God!
Try to imagine the wave of emotion that Noy must have felt. Overwhelming relief, overwhelming praise to God.
“I was so scared but thank the Lord for helping me to remember what those ladies taught us to do. If not for the Lord, my daughter would not be alive today.”
The little girl still struggled to breathe normally, so they sped her to a children’s hospital, an hour and a half journey by boat, followed by another 45 minutes in a taxi. A church leader’s wife continued rescue breaths for the girl the entire way.
After a short hospital stay, Noy’s daughter has completely recovered.
Noy may forever feel a twinge of panic every time her daughter gets in the water, but now she’s an advocate for the CPR training she received. She’ll never tell this story without saying how it saved her daughter’s life.
Saving lives. Did you ever truly stop to think that’s what you’re doing when you click the Donate button? Please give again and trust that God knows where your gift is needed. After all, God is in the business of saving lives.