A New York grandfather is thanking his own personal “hero” for stopping on the side of the road to save his life this summer. Mark Reissig, a triathlete who used to bike 160 miles a week, was 16 miles into a routine bike ride when he started feeling fatigued. He’d been cycling for 30 years, but he’d never felt like this before, and what he didn’t know at the time was that he was experiencing the beginning of a heart attack.
Fortunately, Molly Ames happened to be driving by and noticed that Reissig “got off his bike and seemed a little distressed.” She recalls thinking that he was struggling and that something wasn’t right, so she asked if he was okay, and just before he passed out, he asked her to call 911. Wayne County dispatcher Megan Williams advised Ames to start CPR, which she performed for seven minutes until first responders were on the scene.
Paramedics were able to restart Reissig’s heart and found he had been in cardiac arrest for almost 30 minutes. Thanks to the kindness of a stranger, he’s alive today and Ames has been awarded a proclamation by the town of Walworth for “her heroic actions of administering lifesaving CPR,” as well as a New York State Senate Citation from Senator Pam Helming. “She is and forever will be my hero,” Reissig says of Ames. “She helped a total stranger, and without thinking about how much it would have impacted her life, she just acted. And I can never, never repay and thank her enough.”
Source: People