Prayer Overcomes a “Widow Maker” 

“When they came and got me, they said, ‘Is there medical personnel?’ And I said, ‘Well, I'm a nurse,’" recalls Hillary Deskins. “His face was purple, and I thought, ‘Oh, dear God, he's dead.’”

On July 7, 2021, Jeff Ratanapool woke up early and headed to the gym. For Jeff, Wednesday mornings meant basketball with friends. However, the usual routine quickly took a turn. After playing a game Jeff fell to the ground unconscious. His friends called for help. Hillary Deskins, a retired nurse, was working out nearby when she heard the call.

Hillary says, “He had no pulse, he had no breaths. I knew he was clinically dead. I started trying to do chest compressions; he was so large and so bulky; I could not push down as hard as I should have been able to.”

Soon Hillary was helped by one of Jeff’s friends as another called 911.

“I showed him right where to put his hands and how to interlace his fingers and use the heel,” says Hillary. “And I said, ‘Just push down as hard as you can.’ And I remember saying, ‘Try to break a rib.’ And he said, ‘Break a rib?’ I said, ‘He's dead anyway.’"

The compressions were unsuccessful. Someone brought Hillary a defibrillator.

"I just hit the button. It's about 3,000 volts, I think, and he shocked. And then he started making these, what we call, 'agonal sounds'. All of a sudden he was breathing!"

Hillary asked everyone to pray as Jeff remained unconscious.

"It was, ‘Oh, God, please. Oh, God, please. I don't even know what I'm asking for, but please, God, please.’"

Jeff’s friends continued to pray as EMS arrived on the scene. He was taken by ambulance to Baptist Hospital in Louisville where cardiologist, Greg Meriwether, confirmed Jeff had suffered a widow maker heart attack. Studies show widow makers are fatal nearly 9 out of 10 times, outside of a hospital environment.

Dr. Meriwether says, “Typically the widow maker, when you refer to that, is what’s called a proximal left anterior descending or LAD blockage and that’s in the front part of the artery and because it supplies so much muscle of the heart, it’s a bad thing to happen. A lot of people who have it don’t survive it, don’t make it to the hospital. Time is brain function and if you don’t get high quality CPR pretty quickly after a cardiac arrest or get resuscitated pretty quickly after a cardiac arrest, with each minute that passes your chance of survival and your chance of surviving with intact brain function goes down enormously.”

Jeff’s wife Vickie was quickly notified. Their pastor Stephen Fraser remembers that morning.

Pastor Fraser says, “Vicky was really upset, hysterical, saying what she had heard happened to Jeff. As soon as I heard it and heard her voice, because my wife had it on speakerphone, faith rose up on the inside of me. And I said, ‘Jeff's not going anywhere.’”

Pastor Stephen drove to the hospital, praying the entire way. Not with fear, rather with hope. “I was declaring the promises of God. When I was driving to the hospital, I found myself praying in the Spirit, singing in the Spirit, and rejoicing. I was thanking God for him and praising God all the way to the hospital.”

Upon arrival, Pastor Stephen found that his prayers had been answered. Jeff was conscious and alert.

Pastor Stephen says, “It was like nothing had happened to him. He was sitting in the bed completely normal. Just being his jolly self really. Just kidding around and acting like his biggest concern was if he made the last shot of his basketball.”

Jeff says, “My first thought was I looked over, I saw my wife, I saw my pastor, I saw the nurse. And the doctor walked in, and I remember in my head, thinking, ‘Oh, this isn't good.’ I didn't react like, ‘Oh my gosh, I had a heart attack.’ I remember thinking to myself, ‘Man, I feel pretty good for having a heart attack.’"

“If this had happened almost anywhere else, I think he would have died,” says Dr. Meriwether. “His chances of being alive and being alive with his full brain capacity and mental faculties would be very, very low, so I think it’s a miracle, definitely a miracle in that sense.”

Hillary says, “Without a doubt. He shouldn't be here. He was dead. It had nothing to do with anything we did. God saw fit to bring him back, and it was 100% God, 100%.”

“I mean it was totally a miracle,” says Pastor Stephen

Jeff made a full recovery and is even back to playing basketball Wednesday mornings at the church. He and Vickie are thankful he’s been given more time and give all the credit to God for saving his life. 

Jeff says, “The time I've spent reflecting on it has brought me closer to God. When people gather in Jesus’ name, He’s there. Seeing the power of prayer, people coming together and lifting me up in front of Jesus and God, saying, ‘Please take care of our brother,’ it means the world to me. From that day, after He performed that miracle for me, when I go forward in life and sometimes have trials and tribulations, I jokingly say to Him, ‘I can't wait to see how you're going take are of this one, Lord.’ He'll always be there for me.”