A man who collapsed in McDonald’s from cardiac arrest has become “lifelong friends” with the Good Samaritan who saved his life.
70-year-old Paul Myers was in the fast-food restaurant a year ago when his heart stopped. Luckily for him, Brian Harris walked inside at just that moment and leaped into action.
Performing CPR and eventually using a defibrillator, he restarted Myers’ heart before an ambulance took him to the hospital.
Determined to shake the hands that kept blood pumping to his brain, Myers took to social media in an effort to find and meet Harris. York Press now reports they’ve met up around three times since then and have become “lifelong friends.”
Recalling the moment when he began performing CPR, Harris said “I fought hard, I wasn’t going to give up, I was determined I was going to fight for his life.”
Myers added that he is “eternally grateful” that Brian saved his life but says that it’s been “really difficult” to think of a way to thank him.
“When we met up for the first time, he got there before me and said, ‘Mr. Myers, it is so good to see you alive.’ The only words I could give him were ‘thank you.'”
Myers has no memory of the incident, and says he was on his way to a church meeting in the morning when he realized he was struggling to breathe.
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He knew that if he “didn’t sit down he would fall down” so decided to go into a McDonald’s to take a rest. Harris was on a break from his job at the local railway station, and was nearing the restaurant.
“Then a woman came around the corner saying ‘I think there’s a man having a stroke,'” he remembered.
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Harris said Myers’ pulse was barely discernible and he was clearly struggling to breathe.
Rather than losing it all, Myers came out the other side with a new friend, and hopefully for them both, a more intense exercise regime.
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