I saved his life and then had his baby!
At nine months pregnant, Ashley Goette, 28, woke up to find her hubby wasn’t breathing
Amiracle! That was how my husband Andrew and I described my pregnancy.
Childhood sweethearts, we’d been together since we were 15.
And ever since our romantic wedding by a lake two years earlier, we’d been trying for a baby.
We’d already had our hearts shattered by two miscarriages but somehow, I’d carried this bub full-term.
And the very next day, I was going into hospital to be induced.
‘I can’t wait to meet our baby,’ I smiled to Andrew, 28, stroking my bump.
But at 5am that morning, I was woken up by my hubby snoring.
I was about to tell him to turn over when I realised he wasn’t snoring at all – he was gasping for air!
‘Andrew?’ I said, but he didn’t answer.
Shakily, I rang emergency. ‘I need an ambulance,’ I cried. ‘My husband’s not breathing!’
‘Okay, I’m sending paramedics immediately but you need to commence CPR,’ said the operator. ‘Can you get your husband on the floor?’
With my big belly it wasn’t an easy task, but somehow I managed to drag Andrew off the bed.
‘Don’t leave me,’ I begged, pumping his chest, but he was dying right in front of my eyes.
I didn’t stop working on him until the paramedics arrived around 10 minutes later and took over.
‘He’s in cardiac arrest,’ they said, shocking his heart.
To my relief, although he didn’t come to, he began breathing again.
The medics rushed him to hospital where he was placed on life support in a medically induced coma.
His body temperature was lowered to give his brain a chance to heal. When I touched him, I shrank back in shock – he felt like ice.
‘Prepare yourself for the worst,’ the doctor warned. ‘He may not wake up. Even if he emerges from the coma, he won’t be the same again.’
I was told Andrew had been starved of oxygen for a dangerously long time and
CT and MRI scans pointed to a catastrophic brain injury.
‘I’m not having your baby until you wake up,’ I sobbed, holding Andrew’s icy hand in mine.
‘I promise. I’m not doing this without you!’
His parents, Nancy and Pom, and mine, Shelley and David, and the rest of the family gathered around Andrew’s bedside, weeping and praying for his recovery.
‘You can do this,’ I urged my hubby.
The next
morning, with
12 of us around Andrew’s bedside, doctors again told us to expect the worst before warming his body and lowering his sedation levels.
But Andrew lay there, unresponsive – until Libby, an ICU nurse, went up to his bedside.
‘Andrew, do you know you’re having a baby? Do you want to be part of your baby’s life?’ she said.
To our surprise, he nodded. ‘Then open your eyes,’ the nurse said.
And, as if in a movie, he did exactly that!
‘Andrew, you’re back,’ I sobbed, amazed.
We were all ecstatic. It was another miracle!
‘You’ve had a cardiac arrest,’ I explained to my husband gently.
He was stunned and had no memory of what had happened to him.
Astonished by his recovery, doctors arranged for him to have heart surgery.
But then I began having contractions. There was no way Andrew was going to miss our baby coming into the world!
Thankfully, doctors agreed to delay his heart procedure until after the birth.
So Andrew was wheeled in his hospital bed down to the labour room, where it was parked right next to mine.
‘I’m so glad you made it,’ I smiled.
‘Me too,’ he said, taking my hand across the bed.
My contractions came thick and fast, but when I was 5cm dilated, my labour stalled.
‘The baby’s stuck,’ the doctor said. ‘We’ll have to perform an emergency C-section.’
Moved into an operating theatre, Andrew stayed in the labour room and watched the whole birth on his phone on FaceTime!
At 5.16am, Lennon Andrew
Goette emerged – a 3.1 kilo bundle of cuteness, and a miniclone of his father.
And the first person to hold him was his dad, with all his electrodes still hanging off him.
Soon after, Andrew underwent a four-hour heart procedure to resolve his heart arrhythmia.
Doctors told us his heart condition was caused by the rare Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome. Previously undetected, it meant Andrew had an extra electrical pathway between his heart’s upper and lower chambers, causing a rapid heartbeat.
‘You could have died,’ the doctor told him.
But my CPR and the amazing work of the medical team had meant he’d pulled through.
To our relief, the surgery was a complete success and he was left with very little cognitive damage.
Now we’re back home and eternally grateful for the love and support everyone has given us.
Without all of them, this story could have ended very differently.
I never dreamed I would save the life of my husband... right before I had his baby. To help Andrew and Ashley with medical costs, visit gofundme.com/teamgoette
‘I’m not having this baby until you wake up… I’m not doing it
without you’