Miracle for Mom: All 3-year-old had to do after near-drowning was open his eyes
Published: March 16, 2006
Three-year-old Jacob Stewart of Interlachen gave his mother a miraculous birthday present on March 1, but all he did was open his eyes for her.
Stewart fell into a cold swimming pool in Interlachen on Feb. 26. He was airlifted to Wolfson Children’s Hospital in Jacksonville with a weak pulse and shallow breathing. After being unresponsive to medical efforts to revive him, Stewart woke up to see his smiling mother, Reese Stacey.
“He was making some closed fists and pointing his toes but his doctors said those were involuntary muscle contractions,” said Stacey. “My mother and I have been with him all week praying and crying for a miracle and when he opened his eyes and smiled, it was a miracle.”
On Monday, Stewart visited the Interlachen Volunteer Fire Department Station 4 building and reduced a half dozen firefighters to swollen eyes as he returned to see the men and women who helped save his life.
“I’ve been at this type of work for 36 years,” said Interlachen Volunteer Fire Department Chief Gary Warren with seven years in Interlachen. “It is not too often you get to see the final outcome of an emergency situation. This makes it all worthwhile to see this little boy and his parents smiling. I was not at the scene that night but I am proud of this group. They did everything by the book and that little boy is here because of it.”
Jacob was visiting with his grandparents when the accident occurred, said Jacob’s father, Robert, who has been with Stacey six years.
“My dad is really upset by all this and can’t talk about it, but thank God, he kept his cool and knew what to do,” said Robert Stewart.
Stewart’s father, Thomas Heckman, 69, told Interlachen VFD Capt. Ken Reed that Jacob had climbed on top of a chair trying to retrieve a baseball cap that he had thrown into the above-ground pool in the backyard when he apparently fell in.
“Two things probably saved Jacob’s life,” said Reed, with the fire department three years. “One, the water was extremely cold so that would slow his normal blood flow and, two, Mr. Heckman kept his cool and did CPR. He was not in the water a long time.”
Reed, who works at Florida Septic in Hawthorne, responded first on the scene with firefighter Michael Carpenter at 5:08 p.m., just two minutes after the 911 call was made, and took over CPR duties until paramedics showed up.
“We were there very quickly as it was just on Old Gainesville Road,” said Reed. “Mr. Heckman was still wet and Jacob had no pulse or heartbeat that we could find.”
Reed and Carpenter maintained CPR for about 10 minutes when the Rescue 7 unit arrived.
“It was only about 10 minutes that we waited, but it seemed like forever,” said Carpenter, who works at Beef O’Brady’s in Palatka. “The whole thing was very emotional because we all have kids here.”
Reed had established a weak pulse and was getting shallow breathing from Jacob when paramedics took over to transport him to Putnam Community Medical Center where an airlift was waiting to go to Wolfson.
“I was in Gainesville visiting my grandparents in a hospice when Robert called me,” said Stacey. “I jumped in a car with my sister and a cousin and headed to Shands in Gainesville because that was what they first told us. After I got going, we were told he was going to Jacksonville so I turned around. I was frantic.”
Robert Stewart was at a pool tournament in Palatka when he got the news and met with the Rescue 7 truck at the medical center.
“That was the hardest 15 minutes of my life because I couldn’t get close to him because they were working on Jacob,” he said. “I was shaking all over.”
Once both parents and family convened at Wolfson, Jacob’s ordeal started to become scary to Stacey.
“He wouldn’t wake up,” she said, as she hugged Jacob tightly while visiting the fire department Monday night. “They put Jacob in a cool blanket to prevent shock. They told me that an MRI showed no brain damage, but that an EEG, a brain wave scan, showed some abnormalities.”
Jacob was released Friday afternoon and, Stacey said, he seemed to be fine.
“He is a little less energetic and the doctors expect that,” she said. “But we will just watch him and see. He has a little trouble with balance, but he wanted to run around yesterday, so that’s a good sign.”
Stacey and Stewart said they will just love on Jacob.
“We just want to thank all the people involved here who saved his life,” said Stewart. “What else can I say?”
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