I woke suddenly at 4am. My wife was beside me, lying on her belly, head to the left. She appeared to be spasming, making a hunh hunh hunh sound from her throat. I shook her shoulder, no response. Switched on the light, put on my glasses, went around to her side of the bed. She had a little whitish foam out of her mouth. She appeared to be getting air (airway okay) between the spasming. No signs of stopped breathing (blue lips / face). Heart was strong. Tried to awaken her, no response. Eyes red and open. I thought maybe she had swallowed something in her sleep that was causing a partial obstruction, did a quick mouth swipe with my finger, nothing. Called 911. Operator had me move her to the floor on her back, remove her shirt and begin CPR chest compressions. Really, I said, she's breathing and I can feel her heart beat. Yes. So head tilt, still breathing, but still unresponsive. With breathing and heart beating, I didn't compress hard enough to break her sternum, deep compressions for 30-40 seconds until she reached up and stopped me, and began to come around. I asked her my name, she said Tom. EMTs arrived, took over care. She was groggy, no memory of what happened.

Today an MRI revealed some masses on her brain of unknown origin - next step is to sort that out. Healthy middle aged female, no history of seizures. First aid, CPR - it really does often boil down to doing it for or to someone you love. Please, please make sure you are all trained. She asked, were you scared I was going to die? I told her no, once I had clicked off the A B Cs I knew that she was with us and we will get through this. God bless all paramedics, thank you Bellevue Fire Department (Station 1).

I'm glad it worked out. Let us know how it goes.

I hope that she's alright.

Prayers and best wishes.

I'm very happy y'all made it through the initial crisis, and my thoughts and prayers are with you and your DW for a speedy and complete recovery. But I'm a bit confused by the instruction to do chest compressions when you reported that both pulse and breathing were present. Normally CPR isn't advised for patients with a detectable pulse and respiration, so I am wondering if there were some details left out, or if I'm misunderstanding something?

Not only did you know what to do, did what you needed to do and didn't panic. Good man!

I hope it turns out okay. Fingers, toes and eyes crossed for the both of you.

Sue

Sounds like everything turned out OK! Glad to hear that, hope the masses arent anything to worry about. Good job not panicking, I had to undergo CPR on my father who is a long time smoker, and he stopped breathing in his sleep. Now i found out it was a shallow breath because he still does it! But hope every thing is OK and you have no more incidents!

The calmness of your response is most impressive. We'll keep you in our prayers.

-Blast

Ditto What Blast says.
Adventureboy

Nothing left out, and I was initially confused too - the 911 operator though said do compressions, so I did, but I consciously chose not to do them hard enough to break her breast bone, more to promote some circulation. I could only assume she had a protocol, and we were following it. I told the EMTs she was breathing and had a strong heart beat and that I had intiated CPR, they didn't comment (it was mostly scoop and transport her to the local hospital), and the consulting neurologist thouth it was interesting but didn't differ with the instructions either.

Now that my wife has had one seizure, if she has another I am more likely to treat it like a seizure, monitor her breathing, make her comfortable, time it, and wait for her to come otu of it, then make a decision to contact our doctor. She is on anti-seizure medication so this isn't too likely.

Frankly, it sounds like the 911 operator screwed up. Perhaps followup would be a good idea.

Seizures can be frustrating, because there is very little you can do, short of rapid, proper transport to an ER. Keep the airway open, monitor ABCs, and keep the victim from injury. These situations really test your training.