Advocate Spotlight: Dave and Tia

It was supposed to be an ordinary Sunday bike ride. Dave and Tia had pedaled nearly 25 miles into Oregon’s scenic Gorge, chatting about lunch plans and soaking in the beauty of quiet country roads lined with towering trees and fields. For two lifelong cyclists, this was bliss.

Then, in an instant, everything changed.

Dave’s bike began to drift left. At first, Tia thought he was pulling over for a break. But then he went off the road into a ditch and somersaulted over a six-foot wire fence, landing in a cow pasture. When Tia finally reached him after clawing her way over the fence, Dave was gray, his lips blue, his eyes rolled back. He wasn’t breathing. He had no pulse.

“I knew immediately it was a medical emergency,” Tia recalls. “I thought maybe he was choking, but when I checked his airway, there was nothing. He was gone.”

Adrenaline surged. She straightened Dave’s body, unzipped his bike jersey and began CPR, something she had only practiced on a classroom mannequin. After starting CPR, Tia knew she needed help, but her phone was on the other side of the fence on her bike, so she kept going.

Tia pushed hard and fast on Dave’s chest, providing breaths every 30 compressions. “I remembered they said you might break ribs. And I did. But I wasn’t stopping,” Tia said. “I never imagined I’d need CPR for my husband, but I wholeheartedly believe it’s our responsibility to be ready to help others. That’s why I stay CPR-certified.”

After what seemed like an eternity performing CPR, a man walked toward them on the road. She screamed at him to call 911. He told her that paramedics were on the way. With superhuman effort, Tia continued CPR until help arrived and took over.

When they arrived, firefighters cut through the fence. An automated external defibrillator (AED) shocked Dave twice before his heart started beating again. He was airlifted to a hospital, where doctors performed a quadruple bypass and implanted an ICD (a device that acts as both pacemaker and defibrillator).

Two days later, Dave woke up in the ICU with no memory of what happened. “It was surreal,” he says. “I was the picture of health—cycling thousands of miles, no symptoms, nothing. And then, I was gone.”

Today, Dave is riding his bike once again, all because Tia knew CPR and acted without hesitation.