Ah, ah, ah, ah - I saved my dad’s life with a little help from The Office and the Bee Gees
When my father collapsed suddenly, an episode of the US comedy in which Steve Carell does CPR to the tune of Stayin’ Alive sprung miraculously to mindIt was a boiling hot day last summer, four days after my dad’s 73rd birthday.Mum was plating up dinner and Dad was on the sofa complaining about how stifling it was.I was meant to head to work, for my job as a personal trainer, but decided to take the evening off.It was just as well: as I turned back to Mum, Dad collapsed backwards and suffered a massive cardiac arrest.Mum was hysterical.
She called the ambulance as I tried to stay calm but inside I felt mad with fear as she relayed what the 999 handler was saying.“Check if he’s breathing,” she told me.I put my hand on his chest but felt nothing.“Move him to the floor.” I laid him on the wood flooring.
The call handler told Mum to begin CPR,Dad was motionless as she pushed on his chest,I’d attended first-aid training years ago, while working at a bowling alley, but remembered nothing,Something seemed off, though – the timing wasn’t right,Then I remembered The Office.
Specifically, I remembered a scene in the US series where Steve Carell’s character, Michael Scott, is being taught how to demonstrate CPR to the team, on a dummy, to the tune of the Bee Gees’ Stayin’ Alive.The episode, Stress Relief, is one of the show’s best, with a chaotically funny cold opening in which Dwight purposefully triggers a fire alarm to prove his fire safety talk was ignored, prompting Stanley to have a heart attack.After Stanley has recovered, Michael brings in a CPR trainer, who offers a tip – that the rhythm of Stayin’ Alive perfectly matches the rate at which you should administer CPR.The first aid is ignored as the team harmonise and dance to the Bee Gees, Andy bringing in the high-pitched lyrics.In my parents’ living room, the bit I needed jumped to the front of my mind: “Ah, Ah, Ah, Ah” to compress Dad’s chest, then rest on “stayin’ alive”.
I took over from Mum and played the scene and song in my head for 13 minutes, trying to resuscitate Dad.My arms were getting tired but occasional murmurs let me know he was still with us.I had no intention of stopping.As paramedics arrived and took over, they asked: “Who did the CPR?” “Me,” I said.“You’ve done a brilliant job, you may have saved his life,” they told me.
As I went outside for some air, I thought: “They probably tell everyone that.” As far as I was concerned, I’d done everything I could but not in a million years was Dad pulling through.He did, though.He spent 57 days in a coma and four months in hospital with multiple surgeries.I visited every day.
Medics would ask: “How did you learn CPR?” And I told them: “The Office.”I’m a huge TV and film fan, especially superhero movies.I’ve watched most of The Office three or four times; I find it comforting and Carell nails the cringe factor.Stress Relief is one of the best episodes: it takes something so mundane and makes it hilarious.That’s what made me remember it that day.
Just like The Office, where the team rallied round after Stanley’s heart attack, members the gym I work at, came together, too.It’s near the hospital and many were involved in Dad’s care: one was an anaesthetist, one did his tracheostomy and another gave him speech and language therapy.He’s almost back to full health now but his recovery was rough.Without that episode of The Office, I genuinely don’t think I could have performed CPR the way I did.I’m not the only one: in 2019, a man in Arizona saved a woman’s life by breaking into her car, pulling her out and delivering chest compressions to the tune of Stayin’ Alive.
At Dad’s checkups, doctors still mention it; one of the medics I train recently messaged from a course to say “9% of people survive cardiac arrest out of hospital, most go on to die, which puts your story into perspective”.After all the superhero movies I’ve watched, it’s funny to think it was Steve Carell and The Office that helped to deliver my heroics.You can tell us how a cultural moment has prompted you to make a major life change by filling in the form below or emailing us on cultural.awakening@theguardian.com.
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