A man who was dead for 40 minutes has said he feels he is “just lucky to be alive”.
In December 2022, Micheál McNally was having an ordinary day.
It was dinner time and he and his wife had friends and family over for a meal.
It was while they were having dinner that he suddenly collapsed on his kitchen floor.
“Luckily my good friend… performed CPR straight away,” Mr McNally told Newstalk Breakfast.
“I was dead for 40 minutes and they usually give up after 15 minutes but they kept on going because of the fact that they knew me.
“I don’t know anything about after death, it completely was a blank for a few days after that.”
Clinical death is when a person’s heart stops pumping blood and they stop breathing.
The only reason Mr McNally survived was because one of the guests at dinner was a cardiac nurse and so was an expert at performing CPR.
It meant blood continued to flow around his body and oxygen circulated to his brain.
“Because it happened so quickly to me, I hadn’t got that chance to realise that I was passed away,” he said.
“I just completely collapsed… It happened in seconds.”
What is death like?
Some people who have survived clinical death have spoken of bright lights, a tunnel or feelings such as joy or peace.
Mr McNally experienced none of these feelings.
“It came back to me as the months went on,” he said.
“I will remember something else and something else will come back to me.
“But I don’t remember the whole week afterwards.”
Although he survived, Mr McNally said the emotional impact of his experience was hard to come to terms with.
“The week after I came home… I was just looking at TV and realising I didn’t think I was here,” he said.
“This is all a dream, I’m dead… It took a few days to realise that no, I was living.”
Sometimes in the aftermath, he would end up crying “like a baby” but now he has a different attitude.
“I’m just lucky to be here,” he said.
“I’m lucky to be in a house with my three boys and my wife and all my friends as well.
“I’m just lucky to be alive.”
People interested in completing a First Aid course can contact the HSE.
Main image: Micheál McNally. Picture by: Micheál McNally
