Monday, September 16, 2013

30 Years of Triumph - Robert & Darla Daigle



How does one pen about the Miracle of a Lifetime in a few sentences?  On Feb. 17, 1998 my husband, Robert Daigle, kissed me goodbye and headed to work.  Forty-five minutes later I received a call from the plant where he worked saying he was having some type of problem with his heart and that I needed to head to the hospital.  When I got there they escorted me not to my husband’s side but to a small room telling me the doctor would be in shortly.  When the doctor came in he told me, as well as Bishop Randy and Pastor Renee’ who had gotten there, that my husband had been life-flighted there with not breathing on his own and with no sustainable heartbeat.  He was now on life support and being kept alive only by machines, making him clinically dead.  He was 39.  As I sat across from the doctor, my 5 year old, Tashia, stood next to me on the couch.  My other two, Tiffani and Timothy, were being brought to the hospital by Pastor Kirk Ellender,  I asked, “How many people in my husband’s condition had he seen make it?”  The doctor touched his white hair and said, “I’ve been doing this for 30 years.  I have never seen anyone in your husband’s condition make it.  I can give you no hope and suggest you not have any.”  My reply to him was, “Well this will be your first!”
After they let me see him and gave me their condolences and all of his things, they sent me to another waiting room on the floor where they would be transferring him until his organs shut down.  By law he was to be kept on the machines for 72 hours before an outside decision, which I would have the privilege of making, to “unplug” him.  Bishop and Pastor Renee ‘walked with me and said, “We will stand with you.  But no matter what, know His grace is sufficient.”  A second doctor, in a second waiting room, confirmed the same diagnosis.  It would be most likely a few hours until the organs completely shut down due to my husband’s death.  As we came out of the room, dozens of church members had already gathered.  Bishop came to me a few minutes later and told me to go with my close friend, telling her to get me to eat something.  I did not know this at that time, but the doctor had told Bishop Randy, “You need to prepare his wife.  Mr. Daigle’s organs have started to shut down.  It will only be a matter of minutes now.”  It was then he called the church members to pray a “resurrection prayer.”

Within 10 minutes of this prayer, a family advocate came running into the cafeteria calling for me frantically saying, “Your husband is awake and uncontrollable.  He has broken his wrist straps and is fighting off the nurses.”  I entered the room, along with Bishop and Pastor Renee’ and told Robert to lie back down.  He was literally back from the dead.  There is more to this story, every step was a part of how great the miracle was and how God can change every fact a doctor can give.  Not one doctor could give an explanation.   No nurse could explain.  My God is the God of life.  Robert was to live and not die, and declare the works of the Lord.

Darla Daigle
Nederland Campus

No comments:

Post a Comment