Saturday, March 08, 2008

Young girl to be honoured by Scouts for saving brother's life!

Sarah Lindsay was sleeping peacefully on the morning her brother's shouts broke the silence.
Startled, the 11-year-old girl climbed out of bed and followed the sound of her brother's voice down the hall into the living room. Her brother Chase, 21, was trembling on the sofa.


"My medicine," he groaned.

Chase was having a seizure. Sarah knew her older brother had suffered at least two seizures, but neither she nor anyone else in her family had seen him have one.

Cole was turning pale and twitching. And she was home alone with him.

But Sarah kept her cool on that October morning, and that is the reason that today she will receive the Girl Scout Medal of Honor, the second-highest award bestowed by the New York-based Girl Scouts of the USA.

Sarah ran for the kitchen counter and grabbed Chase's medicine. She took Chase the pill and a glass of water, but his body twitched and the water spilled. The pill fell out of his mouth.

Sarah called her father, Gary, at work at Lockheed Martin. He told her to call 911; he was on his way.

Sarah dialed 911 and explained what was happening. She needed an ambulance right away.
She looked at her brother.

"He was sort of snoring with his eyes open," she said. "His face had gotten pretty pale, and his lips were kind of blue. It was a little scary. But I didn't cry."

Instead, she shoved the coffee table away from the couch. Chase was twitching, and she didn't want him to bang his head. She opened the front door to help paramedics and the police spot the house.

She tried to keep Chase calm.

"They're coming, Chase," she said. "It'll be OK."

It only took a few minutes for police and paramedics to arrive. Chase was rushed to the emergency room, where he underwent tests for most of the day. The doctors said he would be OK, though they're still trying to figure out what is causing his seizures.

"I'm proud of my sister," Chase, now 22, said recently. "If she hadn't been there and handled it so well, there's no telling what could have happened to me."

Sarah's mother, Felicia, who was in California visiting her ill father when the seizure happened, asked the Girl Scouts whether Sarah's actions had earned her a patch. But when Scout officials heard the story, they said she deserved more.

Sarah, now 12, is a member of Troop 2507 of the Girl Scouts of Texas Oklahoma Plains.

The sixth-grader at the Applied Learning Academy in Fort Worth will be honored at 9 a.m. at the Bluebonnet Star Community Thinking Day event at Benbrook United Methodist Church.

Sarah is excited. But she also has other important things to worry about -- like what if Chase has another seizure.

Soon after that October day, Sarah got on the Internet and read about seizures. She and her parents sat down together and came up with an emergency plan.

"I'm just glad my brother is all right," she said. "And now we know what to do if it ever happens again."

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