We Have a Pulse! | Ari & Shimon Dachs

On June 25th, 2025, it was a regular Wednesday morning. I was heading out the door around 9:00 to go to work, and my wife was home with our older son and our younger son, who was about 3 months old at that time. My friend, who would typically drive me to work, usually stopped off on the way at a bagel store. And as I was about to order, I felt my phone buzz at around 9:13 a.m. and I look at my phone, I see my wife is calling. And I just hear pure hysteria. My wife was getting my older son ready for playgroup and it kind of like dawned on her that she hasn't heard the baby in a while, and she decided just to go into the room to check on him. And she found him completely still and blue. She was able to actually administer some level of CPR on her own. I quickly call my father, who is on Hatzalah for 15 years, and I just say: Get to my apartment as soon as possible. I get to the scene. I see Hatzalah ambulances and cars all over. I knew this was... I knew it was serious. I got a glimpse of my son, who's getting compressions on my couch, and I go into the kitchen, where Hatzalah members are with my wife, who was on the floor, in tears. And I just look at my wife and I said, As long as he's still here in the room, there's a chance. He's going to fight and we're going to daven. And I went into the guest bedroom and I just collapsed on the bed. There was an eerie silence in the house. They were doing CPR for close to 20 minutes already, and we don't know how long the baby was down before he was found. And so every second that went by, I knew that was, B’derech Hateva, you know, he may not come back. I’m sorry. I just keep davening and davening and I come out, back to the kitchen. Blanks stares. I’m going to my father, I’m saying, You have to do something. Like, this is your grandson, like, you’re on Hatzalah. And he's just looking at me and the look was just of... devastation. I knew I had no choice. I had to prepare for the worst. I went outside and we started getting the wheels in motion for the next step, just in case. I run back into the room and then, all of a sudden, it hit me. I remember that morning I had been watching Vayimaen like I've been doing every day for the last three years, and I just kind of clicked, like, I know what I have to do. And I said: Ribono shel Olam, My eyes are yours. And I just kept repeating that to Hashem. YouTube, Instagram, it's done, it's over. We all couldn't believe it. Just out of nowhere, pulse came back. Everybody was so excited. Picked him up, got him moving, get to the hospital immediately. A few days later, a team of doctors had a meeting with my son and daughter-in-law and it was a very, very dark meeting. There is no hope here. He will never amount to anything. He’ll never be able to hug, see, walk or do anything. They were so sure of it. The next day, he actually started breathing on his own. He's laughing and he's already starting to recognize different things and the therapists are saying amazing things that he's doing in therapy with vision therapy, and he's recognizing colors and he's able to, you know, hold his neck up. He's not the child that they were talking about at that meeting. He's not that child. The last six months have been a whirlwind of hospital visits, emergency room visits, and rehab, therapies, up and down. It's not only about stories where there's a fairytale ending and Im Yirtze Hashem, there will be, but we would not be at this point in time if it wasn't for the fact that Ari made this commitment to Vayimaen and to be careful. I'm begging you, the viewers, to take on something small, something in Shmiras Einayim and Kedushah for a Zechus for Yehoshua Levi ben Ahuva Malka Chana, who has a long road ahead, but I know that it's in the Zechus of Shmiras Einayim that he is where he is today, and I know that that's what's going to get him to where he needs to be. So thank you.