Paws-ing Death! Hero cat saves owner’s life by pounding on her chest during heart attack
STAPLEFORD, ENGLAND: In a heartwarming incident, a cat woke her owner up after the latter had a heart attack by pounding on her chest with its paws. Sam Felstead, 42, was sound asleep when her seven-year-old cat Billy woke her up at 4.30 am on August 8.
Felstead's out-of-character behavior occurred while she was having a heart attack, but she was unaware of it. When the Nottinghamshire receptionist realized she couldn't move her body and was experiencing shooting pains down her right side, she called her mother, Karen, for assistance.
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Doctors informed Felstead that she had experienced a mild heart attack while she was sleeping. She attributes her survival to Billy's quick actions. She said, "Suddenly I woke up in the early hours covered in sweat and couldn’t move. I went to bed and I felt fine. I’d even been out with the dogs and I didn’t feel ill or have any pains whatsoever."
"Suddenly I woke up in the early hours covered in sweat and couldn’t move. Billy was on my chest and was meowing loudly in my ear hole. He was really meowing. He doesn’t do that normally, he sleeps all day and all night, that’s his life. He wouldn’t leave me. He's not a lap cat. He's not a light cat either and he’s certainly not a cat that wants to be on your knee all the time. He likes to be alone," she added.
"He's never woken me up in the night before, he never bothers you. He doesn’t wake you up for food… I'm just glad he woke me up. Who knows if I would have got up without him, it could’ve been worse for me," the 42-year-old added. She added that Billy ‘loves’ Karen and ‘doesn’t bother with me'.
This guy is a life saver. He woke me up last week to what unbeknown to me was a heart attack. Thank you to @nottmhospitals ED dept, angio theatres and ACU for saving my life and helping me start my recovery. pic.twitter.com/etHokvg7nC
— sam 🌈 (@samfelstead80) August 14, 2022
According to Lucy Hoile, an expert on cat behavior, Billy might have noticed Sam's physiological changes. She said that it might have been a sign of his anxiety that he jumped on her and started meowing. "I do believe he probably did save her life, because that's what enabled her to get medical help, but I wouldn't go down the route of saying he did it on purpose. It was him reacting to the situation."
After a three-day hospital stay, Felstead, whose heart attack was caused by a blocked artery, was given medication and sent home to rest for six weeks. "They looked after me ever so well (but) I have a lot of medication to take for life and I have to take it easy for six weeks," she said.