When 4-year-old Cartier McDaniel was admitted to a Colorado hospital and his heart suddenly stopped beating, doctors lost hope, saying his life-support machine wouldn’t keep him alive for much longer. Cartier’s parents, Destiny Anderson and Dominique McDaniel, were devastated, clinging to a thread of hope. But in a miraculous turn of events, Cartier’s heart started pumping again as unexpectedly as it had stopped.
This miracle made the Denver couple feel that their prayers were answered by a higher power. Speaking to NBC News, they said doctors couldn’t provide a scientific or medical explanation for how Cartier’s heart began beating again after being stopped for over 14 hours. Dominique said he believed, “it was God.”
It all began on April 8 of this year when Cartier showed signs of a fever. Destiny thought giving him Tylenol would help. “I thought it was a cold and would go away,” she said. But she was wrong. The fever didn’t go away. On the contrary, the little boy’s condition worsened by the next day. His limbs became cold, he was sweating profusely, and his breathing was difficult. Later that day, he wet his bed, which was uncommon.
Destiny took him to Children’s Hospital Colorado, where doctors told her that Cartier had gone into cardiac arrest. Emergency treatment for cardiac arrest includes cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and shocks to the heart with an automated external defibrillator (AED). The doctors began CPR. “The doctors were pressing on his chest,” she said. “I started crying and getting hysterical.”
Doctors then placed Cartier on a life-support system, where blood was pumped through an artificial lung that added oxygen and removed carbon dioxide. But this treatment was temporary. “It was the worst moment of my life. The whole hospital room was spinning. I was shaking. I couldn’t believe it was happening,” Destiny recalled with a shiver.
When Cartier was moved to the ICU, their hopes sank. “At that point, we’re just praying for the best,” said Destiny. Doctors declared that it was unlikely that the kid would survive. “He was on life support but it was only a matter of time before the machine stopped working,” the doctors told his parents.
The parents and extended family gathered in the hospital ward to bless Cartier were not used to seeing him in such a state. They had always seen him as an active and adventurous child. Destiny, a mother of seven, said, “I’m thinking, ‘How am I going to tell my kids I’m not bringing their brother home?’”
With no hope left, they clung to their faith and prayed for peace for their son. Then, miraculously, the Holter monitors attached to Cartier’s heart started beeping, showing signs of heartbeats. First one, then two, and suddenly, Cartier was breathing again. “His heart just restarted!” Dr. Aline Maddux, associate professor of pediatrics in the pediatrics ICU, and a part of Cartier’s medical team, told KDVR, “That was really an incredible thing that occurred.”
Despite his heart regaining momentum, doctors feared that some of Cartier’s organs were damaged due to a lack of oxygen in parts of his brain. But they were wrong—his organs were functioning perfectly. “He’s been responding to us with head gestures and he’s able to move his upper body quite well. Amazing things are happening for him and we’re so blessed and very thankful,” Destiny wrote in an update on the GoFundMe page she has created along with Cartier’s aunt, Angela Maduro, to raise funds for Cartier’s medical care.
