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The Woman Who Miraculously Survived Being Stabbed in the Heart

Aired on 10/11/2006 | CC tv-pg
During her 2006 appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show, stabbing survivor Joddi Mayes opened up to Oprah about her miraculous and horrifying story of being stabbed directly in the heart by her husband. Recalling the exact moment her husband sunk the knife into her chest, Joddi confessed that she didn't feel anything at first. "I didn't feel it," she told Oprah. "I just knew I had to get a phone and call somebody."

After being rushed to the emergency room, the medical team quickly went to work, cutting Joddi's chest open in an attempt to stanch her internal bleeding. Amazingly, Joddi was awake as they were working on keeping her alive. "I told myself I had to be awake. I didn’t want to go to sleep," Joddi said to a shocked Oprah. "No way. If I went to sleep, I didn't think I'd wake up."

Here, Joddi walks Oprah through her traumatic ordeal and reveals her motivation to pull through it all. Plus, Dr. David Zich, of Northwestern Memorial Hospital, describes all the ways (six!) Joddi could have died from her injury and settles on one conclusion: Her survival was a miracle.