JACKSONVILLE BEACH, Fla. – Lance Schellpeper says the beach is where life used to feel simple.
Sand under his feet. Salt in the air. A fishing rod in his hands — the way it had been since he was a kid, and the way it was for years with his wife, Linda.
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After Linda died last year, Schellpeper said he stopped going.
But recently, he’d started again. A trip here and there. Once or twice a week. A way to step back into a routine that reminded him of better days.
“It felt good,” Schellpeper told News4JAX. “It felt real good to get back out. Get the fresh air, the sand all over you again. I love it.”
On Wednesday, Aug. 12, he did what he came to do. He fished at Jacksonville Beach. And when he headed back toward his car, he noticed a woman walking her dog.
“I’m a dog lover so I had to pet the dog,” he said. “I reached out to pet the dog and next thing I knew I was in the hospital.”
That’s where his memory ends.
“Just gone,” he said. “Just like I went to sleep.”
Jennifer Carde remembers it clearly.
Carde said she and her dog, Evie — a rescue — had decided to take a sunrise run on the beach.
“He asked to pet her and gave her all the love and we were just chatting and getting to know each other,” Carde said. “Then he just stopped talking and unfortunately fell to the ground.”
She didn’t have time to hesitate.
Carde called 911. She asked someone nearby to hold Evie’s leash. Then she got down on the ground and started CPR.
“Keep that heart pumping”
Carde is a physician assistant in vascular surgery. She told News4JAX that in those moments, early CPR can be the difference between life and death.
“You just got to keep pounding on the chest. Keep that heart pumping until help comes,” she said.
Carde estimated she performed chest compressions for about four to five minutes as rescue crews arrived.
Schellpeper later learned he’d had a heart attack. He underwent a quadruple bypass. And he said doctors told him the CPR Carde started almost immediately is why he survived.
“I’m just really lucky to even be here because of her,” he said.
A stranger becomes a friend
Now, the two sit side-by-side at Schellpeper’s apartment, talking like people who have known each other much longer than a few minutes on a beach.
Schellpeper said the heart attack scared him and changed the way he looks at his health and his life.
“Oh man it scared me bad,” he said. “This whole thing has woke me up.”
He also said it shifted something deeper.
Schellpeper told News4JAX he lost his wife in September. And he can’t shake the feeling that on a day when he could have died, the person who knew what to do was right there.
“I tell everybody I lost my wife in September so I’ve got an angel in heaven,” he said. “I’ve got one right here on Earth too.”
He said it restored his faith. He said he stopped going to church after his wife’s death. He said now he plans to return.
Carde said saving a life outside of a hospital is a different kind of experience — and she credits everyone involved, from the bystander who helped with her dog to the first responders and the hospital teams who took over.
“It’s a completely different feeling when you’re out in the world outside of a hospital and you can help save a life,” she said.
Carde said they live about a mile apart now, and both say they plan to stay in each other’s lives.
“It’s going to go on forever,” Schellpeper said. “It’s not going to end.”