TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) — It was your normal day at Disney World for the Tagle family: Rides, food and fun, all in celebration of son Ernesto’s sixth birthday. But everything changed in an instant.
The family, who lives near Tampa, in Land O’ Lakes, was about to have their lives turned upside down — something they now see as a blessing in disguise.
It happened while Ernesto was on his favorite Disney ride, the “Guardians of the Galaxy” rollercoaster at Epcot.
“I looked over at him and he was passed out, or what appeared to be passed out, to me at the time,” said mother Christine Tagle. “My husband and daughter were sitting in front of me and I kept saying, ‘Something is wrong, something is wrong.’ Unfortunately, the ride is on a track so we had to complete the ride.”
When the ride finally stopped, Christine says her son’s lips were “blue, pretty much almost white” and that she couldn’t feel his breath or his heartbeat. She says she started CPR while Disney workers got an automated external defibrillator to shock Ernesto’s heart. They kept him alive until the ambulance arrived.
Ernesto was intubated, and things were precarious in the hospital for a few days before doctors figured out what was wrong. Turns out, Ernesto had a rare, inherited genetic condition called Catechloaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia.
It’s a heart rhythm disorder that can lead to sudden cardiac arrest.
“It’s triggered from the heart rate increasing, which can happen from sports,” Christine said. “It could happen from cardio activity. It could also happen from being excited, like when you’re a little boy getting ready to ride your favorite roller coaster.”
Ernesto ultimately recovered completely and is a perfectly active now-7-year-old boy.
These days, he looks like a normal kid doing normal kid things. It’s not until he lifts his shirt that you can see his ICD, an implantable cardioverter defibrillator. The device was implanted in his chest as insurance. In the event that his heart should ever stop again, the ICD will restart it.
It may be just an implant but Ernesto says it makes him feel like Iron Man.
There are no more roller coasters in Ernesto’s future, no contact sports either, but his parents are just grateful help was there as soon as they stepped off that ride.
Christine added: “We are incredibly blessed that everything happened the way it did.”