Two survival stories collide in Taco John’s parking lot

Justin Hageman doesn’t work at one Taco John’s; he serves all of them in the area as a facilities manager.

And fortunately, earlier this week, he was at exactly the right location at exactly the right time.

Hageman was at the 26th Street and Sycamore Avenue restaurant, just bringing in a table to swap out some equipment, “when this gal hops out of her SUV and says, ‘My friend’s choking,’ ” he said. “So we dropped the table and went to see what we could do.”

Inside the vehicle, he asked the woman if she could breathe. She shook her head no.

“I just asked her to turn around and started trying to put the Heimlich on her,” said Hageman, whose only training in how to do it came in a high school health class in the early 1990s.

“I’ve seen it done a couple times,” he said. “I did like five thrusts and asked if she could breathe, and you could hear a little gurgling, and she started spitting up what was left in her throat.”

The woman drove away shortly afterward, still somewhat shocked, Hageman said. He never learned much about her. And she definitely didn’t learn that her rescuer knows something about survival himself.

This was Hageman’s fifth day back at work since November. After years of lower back pain, one night he felt something had burst and told his wife he needed to go to the hospital.

“Initially, we didn’t really get any answers,” he said. “And it turned into three weeks, and I was down 40 pounds. Lots of pain and night sweats.”

When answers came, they weren’t good.

Hageman, 45, was diagnosed with stage four Non-Hodgkin lymphoma late last year. It led to six rounds of chemotherapy and 17 radiation treatments.

“So far, so good,” he said. “The last scan came back clear.”

While Hageman was out, his co-workers held a large fundraiser for him on New Year’s Eve. It was clear “the impact of the people that he’s touched in his life,” said Ted Miller, vice president of operations for the Taco John’s franchise.

“It was absolutely amazing … and the community outreach was just incredible.”

This week, Hageman got to give back in a big way. Miller didn’t even hear about it until the store’s general manager told him.

“Justin didn’t even tell me,” he said. “And then I proceeded to find out a timeline and watched a (security camera) video and just thought to myself, what a neat story. It was second nature. He just walked around the other person there and just took over.”

Miller shared it with Tina Braam from Taco John’s International, who came the next day to award Hageman with a Life Saver award — candy included.

For Hageman, who said he’s just happy to be seeing his co-workers instead of medical staff, it was the next element in “a whirlwind year.”

“It’s the Midwest. Most of us would have done something,” he said.

Miller is hopeful that sharing the experience will be uplifting for others — and maybe reach the woman who, like her rescuer, became a survivor.

“Of course, she wanted to get out of there, as I would have, but (I’d like) for her to understand the big picture,” he said.

“It’s kind of a modern-day miracle.”