Heroic Mom Loses Legs While Saving Children From Tornado

We moms often claim there’s nothing we wouldn’t do for our children. Stephanie Decker, a 36-year-old Indiana mother of two, proved this claim in one of the most heroic, selfless acts ever. As a tornado crushed her family home last Friday, Stephanie covered her children with her body to protect them. Miraculously, they walked away without a scratch. Decker lost both her legs.

It’s a tragic story but also exceptionally touching (especially in a time where we’re hearing such despicable stories about unworthy parents abusing, even killing, their children). Stephanie is truly a hero and I’m not one to throw around that term loosely. She literally saved both her children’s lives, which is just unbelievable. Talk about courageous.

According to the The Courier-Journal, Stephanie is in stable condition at University Hospital in Lousiville. ”What I told her was, ”˜You’re alive and you get to see your kids grow up,’” husband Joe Decker said. ”If you look in the basement, there’s no way anybody should have lived, let alone two kids who don’t have a scratch on them.”

They way the whole thing went down is the stuff of movies. Joe Decker told The Courier-Journal how he texted his wife from work to tell her that radar was showing a tornado was headed directly for their home. Stephanie had arrived home just moments earlier and she quickly ran to the basement with their two children: Domnic, 8, and Reese, 5.

“[Then she] just stopped texting me,” said Joe. “She was on top of them.”

The couple’s son, Dominic, was equally as brave. Once the funnel cloud passed, he rushed outside to alert neighbors, who quickly came to his mother’s rescue. One of them, a Clark County Sheriff’s officer named Brian Lovins, put a tourniquet on to stop the bleeding and drove her off until he could flag down an ambulance.

I am in awe of Stephanie’s bravery and courage, and wish her a quick recovery.

(Photo: courier-journal.com)