(La Porte, IN) - A registered nurse from La Porte is going to another college football game at the University of Alabama this time at no cost for her recent life-saving efforts inside the stadium.

 

A video of her overcome by emotion afterwards has gone viral with nearly seven million hits on the internet.  

 

The hit rock song “My Hero” released in 1998 by the Foo Fighters is the sound track for the video taken by an unknown fan and posted on Instagram.

 

Erin Mender, 30, said she doesn’t think of herself as a hero, though.  She views her actions as more about feeling obligated to help.

 

“It’s hard not to feel like you have a duty to do,” she said.   

 

Mender was at the October 26th game against Missouri with her fiancé, Mike Eldridge, when she first leaped into action by assisting a middle-aged fan after he passed out and fell in the seats just before kick-off in 90 degree weather.

 

Mender said the fan, who suffered an abrasion to his forehead, had a rapid pulse, an irregular heartbeat at times and low blood pressure.

 

“He was just really shook up.  He didn’t understand what was going on,” she said.

 

She helped medics carry him out of the stadium for transport to the hospital. Then, while returning to her seat close to the top of the stadium, an elderly medic who had just assisted her with the fan passed out.

 

Mender said she rushed the short distance over and yelled at the man.  She also shook him but he was not responding.  Unable to find a pulse, Mender said she laid his body on a bleacher and started CPR.  A minute after starting chest compressions, she said the man gasped, regained consciousness, sat up and began talking to her.

 

Quickly, her emotions swung the opposite way from the panic and intensity she was experiencing with a life in her hands.

 

“It was such a relief,” she said.

 

Mender said she stayed with the man until medics returned and took him away.

 

It wasn’t long before the emotion filled Mender broke down in the arms of her fiance, Mike Eldridge, a teacher at La Porte High School.  Mender said she tried watching the game but her focus wasn’t on the field. It was more on things like how the life-saving outcome could have been much different and whether both men were doing okay now.

 

“I was just not present at all, like at all,” she said.

 

Mender said the first man she assisted is doing well based on her conversation with him after he later reached out to her.  She’s hoping the other man will contact her soon after hearing from a third party he was doing better.

 

“In a sense, I need closure. I can’t stop thinking about him,” she said.

 

She and Eldridge were given tickets for November 30the when Alabama plays at home against Auburn in a rivalry match between the two teams.  They are the guests of Vista Hosts and Homewood Suites, which is also donating $3 on behalf of Mender to the American Heart Association for every hotel room booked for an Alabama game until the end of the season.   

 

Mender, who has gone to college football games in the past at the University of Notre Dame and Purdue University said she didn’t really get into college football much until after meeting Eldridge, who’s a huge fan of the Crimson Tide.

 

“The environment prior to the game was so fun.  I can’t wait to go back and, hopefully, just have a normal experience,” she said.

 

Mender has since been making videos about how important it is for the general public to be trained in CPR and posting them on social media.  She works at Corewell Health, a hospital in St. Joseph, Michigan.

 

“I live in a world where everyone is CPR certified, so, I guess it never dawned on me to think about that kind of thing.  But, now, I definitely am,” she said.