Jake Booth's wife Jasmine talks about him waking from his six-week coma after getting pneumonia in February.


If he had taken the last six pills in his prescription bottle, Jake Booth may not have needed the miracle that returned him to his family.

Had he finished his course of antibiotics, his family believes he could have avoided the heart attack, the coma, the feeding tubes and much of the agony the family's been through.

While Jake was in a coma for 42 days, doctors didn't think the Bonita Springs resident would ever wake. But his wife, Jasmine Stanley, never gave up.

"I know Jake will be OK," she said, as he dozed in the bed at Promise Hospital in Fort Myers. "I just know it. I truly, truly believe it, despite evidence to the contrary. "

Jasmine, Jake's brother, parents and friends from Minnesota to Florida waited six weeks as Jake, 35, slept, weathering medical scares, emotionally crippling diagnoses, and difficult choices.

Then, Jake awoke. Three weeks later, he smiles. He laughs. He recognizes visitors. He does more each day.

Jasmine, also mother of their children, Eva, 6, and Aiden, who turns 1 on Monday, said she never truly doubted he'd return to her.

"Right now, I'm most excited for Eva for the day when she sees her dad walk through the door and she knows everything is going to be good," Jasmine said.

Coughs, chills

In February, days after celebrating Valentine's, Jake was sick. He was tired, coughing up mucous and had trouble breathing.

He went to his doctor, who gave him three prescriptions, including an antibiotic, to treat his bronchitis.

"He's never been that sick," Jasmine said. "I've known him for 10 years and never known him to have bronchitis. He's always been the guy that doesn't want to go to the doctor."

A few days went by. Jake felt better and quit taking the pills.

By the weekend, he was sick again. His lungs hurt, and he had fevers, chills and a horrible headache.

Jasmine forced him to return to the doctor on Feb. 20. The doctor examined him and called an ambulance, sending him immediately to Naples Community Hospital.

The bronchitis had turned into double pneumonia, and his body's defenses went into overdrive. Headaches had plagued him for years; now they wouldn't stop. Tossing and turning, he kept pulling out tubes. His head hurt so bad, he agreed when the doctors offered to put him in a medically induced coma.

Hours later, his heart stopped working.

"All of our phones went off," said Ron Schwartz, Jake's dad. "We had just left the hospital and were at Jasmine's house."

They rushed back. Traumatized, Jasmine recalled her prayer for God to spare him was reduced to a plea "No, no, no, no, no."

The medical team got his heart working again, but Jake had gone 10 minutes without oxygen. Doctors told Jasmine to expect more heart attacks that night, and he likely wouldn't survive them.

The family spent the night on the floor of the lobby, trying and failing to sleep.

Two days later, on Feb. 22, Jake had avoided more heart attacks but the medical team couldn't rouse him from  the coma. His organs were failing. Doctors told Jasmine they'd done all they could and suggested they fly him to Tampa General Hospital, where doctors had more experience and tools to assist Jake. Jasmine agreed.

Ron said watching a crew load Jake into the helicopter the next day was heartbreaking. A special rotating bed,  Jake, and a five-member medical team barely fit in the helicopter. He recalls Jake's foot hanging out of the helicopter. A crew member bent Jake's leg, pulling it out of the way to close the door.

Jasmine continued to pray in the days and weeks ahead.

"God, you said a father is supposed to turn up a child in the ways they will go," she recalled petitioning. "Eva and Aiden need guidance, and Jake is supposed to lead the household. You have plans to prosper us. For all these reasons I would like Jake to live. I need him to live."

Jasmine's story

Jasmine and Jake met online, setting their first date for The Cheesecake Factory in 2005.

"That date was longest that I ever had," she said. She said after dinner, they ended up at Denny's and talked to 1 a.m. "And we just kept dating."

Just under 6 feet tall and 220 pounds, Jake was ex-Army and a sheriff's deputy at the Collier County jail. Tattooed and a shaved head, other jailers would threaten inmates with calling Jake when they didn't do as instructed. Once they saw him, they fell into line.

The pair moved in together and had their daughter in 2009. They broke up. He moved out.

But their spark re-ignited. Jasmine insisted on joint counseling. They mended their relationship, and he asked to move back in. She told him she'd never live with another man without marriage. He proposed when Eva was about 18 months old and they married within months. Just before Aiden was born, he quit his job at the jail and went to work at Fischer International in Naples as a manager, designing security software.

Computers are where Jake excelled, and he and his brother, Jason, bonded. The six-year gap in their ages meant they had few things in common growing up. It wasn't until Jake returned from the Army and they lived near each other in Estero that they built a strong relationship, mostly through their love of computers. Jason is a graphic designer.

After reading a bedtime story to Eva and tucking her in, Jake would stay up past midnight, playing "Battlefield, Modern Warfare" with his gaming clan, Black Widow Company, and talking to Jason, who had moved to Phoenix.

"I’m so far away, it's hard to get together and do things together," Jason said. "But we always kept in touch on the phone. Computers was really the thing the two of us have in common."

Jasmine, originally from Connecticut, didn't have a lot of family nearby either. Besides a few close friends that she hates to impose on, her mother, at 70, helps with the kids. Jake's parents live in Winter Haven. They and Jasmine were at the hospital daily at first. Jason flew in the day after Jake was hospitalized and stayed a week.

Tampa General

At Tampa General, Jake spent the first days in cardio-thoracic ICU. Machines pumped and oxygenated his blood; he required dialysis for his kidneys, and he was fed through a tube.

"He was completely closed off from the world," Jason said. "There was no input going in and nothing coming out."

Jake didn't react to any stimulus. Doctors stabilized him and moved him to the regular ICU. Doctors thought he may need a lung transplant.

"About (four) weeks ago,  the neurologist said one of the options was letting him starve to death." Jasmine said. "He painted a bleak picture of remaining in a vegetative state for rest of his life."

She said the doctor talked about Jake's quality of life, unable to speak or even recognize people. With so many tubes from the machines keeping him alive, he was prone to infection.

Jasmine demanded a second opinion, but that neurologist, too, confirmed what the other doctor had said.

"I decided not to pull the feeding tube," she said. "In my opinion, Jake has hung in there and ultimately decided he's not dying."

Doctors gave it last shot with a mega dose of steroids, telling the family the damage to his kidneys was worth the risk. But he didn't show any signs of recovery.

Still, Jasmine clung to her faith. She said so many people were praying, and she believed God was working a miracle.

"You shouldn't hold God to a timeline," she said.

Options included sending Jake to a hospice, which, to the family, meant they were giving up. Instead, they found Promise Hospital, a 60-bed acute care facility in Fort Myers.

"I wanted to give him a fighting chance," she said. "In addition to knowing God's been working, Jake could have given up already. If Jake decided to go, he would let me know. They also say when married, two flesh become one. We're connected spiritually.  If Jake wanted to go, he would let me know and that time had not occurred yet. I'm giving him and God the time.

"He's got everything to live for. He's only 35. He's my husband, and he needs to live."

Good fortune

Ron said good-bye to Jake as a crew loaded him into an ambulance for his ride to Promise Hospital on April 1. He and Vera, Jake's mother,  worried something would happen in the ambulance and they'd never see him alive again. She wasn't ready to watch him ride away.

A paramedic offered Ron support, telling him that strange things happen to patients when he transports them: One guy hadn't spoken in 10 months but started talking during the ride.

Ron looked at Jake.

"I watched them put him in and he squinted from sunlight," he said. After weeks of nothing, hope fluttered. "I didn’t know what to think of that. But he definitely reacted to sunlight."

Returning to Winter Haven, tired and hungry, Ron and Vera stopped at a favorite Chinese buffet. After dinner, Vera opened her fortune cookie and began to cry.

"I looked at her and asked what’s going on — we’ve been emotional," Ron said. "She showed me the fortune: Believe in miracles."

It gave them another boost.

Two days later, they drove to Promise Hospital. Jake was awake and smiled at them.

"We believe it’s a miracle," he said. "Two neurologists told us he was not going to be Jake anymore. He wouldn’t know who we were."

Jake answered a nurse's questions by blinking once for 'yes,' two for 'no.'

Ron posted to the Wake Up Jake Facebook page that Jason had created to keep friends and family updated.

"So here I am, Jake's dad, feeling like I did when he took his first step, said 'dada' for the first time, and scored his first ice hockey goal. Seeing him open his eyes and know us was an avalanche of joy," he wrote.

Jason posted Switchfoot's "Dare You To Move", saying it's been his inspiration. The lyrics include "Everyone's here, Everybody's watching you now, Everybody waits for you now, What happens next."

"I dare you to move Jake," he wrote.

On April 6, Jake, still on breathing support, said his first words: "Hello", followed by "1-2-3." His family celebrated.

The next day, he said "Jasmine," and "Eva" and responded to flash cards, correctly identifying  socks, a ball, a brush, and a hammer. Then he demanded to go home.

Three days later, he was still making the same request. This time he insisted he could walk. So Jasmine and the nurses let him try to sit on the edge of the bed. Through sheer determination, he sat up with little help and swung his feet over the side of the bed.

That pushed his limit, and they helped him lay back down.

Unknown cause

While Jasmine is hesitant to say that stopping his antibiotic treatment directly led to Jake's subsequent double pneumonia and coma, Jason and Ron firmly believe it played a role.

"It's a lot of heartache from six pills," Jason said.

Dr.  Sumeet Shetty, chief medical officer at Promise Hospital, talked in general terms about antibiotics and their role in treating disease. Laws dictate he can't comment on individual cases.

Shetty explained that many factors determine antibiotic use. For example, a skin infection could required antibiotics for six days. If the infection became an abscess and reached the blood stream, a doctor may prescribe an antibiotic for two weeks. If that same infection reached bones or organs, a patient could need antibiotics for six weeks. In addition, patients may have other medical issues, such as diabetes or thyroid problems, that could vary the results.

By halting the treatment, patients risk the infection doubling down, the bacteria coming back stronger and more resistant to medicine, he said.

"Then you have a infection out of control, which impacts your body and multiple organs and you can die,"  Shetty said.

He said that education is the key in getting patients to comply with treatment.

While bronchitis is not an infection, doctors often prescribe one to combat accompanying bacteria. Pneumonia can be caused by a fungus, virus or infection.

Jasmine said while stopping the antibiotics may have played a major role in Jake's worsening pneumonia, Jake also could have been fighting a resistant super bug to begin with.

Medical tests couldn't pinpoint the cause of Jake's pneumonia, Jasmine said.

Making strides

Tuesday, doctors removed the trach tube, allowing Jake to continue breathing on his own and able to talk at will. He's been working on sitting up in a wheelchair, adding minutes each day. Wednesday, he worked the TV remote, stopped on a political show, and uttered an expletive.

Jasmine has  filled the walls of his room with photos of the family, posters and knickknacks of his work desk including his favorite Star Wars characters. Eva sends colorful drawings that Jasmine tapes to the walls. She has calendars with his milestones noted, Bible verses and encouraging messages.

Thursday, Jasmine rolled him down to the hospital's gym, where he had occupational and physical therapy.

With therapists keeping tabs on his pulse and blood-oxygen levels, Jake followed every instruction. He did three minutes of arm-pedaling, followed by some upper body strengthening exercises.

He gripped a 1-lb. bar about 2 feet long in his fists, flexed his arms from his lap to his chin with 10 repetitions.

A physical therapist and an aide stood on either side of his wheelchair, giving him directions and guiding his elbows as needed. Lots of praise followed. As Jake completed each repetition, he kept his eyes focused on Jasmine, sitting directly across the table.

Before long, he was sitting in front of a television connected to a Wii gaming console. Bowling required too much coordination and fine motor skills, but he soon scored two points at table tennis.

A few more exercises followed before Jasmine took him outside for some fresh air. She handed him his sunglasses, and he smiled as he put them on.

He still has a long way to go. He has kidney dialysis three times a week, and his therapists are hoping to start strengthening his lower body soon so he can walk again. Eventually, he'll transfer to inpatient rehab to continue building his strength before his return home.

In recovery

As Jake continues to recover, Jasmine relies on friends, her mother, and church members to help her through. Eva and Aiden haven't seen their father; Jasmine and Ron think it would be too traumatic.

"It would scare her to see him in the state he's been," Jasmine said. "He wouldn't have been able to hug her back."

Over two months, his weight plummeted to 146 pounds. His hair and beard grew out. A nurse shaved his beard and head. He's gained a few pounds. Now he looks closer to the daddy Eva remembers.

"There was a time when I was scared, scared on a very realistic level and scared that I would lose the man that I love," Jasmine said."How do you tell your young children that?"

She leaves the pair for short bursts with her mother, no more than three hours at a time, while she visits Jake.  She's tentatively planning to let them visit him in the coming week.

She tries to keep their lives normal, taking Eva to dance class to practice for her spring recital and getting her to school. But Jake has missed easing the trauma when classmates told Eva her thumbs were ugly, their Lego play times, popping out to the park, and blooming puppy love when a boy developed a crush on her.  He's missed Aiden adding words and taking a few steps while hanging onto Jasmine's hands.

Jasmine has returned to work part-time as a bank teller, and they live on Jake's short-term disability — 60 percent of his former paycheck.

She knows she'll become the main wage earner for a while and ponders her career options, especially since she'll need to carry the medical insurance. She's hoping to expand her role at the bank, but that's at least a few weeks off.

The rent remains due each month, day care takes another chunk out of the budget, and medical bills are beginning to arrive. The family expects they'll reach in the tens of millions of dollars.

"He does have good health insurance," Jason said. "That has absorbed most of that. But what they are going to get charged, it's not something a normal person would make in the lifetime."

GoFundMe accounts Wake The Jake and Booth Family Help Fund have raised about $10,000. Jake's gamers group, with the motto One Team, One Fight, raised $1,900 during a gaming marathon. Jasmine traded in the family car for a smaller, less expensive model.

Ron said the family hopes others learn from Jake's experience. He's encouraged Jake's friends to have living wills and assign power of attorney. He begs them not to take their health for granted  and finish their medicine according to the prescription.

Ron makes phone calls, letting all of Jake's caregivers know he appreciates their help and updating them on his son's progress. He's talked to the doctors, nurses and paramedics. He's looking forward to the day he and Jake take a road trip to Naples and Tampa hospitals to show off his miracle son.

He offers a parting piece of advice.

"Don't ever doubt the power of prayer or the fortune in your fortune cookie,"  he said.

Connect with this reporter on Twitter @stacey_henson

By the numbers

1 fortune cookie giving a family hope

2 neurologists that didn't think Jake Booth would awake

6 pills remaining on his antibiotic prescription that he didn't take

10 on the Glasgow Coma Scale -  meaning major impairments likely

42 days in a coma

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