LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — If you spend much time in this space, then the name “Natalie Jenkins” is a familiar one, as it was told to you last month on LEX18. Her story of heroism begins in early February, when she saved the life of John Harris, a frequent shopper in the Wal-Mart where she works.
“Everybody was just standing around doing nothin’”, Jenkins told LEX18 when we first talked to her in May. “So I just, it just clicked in. I had never done this before a day in my life. CPR just clicked in my brain and I just started doing chest compressions until paramedics got there.”
As you can imagine, the Harris family was eternally grateful. They tracked her down and showered her with gifts to express their appreciation.
But Jenkins never heard anything from her employer. I personally went to the store and spoke to management and made several calls to their corporate office, but to no avail. No response and no citation for Natalie.
Until a couple of weeks ago.
“They was like ‘we’ve got something for you’ and I was like ‘okay’. I thought it was like this little pin or something that they had been giving away. And the man came out of the room and he was like ‘this is for you’ and I was like ‘what?’ and he brought it out from his back. It was a plaque and I was like ‘oh wow’ and they was like ‘this has never happened before in Wal-Mart…we really didn’t know what to do’,” beams Jenkins.
And how did that make her feel?
“It made me feel good. It really did. I couldn’t believe that they done it, but it made me feel good.”
Jenkins says obviously she wouldn’t have changed a thing and loves being invited now into the Harris family. And…she even giggles at the attention she’s gotten since being tabbed as a “Hero Among Us”.
“This lady was like ‘hey superstar’. She said ‘you was on national news’ and I was like ‘yeah right’ and she said ‘no, for real’. I’m like ‘are you kidding me?’ and she’s like ‘no’. I was like ‘wow’ and then my sister called me and she was like ‘I just seen you on TV’. She said ‘you national’. I was like ‘you’ve got to be kidding me’. She said ‘you didn’t think it was going like that’ and I said ‘no I didn’t. I just thought it was just going to go on channel 18 news and that was it’ I was really shocked and people are still talking about it!”
