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Kieran Quinlan

Aged 17, Kieran Quinlan is heading to a party when he’s confronted by a man with a knife.

He’s given a countdown: 3… 2… 1… And then it happens — Kieran is stabbed, the knife reaching his heart.

The wound leaves scars across his entire life. What follows is a battle for survival.

In Â鶹Éç Radio 4’s Life Changing, Dr Sian Williams talks to people who’ve lived through extraordinary crunch points in their lives. This is Kieran’s story.

Aged 17 and living in Birmingham, Kieran Quinlan was busy. He was juggling two jobs, one in construction and one in retail, he was also studying to be an electrician and boxing nearly every day of the week.

But then, in September 2010, his bustling life almost came to an abrupt end.

Kieran had been working late when a friend invited him to a party. It was in a part of town he didn’t know and it meant taking two buses to get there. It was 10pm by the time Kieran was waiting for the second bus. As he pulled out his phone, a man nearby grabbed it and ran on to the bus as it pulled up, Kieran followed him.

“I'm not an aggressive person,” says Kieran, “so, although I can handle myself, the last thing I wanted was to get into a fight with a stranger.” He want to speak to him and get the phone back. “I’m naïve, I’m 17, I’m thinking no one’s going to stab you for a phone.”

Both men were now alone on the top deck of the bus and the mugger pulled out a knife and threatened Kieran: “Empty your pockets or I’m going to stab you.”

“I start looking out the window,” remembers Kieran, “just thinking, ‘he's going to bluff, he's not going to do it.’” He was given a countdown: 3… 2…1... and the guy went for him. There was a scuffle, and Kieran knocked his assailant to the floor: the man looked up and said: “Look at you, you’re dying!”

Kieren's torso and post-operative scar

Kieran had no idea he’d been stabbed.

“I look down and I'm literally just covered in blood,” recalls Kieran, “from my chest all the way down to my toes. So, I put my hand over my chest and blood started squirting through my fingers.”

Despite his catastrophic injuries an adrenalin-fuelled Kieran chased the man down the stairs where he was almost stabbed again but then the bus doors opened and his attacker ran off into the night.

“As soon as he leaves the bus,” recalls Kieran, “the adrenalin goes, I just slump into a chair. I can't physically lift my arms anymore. Everything just starts closing, and just going darker and darker, to the point where I can’t even make out shapes anymore.”

With the world turning dark around him, it was obvious to Kieran that he was in serious trouble. He started reciting his name and address over and over in case he didn’t make it.

An ambulance was called, Kieran was rushed to hospital and given a full blood transfusion and felt himself coming back to life. He was in good spirits again, asking the nurses very politely not to cut through his brand new jeans and reassuring his mum that he would be ok. But then in theatre his wound ruptured. “Everybody panicking, doors slamming open… and then I hear myself flatline.”

My heart stopped three times

During surgery, Kieran’s heart stopped three times. He woke up the next day in the Intensive Care Unit. He had survived a knife wound that was two inches deep and had gone through his heart and aorta, the main artery which carries blood from the heart.

Doctors told Kieran that it was a miracle that he was still alive. They said it was down to his fitness. “My heart rate was just a lot slower than the average person, so there were less beats per minute, and I was able to stay conscious for longer.”

The rug got swept from beneath my feet again

For a while it looked as though Kieran would just bounce back, unscathed by the trauma. He went back to work, back to his studies and back to the gym. He was determined to “keep moving” and step straight in to his old life. All was going well; he was just preparing for a boxing bout when he was told he needed a medical.

He’d recently had open-heart surgery, he needed to be given the all clear. Kieran went first to one doctor, then another, then another; they all said the same thing — there was no way he could fight.

This wasn’t just a hiccup — it was a body blow. “It was almost like the rug got swept from beneath my feet again for the second time, and the second time was harder to deal with than the first.”

Kieran went into a downward spiral, drinking heavily, taking drugs. He was angry and started picking random fights. “I was just hyper-aggressive. I just wasn't a nice person.”

His attacker was convicted and sentenced to a minimum of five years in jail. Three years in to his sentence a rumour started to circulate, that he was going to be released early. Kieran became obsessed by the idea that he’d squandered the last years. He started to compare where he and his attacker were in their lives.

I’m still here, still looking my goals in the face. What’s your excuse?

“He's going to come out of prison and he's going to have the same life as me. I've had my boxing career taken away from me. I've got insomnia, PTSD. I've got all these mental health hang-ups, and then we're going to have the same life. Where's the justice in that? I’ve just wasted my three-year head start. It sent me into a spiralling depression.”

I haven’t got six months

Kieran became more and more depressed – and then suicidal. He hadn’t shared any of this with friends or family. He found his way to a doctor’s surgery and asked for help. “And he was like, ‘Do you want a week off work?’ and I said I don’t think you’re hearing me mate, I’m going to kill myself, I need your help.” The doctor said he could put Kieran on a waiting list to talk to a counsellor but that would take six months. Kieran’s reply was, “I haven’t got six months.”

He walked out.

I was never going to ever feel like that again

Kieran went home and poured all of his anger, resentment and frustration into his laptop. He wrote and wrote and wrote, a torrent of ugly and violent feelings that he’d tried to keep buried. He saved the word document and came to a decision: “Your only option is to give it your all.” He says, “I made a promise to myself that I was never going to ever feel like that again.”

The first steps back

Kieran went back to the gym and started training seriously again. It wasn’t easy. With eight metal rings holding his sternum together, some exercises were painful or not practical at all. But Kieran persisted. The alternative was just too bleak. As he got stronger, he got more focused, less angry, more and more motivated. “I got stabbed in the heart and had open-heart surgery I’ve suffered with PTSD, depression, insomnia and I’m still here, still looking my goals in the face. What’s your excuse?”

He stopped drinking and taking drugs and threw himself into his training and nutrition and the body he’d been ashamed of started to give him confidence. “It was just something where I could see a direct correlation with my hard work and efforts.”

Kieran got an apprenticeship as a personal trainer; he wanted to share the high he was getting from this transformation. He’d gone from being hyper-aggressive, unable to hold a conversation, to positive and outgoing again, his old self. Kieran’s since set up his own gym in Birmingham that’s seen 3,000 people through its doors.

No regrets

Ten years after the attack the man behind it got in touch. Kieran started to communicate with him online; they haven’t yet met but Kieran says the door is open. “All the life experience I’ve had, why not have one more?”

He has no regrets. “The whole thing is absolutely positive to me now. I can't see it as a negative because why would I? Why would I spend my life looking back in regret? It has produced this willingness to win, this resilience, this passion, this desire to be successful and help people. It's all positive.”