Editor's Note, 7/16/26: This article has been corrected since original publication, with additional information added for clarity. The original source reporting Preseau's declaration of brain death was in error. We have adjusted our reporting to reflect this.

A Florida family is celebrating a miracle, as Navy veteran Ethan Preseau, 28, woke up after an 'honor walk' just prior to a planned organ donation.

Key Takeaways:

• Ethan Preseau was moving items into his new home when his girlfriend realized he had been outside for too long. She found him unresponsive on the ground.

• His family asked for 10 days before life support was turned off. They planned his funeral and planned to donate his organs.

• On day 10, the nurses disconnected his life support, but Ethan didn't die. Instead, he woke up.

The Details:

In early June, Ethan Preseau and his girlfriend, Piper Wade, were moving into their new home in Pensacola, when Ethan went to get suitcases from the truck. When he didn't return, Wade went to check on him and found him lying unresponsive on the ground.

"You don't want to see someone that you love in that state," Wade told ABC 3. "So I just freaked out and I immediately — I don't know CPR, but I understand what it is, so I tried to do that for a second. But I realized I don't know what I'm doing, so I ran inside as fast as possible and I called 911 and they were there so fast. Maybe in like 30 seconds they were there."

At the hospital, Preseau was put on life support and doctors learned he had an infection in his heart. A GoFundMe posted by Preseau's family, however, suggests that at one point, Preseau was breathing on his own.

'Miracle': Pensacola Navy vet declared brain dead awakens days before funeral

"When they did the brain MRI, the MRI showed that the thalamus was black and dead. So we had absolutely no hope," said Ethan's stepmother, Denice Preseau.

Wade asked that they give him a chance — at least 10 days before removing life support.

According to the family's GoFundMe page, "Per his previous request, Ethan’s organ donation was set up. The one caveat being that they could only use his donation if his heart stopped within an hour of being unplugged."

"It's not supposed to be the father burying the child," said Preseau's father, Jeffrey. "It's supposed to be the other way around."

His family planned his funeral and on day 10, the nurses, staff, and family lined up for Preseau's honor walk, a tradition carried out for patients who are donating their organs.

After the honor walk, nurses presented his family with an American flag for his service and then removed Ethan's life support and allowed his family to say their final goodbyes. The family then went to take a walk on the beach. As they walked, the phone rang. It was the hospital.

As the family rushed back into his room, Ethan followed his father with his eyes, turned his head, and smiled.

"When we walked in and saw that, I immediately got the nurse. ... And he's like, 'Well, maybe he's just doing this movement, you know, from this and that,'" his father said, adding:

"And it was so funny. He came in. He's like, 'Ethan, Ethan, stick your tongue out for me.' And he goes and stuck his tongue out and he turned and looked at me and his eyes was the size of silver dollars. And he's like, 'Hold on, I got to go get two nurses to witness this.' So the two nurses he got were two of the nurses that did the honor walk with us. And they came in, asked him the same thing, stick out his tongue, and they started crying. They're like, 'Oh my gosh, this is a miracle.'

The one doctor did say, 'I can definitely see this in the medical books in the future because they're all baffled. I mean the doctors are baffled, the nurses are baffled... he's doing his commands and stuff and it's just, it's unbelievable. I mean, everybody that walks in, the chaplain walked in and she was like, 'This is a miracle.' It's nothing short of a miracle that my son is coming back out of this."

According to the family's GoFundMe page, Preseau has now been transferred to a rehab facility for people with traumatic brain injuries, but he is smiling, laughing at jokes, and using sign language to communicate.

His stepmother, Denice, wrote on the page in a July 11 update, " He’s able to say a few words, but it’s hard to make out what he’s trying to communicate. He’s also in good spirits and laughs at our 'dad jokes.' We are overwhelmed by the outpouring of support and truly blessed beyond measure. Our cup overruns with the grace of God."

Zoom In:

In response to the local news reports and Live Action News' reporting on Preseau's story, a representative for the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations (AOPO), reached out to Live Action News via email.

The AOPO told Live Action News that, while not knowing the specifics of Preseau's case, he did not appear to have received a declaration of brain death, stating, "Context from the GoFundMe arranged for Ethan’s recovery underscores that he was not brain dead."

The representative referenced paragraph 5 of the family's page, which states, “Per his previous request, Ethan’s organ donation was set up. The one caveat being that they could only use his donation if his heart stopped within an hour of being unplugged.” The AOPO noted:

[H]ad Ethan been brain dead, there would have been no need for the one hour wait after he was removed from ventilator support; that is specifically part of the process for patients passing away via circulatory death.

The AOPO then clarified that "There are two medically and legally recognized pathways through which one could become an organ donor after passing away":

• Donation after brain death (DBD) occurs after a patient has irreversible loss of brain function and is declared brain dead through neurological testing.

• Donation after circulatory death (DCD) occurs after a doctor determines a patient is in an irreversible condition and the family decides to withdraw ventilator support with the expectation that death will follow. Donation would then proceed only after the patient’s heart permanently stops beating, death is declared by the hospital and donor authorization is confirmed.

In either scenario, organ donor eligibility is only ever considered after all lifesaving efforts have been exhausted by the hospital. Even then, decisions about medical treatment, end-of-life care (e.g., a family deciding to withdraw ventilator support), and the declaration of death are made by a patient’s treating physicians and are kept separate from the organ donation process.

Detailing some of the typical processes involved in organ donation for "potential DCD cases such as Ethan’s," the AOPO stated:

... [O]nce ventilator support is withdrawn the hospital team closely monitors the patient while the donation team remain on standby. If the patient does not pass away within a required timeframe (60-120 minutes depending on the hospital), then the process is immediately halted and hospital staff resume caring for the patient.

If the patient’s heart and breathing do stop permanently, and this continues for an additional required period (2-5 minutes, again depending on the hospital), then the hospital team will officially declare death. 

The AOPO also claimed that situations in which organ donation is authorized are "under even more oversight" and that "it's not unheard of for potential DCD cases to be authorized and preparations made, but the patient doesn't pass away once life-sustaining care is withdrawn."

Though it may not be unheard of, it seems clear that, given Preseau's medical team's amazement at his recovery, it is exceedingly rare.

Why It Matters:

There is a great deal of controversy over the idea of brain death and organ donation and what that means and looks like. There are many stories about individuals who have awakened after declarations of brain death.

In response to the existing confusion surrounding brain death, in 2020, Texas Right to Life released a brief, informative video including three questions that concerned family members can ask hospital staff in the event of discussions about a loved one being brain dead:

1. “Is there any activity or function in his or her brain stem?”

2. “Has a blood flow study been run?”

3. “Have the test results been assessed by a neurologist?”

American Life League notes, “If [brain death] were identical and equivalent to death, why would it be necessary to coin a new term?”

The pro-life group argues, “Death is the total cessation of all brain activity, including the brain stem, combined with the cessation of cardiopulmonary functions. Neither the cessation of brain activity nor the cessation of cardiopulmonary functions alone is sufficient. A person is either truly dead or he is still living. The 'brain death' diagnosis indicates that, in fact, the patient is not actually dead.”