‘Yellowstone’ spinoff star reveals she died for 3 minutes in COVID battle
Actress Danielle Vasinova died during her battle with COVID-19 — yet lived to tell the tale.
The star of the “Yellowstone” prequel “1923” and the upcoming spinoff “The Madison” has revealed that her heart stopped for three minutes while hospitalized because of the disease.
“On Dec. 12, 2019, I died for three minutes,” Vasinova, 42, told People in a new interview published Thursday.
Having contracted the disease before it was widespread in the US, Vasinova said she thought she “was coming down with the flu.”
“I went to urgent care in downtown L.A., and they decided it was strep and sent me home with some antibiotics. But by the next day, I could barely walk. My legs wouldn’t move. It was bizarre.”
“I felt like I was going to die,” she recalled.
Her uncle rushed her to the emergency room. He told her that what happened next was akin to a scene from a movie.
“He said people were running around me, and a tiny girl jumped on top of my chest and began pumping, pumping, pumping. And then he saw my heartbeat on the monitor just go. Flatlined,” Vasinova continued.
For three minutes, her heart stopped beating. An ER nurse repeatedly attempted to revive the actress until they finally found a pulse. She was then moved to the ICU and put in an induced coma.
“I had complete organ failure,” Vasinova added. “I went from young and healthy to this infection that completely took over my body all of a sudden. It just came on, and it just rocked my world.”
While she doesn’t have any memories from the three minutes she was legally dead, she said she’s felt a connection to a higher power and angels around her since the traumatic ordeal.
“I didn’t see the light or a tunnel, but they say it can come back to you in flashbacks,” she went on.
“I did, however, start to see a lot of angel numbers everywhere. I would see sequences like 5555, 7777. It was bizarre, but something was telling me, ‘There’s something more for you. You weren’t meant to go just yet. You’re meant to do something else.’”
The actress continued, “It’s hard to even describe how I feel, but I’m so much more connected. This felt like the turning point in my life. The death and the rebirth. I know to take nothing for granted. Life is so precious, and it is such a gift. We’re here to do some good in the world, to be of service, and to be forever grateful.”
After recovering from COVID-19, Vasinova was able to meet the nurse responsible for bringing her back to life.
“I found out her name was Ruby, so I went back to the hospital with a bracelet with a tiny ruby in it just to say, ‘Thank you for saving my life,’” she told People.
“I didn’t know if she was going to recognize me, but when she opened the door, I started crying, and she just lost it. She told me she never knows who lives or dies after they get transferred. She just gave me the biggest hug. Because I’d been gone for three full minutes. But I came back.”
Vasinova is one of the latest actors to be announced as joining the cast of “The Madison,” which stars Michelle Pfeiffer.
The latest installment in Taylor Sheridan’s “Yellowstone” universe, “The Madison” is described as a “heartfelt study of grief and human connection following a New York City family in the Madison River valley of central Montana.”
Vasinova will play Kestrel, “an indigenous woman married to a Montana rancher who lives with her family on a double-wide trailer on their ranch.”
