Matthew Raiche, February 22, 2022.
As told by Matthew’s beloved wife, Jamie
On Feb 2, 2022, my husband was doing his routine of soaking in an ice bath for five minutes followed by a brief hot tub session. He would generally do this process twice, moving from cold to hot. This helped my husband’s chronic back pain immensely. Other than his back pain, Matt was a very healthy 40-year-old and an excellent swimmer. He had also started practicing breath-holding after reading and learning about Wim Hof’s technique to control breathing and holding his breath longer and longer. On this particular day, I saw him just before I went into our house as he was doing his last round of cold to hot. When I didn’t see any movement outside, I went back out and found him in the hot tub. I thought he was still holding his breath. He was completely submerged all the way to the bottom and when my son and I looked at him, we noticed his feet were purple. I then jumped in and realized he was unconscious. After attempting CPR and calling over neighbors to help, the ambulance arrived and he was brought to the hospital where they told me the heartbreaking news that I lost my husband. Matt passed out while performing breath-holding. Never did I think anything so avoidable could happen to him. We have four amazing boys who will forever miss their father and the wonderful man he was. The Lord is with us now during this time of grief just as he was when my beloved husband passed from this life into eternity. My hope is that this very avoidable practice becomes widespread to everyone who enters water and they know there is great risk involved.