Our lives can drastically change at any second. This is a fact that Imunek Williams and her fiancé, Shamar, have become acutely aware of within the last year. It started on December 13, 2022 when Shamar woke up feeling strange. After a while, he couldn’t feel his legs.
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He planned to go to the hospital, but nothing could have prepared him for what he’d discover: A blood clot on his spine popped, sending blood to his muscles which, in turn, paralyzed him. But thanks to emergency surgery, Shamar is still alive and well. Then, fast forward five months, and Imunek narrowly avoided disaster.
At the time, Imunek already had a 1 year old and was eight months pregnant with her second kid. She was also still working her job as a bus driver for local schools. The day was fairly normal until a weird smell began to fill the vehicle.
“I had the driver window down and thought the smell was coming from another car at first but then the smoke started coming through my heater so I pulled over,” Imunek recalled.
She attempted to use her radio dispatch to discuss the issues she was having, but it didn’t take long for her to decide that they didn’t have time for a conversation. Instead, she rallied together the 37 kids she was transporting, ranging from elementary to high school, and got them off the bus as quickly and calmly as possible.
“Fifteen to 30 seconds after the last child got off the bus, I turned around and the bus was up in flames,” she said.
Although Imunek did inhale a good amount of smoke, both her and her baby were found to be healthy, as were all of the children on her bus that day. To express their gratitude, all of the children’s parents wrote thank you notes for the quick-thinking bus driver. A GoFundMe page was also created as a way to help raise money for the newest addition to their family.
Speaking of which, Imunek and Shamar have since welcomed their baby into the world! And although their lives have changed in way they couldn’t have imagined, they’ve gone on to express how they manage to remain so grateful.
“What is the inspiration to get through your adversities?” Jennifer Hudson asked the couple on her talk show.
“Being able to breathe,” Shamar replied. “My kids.”
“We’re just not the kind of people who give up really easy,” Imunek added. “We always have this thing to just keep going. Hard times don’t last so everyday, just keep going.”
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