'Mother's Day Miracle' Saves Mom of 9/11 Victim Lisa Frost

Melanie Frost, the mother of 9/11 victim , was found Sunday floating face down in a swimming pool at the home where her daughter grew up.

Tom Frost told Patch Monday afternoon that Melanie Frost is in serious but stable condition, and that doctors are cautiously optimistic that she will make a full recovery although it's "too early to tell."

He called Lisa a guardian angel responsible for "a Mother's Day miracle."

Melanie Frost was discovered around 2:30 p.m. on Mother's Day by her former husband. Now living in Laguna Woods, she had spent the night at the home they raised Lisa in and was expected to have dinner later that day with son Daniel and his wife, Jenna.

Melanie Frost had talked to Tom about 5:20 a.m., when he left for work as a Southern California Edison substation operator. He spoke to her at 8:30 a.m., but began to worry when he phoned and she didn't answer.

"I didn't want to lose her," Tom Frost said. "She's my best friend. It was just a stroke of luck, a Mother's Day miracle, that I happened to be thinking there might be something wrong. I had a need to go home anyway; my son and his wife were going to come over for dinner. I bought some food to go, dropped it at the house, and when I did, I saw her floating face down in the pool."

Frost called 911 and began CPR. When Orange County sheriff's deputies arrived they did chest compressions and he continued breathing into her mouth. "I noticed that she started breathing again. ... Then the paramedics took over."

She was taken to Mission Hospital and placed on ventilator, which she remained on through Monday. Tom Frost said Melanie has been able to move her arms and legs, and has been awake even though she has been mostly sedated.

A hospital spokesperson confirmed that Frost was in serious condition.

"We have nothing to indicate that it's anything but an accident," said sheriff's spokesman Jim Amormino on Monday, adding that Tom Frost saved his ex-wife's life. "A couple more minutes and it probably would have been fatal."

Tom Frost thinks that his ex-wife may have had too much to drink and went outside to smoke a cigarette. "She lost her equilibrium and fell, hit her head and fell in the pool," he said. "Nothing more than a simple accident that happened. She may have been a bit more distraught because of Mother's Day, and the bin Laden thing has heightened the feelings of Lisa being gone."

Tom Frost, who has served as family spokesman in the 9 1/2 years since his daughter's death aboard United Airlines Flight 175, has been inundated by media this week in the wake of Osama bin Laden's death at the hands of American military forces.

Lisa Anne Frost, who had graduated as valedictorian in hospitality administration at Boston University, was killed on the second plane that slammed into the World Trade Center. She had grown up in Rancho Santa Margarita and attended Trabuco Hills High School. She was 22 when she perished.

Melanie Frost battled depression in the wake of her daughter's death, and she also suffered from aneurysms. She remained amicable with Tom Frost after their divorce.

"I feel very good that I went through CPR refresher training a week and a half earlier," Tom Frost said. "A Mother's Day miracle that Lisa seems to push me in the right direction. It's uncanny, but she was Melanie's guardian angel.

"When I was doing CPR on her, I never thought she would come back. When we got a pulse, I was stunned. I thought she was a goner. That she might recover fully is blowing me away."